2. c. 5. but this new God of Constantine was too hard for all Licinius his old Gods insomuch as being disappointed of their aid he exauctorated them and run about seeking other Gods to relieve him Id. Ib. c. 15. Touching Christ's Title the Son of God attributed to him by Christians Celsus his Jew lib. 1. cal 26. thus expostulates with the blessed Jesus Seeing thou sayest that every man is the Son of God by Providence or Creation and that Persons so and so qualified are his Children by Favour or Grace wherein dost thou excel all other men who givest out thy self to be his Son after a more excellent way Resp. He was begotten of the Substance of his Father we are born again of the will of God The blasphemous Familists and Quakers may here learn into whose Tents they are removed And in the same Book cal 33. thus he descants upon Gods calling his Son into and out of Aegypt What need was there that when thou wast an Infant thou shouldst be carried into Aegypt to escape the fury of Herod's Sword for fear of death cannot fall upon God Was it in obedience to thy Father who sent his Angel to call thee thither Why could not that great God whom thou calls Father with as little trouble have secured thy life at thy own home in thy native Country as he put himself and his Angels to in sending first one to call thee into a strange Land and then another to recal thee into thy own This was done that the Scripture might be fulfill'd Out of Aegypt I have called my Son that the Reality of his Humane Nature might be evidenc'd that his glorious Deity might be demonstrated by the Angels attending upon him as the only begotten of the Father Upon Herods murthering the Innocents he descants lib. 4. cal 27. ridiculum cùm Herodes irabundus occidit infantulos Could not he whom thou calls Father have secur'd thee from Herod He brings in in his first Book the Jew calumniating Christ to have learned Magick in Aegypt by the improvement whereof after his returnâ— into Judaea he attempted to make men believe he was King Messias cal 20. and in the 28 cal he repeats the whole story of the Wisemens coming to worship Christ of their telling Herod the King of Israel was born of Herod's slaying the Bethlehemitish Insants c. And thus casts his scoffs cal 23. upon the voice that came from Heaven at Christs Baptism Thou sayest the form of a Dove lighted upon thee and a voice then came from Heaven saying This is my Son What VVitness is there of this worthy of credit who beside thy self and thy Companions saw this Vision heard this Voyce The mighty VVorks wrought by our Saviour were so many Witnesses that he was the Son of God and that God was with them in all they said and writ And why doth not Celsus make the like Exception against the reports of his healing the Sick casting out Devils and raising the dead c. but because those Miracles were wrought in the sight and hearing of multitudes uninterested And yet even here John the Baptist saw and heard all whom not to have been Christs Disciple but to have been murdered by the command of Herod not for following Christ but reproving Herod Josephus testifieth who also affirmeth that multitudes flocked to John's Baptism and the sacred History tells us that Jesus was baptized when all the People were baptized Luk. 3. 22. and that he came to John to be baptized of him while John was exhorting those multitudes that came out of Jerusalem Judaea and about Jordan Mat. 3. 5. 13. § 3. Article 3. Who was conceived by the holy Ghost born of the Virgin Mary Celsus in Orig. 4. cal 1 2 3 c. thus states the Controversie betwixt the Christian and Jew touching the coming of the Son of God down from Heaven for us men and our salvation as the Nicen Creed prefaceth this Article The Christians say there is already descended the Jews say there is to descend from heaven a certain God or Son of God who is the Justifier and Saviour of mortal men A Conceipt saith he so absurd and unbeseeming the Deity as it needs no other Confutation but its bare men tioning Resp. Celsus here verifies that of the Apostles the Gospel is foolishness to the Greeks but to them that believe the Power and Wisdom of God and yet this Hypothesis that God would descend into this dungeon of the Earth for the salvation of Mankind was held by the Platonicks 〈◊〉 hath been proved But hear we how Celsus cavils against it For what new thing could come into Gods Mind that he should now at last descend to us Did he come to know how the affairs of mâ—nstood here on earth Did not he know all things without coming to see or if there had been any thing amiss could not he have rectified it by his Divine Power without sending his Son what pity it is that Celsus was not of Gods Council to be born amongst us he must of necessity desert his own habitation above if he descend to us The Porphyrian Scepticks in St. Austin Epist. 2. speaks in the same tenour Mundi Dominus Rector tamdiu à sedibus suis abest atque ad unum corpusculum totius mundi cura transfertur The Lord of the Universe was so long absent from his own seat and the care of the whole World is transferr'd to the body of one Woman Novit ubique totus esse nullo contineri loco novic venire non recedendo ubi erat novit abire non deserendo quà venerat God is altogether every where and contain'd in no place he can come without forsaking the place where he was he can depart without deserting the place from whence he came But Celsus proceeds Did God or the Son of God therefore come down from Heaven and dwell among us that he might make himself known to the World that had been ignorant of him before as Princes go on Progress to shew their Magnificence to their Subjects in the Country Did God then now at last after so many Ages laps'd think of justifying men whose Salvation he neglected for so long a time before St. Austin Epist. 49. quest 2 da. proves that pious persons before Christs coming were saved by Christ whose Grace was at no time wanting to any Nation and that the varying of the Mode of Worship according as the divine VVisdom thinks expedient for mens salvation does not make a various Religion But hear we Celsus confirming the Tradition of this point of Christian Faith while he objects against the Doctrine delivered If the Christians be in earnest when they say they believe that God so loved the World that he sent his only begotten Son into the World to save it what other arguments than what are drawn from that Love need be urged to constrain men to love God and live unto him and therefore Christ did foolishly in
of his Nurture Nazareth of his greatest Residence in the time of his Ministry Galilee The Confederacy of Herod and Pilate of Jew and Gentile against him the Treason of him that eat of his Bread that dipt in his Dish the Price at which he was sold the Purchase of the Potters Field with that price of Blood All the Puctilio's of his Passion The Piercing his Hands Feet and Side The Distension of his Sacred Body upon the Cross so as one might tell all his bones the Marring of his blessed Face with Buffeting spitting and besmearing with blood trickling down from his Thorn-crowned Head his being numbred with Transgressors his being Crucified between two Thieves the Souldiers dividing his Garments among them their casting Lots upon his Vesture The Jews scornful and malicious deportment towards him hiding their face from him turning their backs upon him rejecting him as not their King when Pilate presented him their giving him Vinegar to drink The very form of words wherewith they taunted him were by Prophecy put into their Mouthes He trusted in God that he would save him let bim deliver him if he will have him Mat. 27. 43. Psal. 22. 8. His making his Grave with the rich his being buried like a noble man for he was before hand by Mary Magdalen anointed against his Burial with most precious Spikenard was perfum'd imbalm'd by Nicodemus a Ruler of the Jews wound in fine linnen by Joseph of Arimathea and laid in that new Tomb which that Honourable Person had hewne out of a Rock in his Garden for himself and to make his Funeral more august the Chief Priests and Pharisees contribute a guard of Souldiers to watch his blessed Corps and take order that his Sepulchre be made fast with a hewen Stone filling the mouth and fastned with Cramps of Iron into the sides of his Tomb the most honourable form of entombing All which things the Evangelists do therefore affirm to be done that the Scripture might be fulfilled and our Jesus demonstrated to be the Person of whom those infallible Oracles spake The far greatest and most substantial part of those things not being applicable in truth to the persons that spake them David in his own person suffered not such like things any more then he did not see corruption as Saint Peter argues And therefore as the same Apostle dictates those Prophesies were not of private interpretation that is as Saint Philip in answer to the Eunuchs question resolves the Prophets did not speak those things of themselves but of some other man to wit the Messias 2. Can any thing be imagined more purely contingent than those things Is it conceivable how so long before there could be a Foreknowledge of their Futurity by the Prophets inspection into their Natural Causes The Learned Vossius de Origine idol lib. 2. cap. 48. doth explode the madness of some Modern Astrologers who affirm that all the Miracles wrought by Christ and his Apostles or any body else were the natural and necessary effects of some Conjunctions of Planets and were not ashamed to ascribe to the Horoscope the Birth of Christ of a Virgin and all his stupendious works and those great Changes which have faln out in respect of Religion ascribing the rise of the Jewish to the Conjunction of Jupiter with Saturn of the Chaldean to the Conjunction of Jupiter with Mars the Aegyptian to the Conjunction of Jupiter with the Sun The Mahometan to the Conjunction of Jupiter with Venus the Christian to the Conjunction of Jupiter with Mercury and the Antichristian to Jupiters Conjunction with the Moon all which is to be read in Albumazar lib. 2. de mag conjectul tract 1. dissect 4. Say that such Conjunctions might possibly incline those parts of the World under the Dominion of their Influence to imbrace those several Religions yet he must be of a Facile Faith that can believe it was possible for our Divine Prophets to read their Predictions in the Book of the Starrs who if they had had an everlasting Almanack in their heads from what Positions of the Heavenly Bodies could they have Prognosticated the concentring of so many emergencies upon one man from what Conjunction of Planets or Lincaean inspection into Matters of State a Book more tost and to better purpose than the other by those prudent Judicial Astrologers who had a mind not to shame their Profession could David foresee the agreement of Herod and Pilate who the day before were at enmity and on the day of our Saviours Passion were made Friends and that in order to our Saviours Crucifixion at Jerusalem which according to Gods determinate Counsel revealed to David could not be effected till those Rulers under the Gentile Empire stood up in their Masters quarrel and with the people of Israel took councel together against the Lord and his Christ as the Church dictates Act. 4. 25. 27. From what sowr and crabbed Aspect of the Planets could David foretell their turning of Drink into Vinegar From what influences the distilling of the Blood of God from Christs Head Hands Side Feet In what Ephemeris did the Prophet read that astonishing Darkness that invelopt the Earth Briefly in what Cause but the Will of God revealed to them by himself could they see those strange events that fell out that one Year that acceptable Year of the Lord that one Week that great Week as the Ancients stiled it that one Day that Day of Redemption Let the most expert Astrologer erect a Scheme set up all the Lamps of Heaven in that posture wherein they stood at our Saviours Passion and try if he can by their Light discover the least appearance or likelihood of a reason that in such a juncture such things must fall out by the course of nature That at that time for instance those Prophetick Forms which the Jews used in derision of Christ that had hung as it were frozen at the Prophets lips so many hundred of years should be thawn and drop into the Mouthes of that Generation That the Legs of the Thieves should be broken and not our Saviours That his Side should be pierced and not theirs c. 3. Those Prophecies are so plain and the Application of them in their Effects to the Blessed Jesus so natural as we need not strain courtesie with the Letter it self to wrest it from its most obvious sence in making the Buckle and Thong meet in making the accomplishment kiss the Oracles Here need no Salvoes of the Prophets Credit by understanding them to speak figuratively The Text is so easie as it needs no other Gloss than the plain History of the Gospel the same words the same things which the one foretells to be done the other tells as done Bethlehem answers Bethlehem Nazareth Nazareth Aegypt Aegypt as face answers face David declaring the case of his own soul used the phrase of Broken Bones Metaphorically to shew the dislocation of its Faculties by his great Fall But Moses in describing
have done for the same space is a Castle-built in the Air of Fancy without Scripture-grounds I have given my reasons why I cannot subscribe to them that think the Millenium finish'd and some why I think it began where the Antimillenarians generally dated it and shall make further proof of both those Points in laying down the Reasons why I dare not follow those that think it is not yet begun 1. I dare not chuse for my Guides in interpreting Scripture such as have palpably misled their followers as often as they have assayed to point out the beginning of their fancied Millenium Of this Bran were they who a while ago have perswaded the world that Satan was to be bound in that anno mirabili that wonderful year 1642. that very year when Hell broke loose And when those ductile Souls who by their perswasions were induc'd into a belief that at the top of that hill at the fulness of that Time they should touch the Moon with their fingers found themselves abused These Crafts-masters in perverting the Word of God encourage their Idiotproselites who had not so much wit as Children to dread the fire after it had burnt them to lift up their hands that hang down to strengthen their knees enfeebled by their disappointment of as great hopes as they have of Heaven and to walk after those blind Guides in hope still to see the Dawning of this day of a 1000 years from Hill to Hill from Date to Date till at last the frustration of their expectations that the Heavens would fall and Men would catch Larks anno 1666. converted most of their Scholars into Papists or Atheists having gaped all that year after Christs Reign on Earth which they then hoped to see as verily as the Mexicanes expect the end of the World the last day of their Rota an Almanack calculated for 52 years they would have made work for the Tinker had they at every approach of their conceited Millenium broken all their Pots Kettles Plate and all kind of utensils and houshold-stuff as the Mexicanes do theirs the last day of their Rota as conceiving they shall never more have need of such things Scaliger de emendat ad finem lib. 3. But I wonder more that the Learned and Judicious Alstede should court this Cloud with so indefatigable an importunity as in order to his laying hands upon it he runs at one breath to the top of four Hills makes no less than four Epocha's for the beginning of it Upon such Principles as Alsted proceeded upon viz. the great Conjunctions Albumazar foretold the expiration of Christian Religion after it had reigned a thousand years above six hundred years ago And R. Abraham Avenaris gatherd that the Messias would come in the year of Christ 1444. there being in that year a Conjunction of Jupiter with Saturn in Cancer or at the utmost anno 1464. when there was the same Conjunction in Pisces Frustrà Miselli aliûm expectant Messiae adventum quam gloriosum illum quo in nubili veniet ad judicandum orbem Vossius de origine idolelat 2. 48. But in vain saith Vossius do these wretched Jews expect any other coming of the Messias than that glorious one when he will come in the Clouds to judge the World Are not Protestants as bad as they in looking for any other Christian Millenium than that which is now current seeing Mahometans expect the expiration of Christian Religion at the end of this Millenium upon the very same grounds that some of us expect the Millenium yet to come and that upon no better Principles than John Aunius a Popish Doctor of Wittenberg assured to the Emperour Victory over the Turks and to the Pope the whole Worlds coming in to and continuing under his obedience for a thousand years to begin anno 1481. But the issue saith Beroaldus Chron. l. 3. c. 6. shewed by what spirit he was led and bewrayed the madness of the Prophet And doubtless Pope Sixtus the Fourth would have been as mad as he had he prick'd up his Ears to have them claw'd by that wide-gaping Promiser as our Fanaticks did theirs to listen to the Alarms that Alsted gave them to their holy Wars For to return to him His first Aera of the Reign of Saints of the blessed Millenium should have commenc'd Anno 1622. when I was scarce got out of my Childs Coats and therefore I my self could not make observation of any glorious Change then happening but I was told that the Sun still kept the same station in the Heavens and had the same operation upon Earth which it used to have within the Memory of Man that the Moon retain'd the same spots in her face which she had when Alsted first saw her that Boyes were as towardly Neighbours as loving Princes as Gracious Subjects as Loyal the Rich as Liberal the Poor as well reliev'd in times past as since that year His second Aera bore date anno 1636. I was then of age to observe how the Bonny Scot got him up to this Hill to see Christ enthron'd on the Presbyterian Tribunal and all that would not submit to that his Government sitting on the Stool of Repentance who have since without walking in the Counsel of the Ungodly sate in the seat of truly divine Scorners of all such Bug-bears The third an 1642. upon that Mount were seen the feet of them that preach'd the everlasting Gospel as they blasphemously called that Form of Government they were then about to erect upon the ruines of whatever was Ancient Sacred and should have been dearer to us than our lives that publish'd to our English Sion those glad tydings that now the time was come that the Saints must reign St. Rebels St. Plunderers St. Murderers St. Regicides The fourth an 1694. But our hot-spurrs had not patience to wait so long many of these covetous wretches who under a cloak of Religion trouble the Waters that themselves may fish for Preferment and Estates may have death gnawing upon them before that time come and therefore that they might be guawing the bones and eating the flesh of the mighty they anticipate the time and pitch upon an 1666. as the season appointed of God for the Conversion of the Jews the Fall of Antichrist the binding up of Satan and the Reign of Saints things ill put together for though I believe that the Reign of Saints which they look for will be coetanous to the Jews Conversion that is they will both be ad Graecas calendas when Geese piss holiwater yet I think the Reign of such Saints as they are will rather be the Rise than Fall of Antichrist and the effect rather of the loosing than binding the Devil As they mist it in the mis-joyning of things incompatible so they were strangely wide in their Calculation leaving out the round sum a thousand and pitching upon the fragments However they did wisely at last to trust to Alsted no longer after he had
six her eye more narrowly upon Emergencies there as things of highest State-concern in respect of that then famous Eastern Prophecy of one to arise at that time in Judea who should be King of the Universe § 4. At that time when the Erection of an Universal Monarchy was according to that Prophecy expected appeared Persons of a more Lordly Spirit amongst the Romans than any former Age had brought forth Caesar and Pompey ' s Ambition sprung from this Prophecy The then greatest Spirits courted the Jews favour and used means that they might be that oriundus in Judaea § 5. The arts which the Roman Candidates for the Universal Monarchy used to bring the World into an opinion that they were designed by Heaven to something extraordinary Julius his Dream his cloven-footed Horse his Mules his Triton his pressing to have the Title of King because the Sybils had prophesied one at that time would be King of all the World The Fathers quotations of Sybils vindicated § 6. Augustus had his Education amongst the Velitri who had a Tradition of the tendency with the Eastern Prophecy that one of that City should obtain the Kingdom of the whole World The Roman Prodigy before his Birth His Mother Atia conceives him by Apollo Her Snake-mole Nero ' s Bracelet Atias Dream of her Entrals Nigidius his Prognostication The Prediction of the Thracian Priests His Fathers Vision Cicero ' s Dream § 7. Tiberius his Omens Scribonius ' s Prediction Livias crested Chick The Altars of the conquering Legions His Dye cast into Apon ' s Well Galba ' s Mock-prophecy § 8. Titus and Vespasian ' s Motto Amor deliciae in English the desire of the Nations The Prodigy of Mars his Oak The Gypsies Prediction Dirt cast by Caligula into his Shirt The Dog bringing a Man's hand The Oracle of the God of Carmel His curing the blind and Lame c. CHAP. X. The more open Practices of soaring Spirits in grasping at the Judean Crown their hopes to obtain it and as to some of them their Conceit of possessing it § 1. Cleopatra ' s Boon begg'd of M. Antony denyed Herod ' s Eye Blood-shot with looking at the Eastern Prophecy § 2. Vespasian jealous of Titus The Eastern Monarchy the Prize contended for by both Parties in the Jewish Wars Mild Vespasian cruel to David ' s Line § 3. Domitian jealous of Davids Progeny Genealogies Metius Pomposianus his Genesis and Globe his Discourse with Christ's Kindred about Christ's Kingdom Clancular Jews brought to light Trajan puts to death Simeon Bishop of Jerusalem for being of the Royal Line § 4. Glosses upon the Eastern Prophecy under Adrian involve the Empire in Blood Jewry in Desolation Fronto taxeth benumm'd Nerva for conniving at the Jew CHAP. XI St. Paul's Apology before Nero was in Answer to some Interrogatories put to him through the Suggestion of his Adversaries touching the matter of the Eastern Prophecy Ex. Gr. Is not this Jesus whom thou preachest to be risen again from the Dead that Jesus of Nazareth whom ye call King of the Jews § 1. Tertullus his Charge against St. Paul a Ring-leader of Nazarites Lysias his Interrogatory art not thou that Alexandrian Egyptian Nero put in hopes of that Kingdom which St. Paul preach'd Christ to have obtained Poppaea Nero's Minion Disciples slink away § 2. Why St. Paul stiles Nero a Lion of the Kingdom of God The Lions Courage quails at St. Paul's Apology Nero after that trusts more to his Art than Gypsies Prophecies § 3. St. Pauls Appearance within Nero ' s Quinquennium Pallas Foelix his Brother and Advocate out of Favour in Nero ' s third Festus hastens St. Paul ' s Mission to Rome the Jews his Trial. § 4. Nero not yet a Lion in Cruelty but in opinion Judah ' s Lion St. Paul ' s Doctrine tryed to the bottom before Nero desponds An Apology for this Pilgrimage through the Holy Age its Use. CHAP. XII As no Age was less like to be Cheated than that wherein the Apostles flourish'd so no Generation of Men was less like to put a Cheat upon the World than the Apostolick and Primitive Church § 1. The Apostles and Primitive Churches Veracity evinc'd by their chusing Death rather than an Officious Lye to save their lives Pliny ' s testimony of them § 2 3. They hide not their imperfections nor the Truth to please Parties or to avoid the Worlds taking offence The offence which Heathens took at some Gospel-passages § 4. All false Religions make lyes their Refuge Pagan Forgeries § 5. Papal Innovation founded on lying Legends Sir Thomas Moor upon St. Austin Gregory Turonensis and Simeon Metaphrastes devout Lyars The Story of the Baptist ' s Head BOOK II. THE ARGUMENT As they could not nor would not delude others so they were not themselves deluded persons or Men of crazy Intellects but propounded to the World a Religion so every way fitted to the Dictates of Common Reason of the most Refin'd Philosophy and of pre-existent Religion as it was impossible for them to have fram'd had they not been of perfect Memory and sound Minds THE CONTENTS CHAP. I. The Gospel's Correspondency with Vulgar Sentiments § 1. The Testimony of the Humane Soul untaught to the Truth of the Christian Creed in the Articles touching the Unity of the Godhead his Goodness Justice Mercy The Existence of wicked Spirits § 2. The Resurrection and Future Judgment Death formidable for its Consequence to evil Men No Fence against this Fear proved by Examples § 3. In hope of future Good the Soul secretly applauds her self after virtuous Acts. This makes the Flesh suffer patiently CHAP. II. Reason nonplus'd help'd by Religion acquiesceth in her Resolutions § 1. Man's Supremacy over the Creatures the Reason of it not cognoscible by Natural Light § 2. Yet generally challenged even over Spirits whom men command to do what themselves disgust § 3. The way of Creation a Mystery Reason puzzel'd to find it out can but conjecture § 4. Divine Revelations touching both acquiesc'd in as soon as communicated Scripture-Philosophy excels the Mechanick Plato's Commendation § 5. Nothing but the God of Order's Grant can secure States from Anarchical Parity and Club-law § 6. Heathens assented to the Reasons of both assigned by Scripture CHAP. III. Natural Conscience Ecchoes to Christian Morals § 1. A Dispraise to dispraise Virtue or praise Vice The Comicks Liberty restrained § 2. How the worst of Men became to be reputed Gods § 3. Men were deified for their Virtues Vice ungodded Gods § 4. Stage-Gods hissed at The Infamy of Players The Original of Mythology CHAP. IV. Christian Religion concords with the highest Philosophical Notions § 1. Divine Knowledge coâ—â—unicated from the Church to travelling Philosophers Our Religion elder than Heathenism by Heathens confession § 2. Christian Articles implied in Pagan Philosophy's Positions Man's happiness through Communion with God and Conformity unto God § 3. This Conformity and Communion effected by God-man God manifest in
as asserted by the Church in those writings which opposed Christian Religion § 1. Maker of Heaven and Earth § 2. His only Son § 3. Conceived by the holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary § 4. Suffered under Pontius Pilate c. § 5. Rose again the third day § 6. Ascended into Heaven thence c. § 7. The Holy Ghost § 8. Holy Catholick Church c. CHAP. V. The Truth of the Gospel-History attested by Secular Writers § 1. Old Antagonists did not persist in the denial of any point of Gospel-History save that of Christs Resurrection and the manner of their denying it proves the Truth of it § 2. Josephus his Story of John Baptist accords with Gospel-History § 3. His Text in testimony of Jesus vindicated from the Exceptions of Vossius c. § 4. Josephus his date of Christs and the Baptists Story falls in with Gospel-Chronology § 5. The Stories of Herod Herodias Aretus Artabanus Philip Lysanias in Josephus Tacitus Suetonius timed to Sacred Chronology § 6. The Twin-Priesthood of Annas and Caiphas at Christs Baptism and Passion cleared § 7. The Date of Philip the Tetrarch his Death CHAP. VI. The Date of Christs Birth as it is asserted by the Church maintain'd by Scripture § 1. Christ homaged by the Magi early after his Birth § 2. Christ born and Baptized the same day of the year § 3. God would have the Church observe the day of Christs Birth The Priestly Courses the Character of it which from the first Institution by Solomon to the last and fatal year of the Second Temples standing were never interrupted § 4. The Calculation of these courses leads us to the Conception and Birth of the Baptist and our Saviour § 5. Christs Baptism and John's Ministry in the same year of Tiberius Reign point out the same thing Objections answered § 6. The taxing of all the world ill-confounded with that of Syria CHAP. VII Josephus his Suffrage to the Evangelists in the Substance of their History of Christ. § 1. He appropriates the Compellation Christ to our Jesus speaks of the Churches growth in a Gospel-stile § 2. Describes Christs Disciples by Evangelical Characters gives the Evangelists Reasons why others did not embrace the Gospel § 3. He peremptorily asserts Christs Miracles how he came to a certain information thereof Appion and Justus would have found it out if he had proceeded here upon presumptions and uncertainties § 4. He describes Christs Miracles after the Evangelical Model § 5. And affirms them to have been such as the Prophets had foretold The Touch-stone of Canonical History § 6. He asserts Christs Resurrection with all its Circumstances CHAP. VIII Josephus confirms St. Lukes History of Herod Agrippa § 1. He paints him in Evangelical Colours as the Jews favourite as a Prodigal as much in the Tyrians Debt and therefore displeased with them c. § 2. He Dates his Death according to St. Luke St. James Martyred in the third a Famine at Rome in the second and third In Judaea in the fourth of Claudius § 3. He describes his Death after St. Lukes Style Two Acclamations immediately after the second he was struck by a Messenger of Death an Owle § 4. Angels assume what form the divine mandat prescribes Evil Angels God's Messengers § 5. Herod the Great died of the like stroke Josephus gives the natural Symptoms of Agrippa's Disease § 6. A Digression touching St. Paul's Thorn in the Flesh. CHAP. IX Other Secular Witnesses to the Truth of Sacred History § 1. Phlegon of the Darkness and Earthquake at Christs Passion § 2. Thallus his mistaking that Darkness for an Eclipse § 3. The Records of Pagan Rome touching that and other Occurrences § 4. The Chronicles of Edessa though Apochryphal yet true Julian's Prohibition of the use of secular Books in Christian Schools his Testimony § 5. Moses his History of Joseph attested by Pagans § 6. His History of himself § 7. Of Noah Balaam c. avouched by Secular Writers CHAP. X. The Adversaries forced upon very great Disadvantages to their own Cause by reason that they could not for very shame resist the Evidences brought in defence of Sacred History § 1. Christ accused of working by the Prince of Devils that Accusation withdrawn in open Court and this Plea put in against him that he made himself a King and therefore was an Enemy to Caesar § 2. Pety Exceptions rebound upon the heads of their Framers § 3. The Modern Sceptick's half-reasons too young to grapple with old Prescription § 4. Christs Works Gods Seal to his Mission § 5. The present Age as able to judge of the Nature of those Works as that was wherein they were done § 6. Atheistical Exceptions against particular points of Religion an Hydra's head yet they all stand upon one neck and may be cut off at one blow by proving the Divine Original of Religion BOOK IV. THE ARGUMENT 4. The Divine Original of Sacred Writ is as demonstrable as the being of a God from the Infinity of Wisdom express'd in its Prophecies and of Power in its miracles THE CONTENTS CHAP. I. The Being of a Deity Demonstrated § 1. The Existence of a Deity demonstrable from the frame of the world the composition of humane bodies § 2. The Garden of the Earth did not fall by chance into so curious and well order'd knots The ingenuity of Birds sings the Wisdom of their Maker c. § 4. The Heavens declare the glory of God CHAP. II. The Author of Christian Religion hath stamp'd thereon no less manifest Prints of infinite Science than the Maker of the World hath left upon that his Workmanship § 1. Heathen Prophecies the Result of Ratiocination § 2. From general Hints which for mens torments God might permit the Devil to communicate § 3. The Ambiguity of Oracles on purpose to hide the Ignorance of them that gave them § 4. It was by chance they spake truth § 5. Scripture-Oracles distinct of pure Contingencies their Sence plain punctually fulfill'd CHAP. III. Instances of Prophecies fulfill'd whose Effects are permanent and obvious to the Atheists Eyes if he will but open them § 1. Predictions that Israel would reject their own Messia made by Jews Confession many hundreds of years before Christ. § 2. The Prophets foretell Gods Rejection of the Jews for their Rejection of his Son § 3. Texts proving a final Rejection Christs Blood calls down this vengeance § 4. These Menacies executed to the full Temple City and all vanish'd Spirit of Prophecy past from the Synagogue to the Church CHAP. IV. Gematrian Plaisters too narrow for the Sore § 1. The Ark. § 2. Holy Fire § 3. Urim and Thummim § 4. Spirit of Prophecy in the Second Temple § 5. Exorcisme and Bethesda's all-healing vertue the second Temples Dowry CHAP. V. The Jews rejected Messias to be called the God of the whole Earth and all other Gods eternally to be rejected § 1. The God of Israel every where worship'd where Christian Religion
the point of obtaining Divine Honour at the Romans hands Augustus erected an Altar To the first begotten Suidas his story of Augustus his Altar defended Augustus his unhappiness in his Issue might probably put him upon referring the choice of a Successour to the Oracles determination His slighting Apollo argues the Answer he received not to have made for Apollo's credit § 5. Some passages touching this Argument in Tertullian cleared from the Anabaptistical gloss Where the Emperours and Senates shooe pincht them How much this State-maxime prejudic'd the Apostles § 1. NOtwithstanding that the World was so well fortified against Seduction by its being so well seen in the above-mentioned Arts yet had the Gospel found it in a disordered posture through its defect of polity this might have given an advantage to the Assaylants to subdue it to the belief of things not rationable or credible While every man is left to do what is good in his own eyes as the Jews were when there was no King in Israel the stragling Sheep may easily become the prey of Wolves and Foxes How many vast valiant expert and while well marshall'd terrible and inconquerable Armies have through want of Discipline in a disordered march been put to the Rout by a less strong and worse skill'd Enemy But the Gospel charged the world when it stood in a full field and well ranked body to receive the on-set not in that condition wherein the Danites found Laish careless and heedless without a Magistracy to put them to shame in any thing and keep them in order which was the great incouragement their Spies gave them to make an attempt upon that City Weem's Exercitations on Judg. 18. 7 8 10. For that part of the world wherein the Apostles obtain'd most ground was then united under the newly erected Standard of Augustus as General and under the Conduct of twelve as famous Gown'd Captains I mean Lawyers and Politicians as ever appear'd at one Muster viz. Sleidan Clav. Hist. lib. 2. Lucillus Balbus P. Octavius Balbus C. Aufidius C. Juventius C. Orbius Sext. Papirius Lucius Servius Sub. Rufus Tesâ—a Offilius Casselius Tubero all flourishing in the Reign of Augustus who himself was the most substantial and well weighed Statist that meer Nature has exhibited to the world equal'd by few that have had the benefit of Sacred Politiques but for that they may thank their studying Machiavel more than Melchisedeck Of him the Heroick Poet under the shadow of Counsel draws as high an Encomium as any Prince is capable of in point of prudence for the Administration of Empire Excudent alii spirantia molliùs aera Tu regere Imperio populos Romane memento Hae tibi erunt artes Let others learn to mould brass do thou learn to govern men To these succeeded Sleidan Clav. Hist. l. 2. Caesius the two Aufidii l'acuvius Flavius Priscus Varus Labeo Father and Son the Son of that repute as he left his name to a Sect of Lawyers Nerva Father and Son to one of whom Coccejus Nerva Tacitus ascribes all kind of Knowledge both in Humane and Divine Laws and reports him to have been a man of that foresight in Civil Affairs as to prevent the seeing of that mischief which the dissoluteness of Tiberius at his beloved Capreae would immerse the Empire in he chose to end his dayes by a voluntary death notwithstanding the Emperours perswasions to the contrary Annal. lib. 6. both the Longini from whom the Cassian Sect had its Sirname and Original All these under Tiberius Alsted Cron. Juridicorum who in point of vafrous cunning deserv'd the name of Fox as much as he upon whom our Saviour bestowed that title Herod This was the Scheme of that Heaven of the Roman Empire when the Son of Righteousness enter'd upon his race from the one to the other end of it through the Zodiack of his Twelve Apostles beyond the circumference of whose Doctrine once deliver'd that Sun never moves in his illuminating the world with saving Light all pretended supernatural Revelations eccentrical to that are but the dwindles of blazing stars The two Luminaries Augustus of stay'd policy Tiberius of versatile craft moving successively through a Zodiack of Twelve Statists stars of the greatest magnitude that ever shin'd at once in the firmament of that State The two first Judges of the Universe that enter'd upon that preferment by way of inheritance assisted each of them with a full Jury of as able Lawyers as ever past Verdict together sitting successively upon the Bench when the Cause of the Gospel was first pleaded as if they had been impannell'd on purpose to take notice of the Evidence brought into Court The Empires skill in Law was at its highest exaltation when the Royal Law came out of Sion our great Law-giver disdaining to vie the Arcana of his Empire with any State-maximes but the very best of humane invention Would the blessed Babe have ventured to thrust in his head among these sage Councellours had he not been the everlasting Councellour the Antient of Dayes to set up his Post against this Post had it not been like that at the Temple Gate stability it self to erect his Kingdom against this so well model'd an Empire had not his been the gift of him that said Thou art my Son c § 2. Especially if it be further considered That the genius of the Roman Polity disgusted the introduction of any Foreign over the head of its own Domestick Religion Ovid shuts up the discourse of the translation of Aesculapius with an Epiphonema His tamen accessit delubris advena nostris though he had begun it with this Salvo of the Roman maxime Not to receive any foreign God till he had given a sign of his renouncing his former Altars quáque ipse morari Sede velit signis calestibus indicet optant Annuit his motisque deus rata pignora câ—istis Et repetita dedit oráque retro Flectit antiquas abiturus respicit aras c. Met. 15. The Senate would not allow their General Lutatius in the Punick War to consult the Oracle of the Goddess Fortune at Praeneste for this reason alledged by Valerius Max. cap. 3. l. 1. because the Roman Republick ought not to be administred by the Conduct or Counsels of any God but their own Tiberius himself saith Tertullian Apolog. cap. 5. could not obtain of the Senate an Edict to have our Jesus canonized for a God at Rome though he moved earnestly for it upon Pilate's Letters informing him what had past in Judaea Celsus that fierce enemy of Christian Religion in Orig. l. 4. Cal. 11 12. will allow the Jews their own Religion and if they please to esteem Christ their Lord and King illa se jacret in aula he will not envy him that honour in his own Countrey but that that obscure and despicable Nation should impose a God and a Religion upon the whole world this is that he so highly disgusts The Pestilence raging and the people running
return and bring them into a worse Bondage to the Ceremonial Law than they were in before that their last Estate that of Judaick Christians should be worse than their first of Judaism It were easie to multiply Instances and to point to those Passages in St. Mark who wrote his Gospel to the Grecizing or Alexandrian Jews whose Bishop he was from St. Peter's Mouth that make clearly for St. Paul and against St. Peter but for Brevities sake I wave that and come to shew that on the other Hand St. Luke who was St. Paul's Amanuensis in that Gospel of his writing but St. Paul's inditing challenging therefore a Propriety in it and calling it his Gospel Rom. 2. 16. does no more favour St. Paul's than St. Peter's Cause presenting St. Peter as the Mouth of the whole Colledg of Apostles in confessing Christ to be the Son of God the King of the Jews and receiving from Christ upon that Confession the Privilege of being the first-laid Stone in the new Jerusalem upon which Christ would build his Church And in his History of the Acts of the Apostles demonstrating how Christ made good that Promise to him For though all the Twelve were so many Pearly Foundation-Stones upon whose Persons and Preaching the Gospel-Church was built and though all of them were Doors in the City of God and had the Keys given them to open the Door of Faith to the Jew and Gentile Yet St. Luke gives the Preheminence to St. Peter in order of Time reporting him with his Brother Andrew to have had the first explicit call to Christianity and after that to the Apostolical Office and and so his Person to have been laid as the first Stone in the House of God and in the Foundation of the Apostles and informing us how his Key of Doctrine after Christ's Assension and assuming of his Kingdom did at Jerusalem on the Day of Penticost and some while after at the House of Cornelius first open the Door of Faith both to Jews and Gentiles how his Sermons were the first Pearly Foundation-Stone upon which the Catholick Church of Jew and Gentile was built Nay St. Luke relates those Passages with such Circumstances as are of greatest Tendency towards the heaping of Honour upon St. Peter's Person presenting him not only as the Stone upon which those individual Converts were laid but in their Persons as their Representatives the whole Church of believing Jews gathered from every Nation under Heaven to his Sermon on the Day of Pentecost and of Gentiles represented by Cornelius a Roman a Name in the Idiom of that Age equipollent to a Citizen of the World God the King of the Jews his peculiar Heritage and Caesar the Emperour of the Romans sharing the World betwixt them The Poet came nearer the Truth in the Evangelical Sence of all the World then he was aware of in his Divisum imperium cum Jove Caesar habet If any of our own Furiosi fasten his Canine Teeth upon this Interpretation of the Rock and Keys and cast up his Snout in the Air as if he smelt Popery in 't he may know if he have not confin'd himself to the Circle of Modern Systems or be not too proud to learn of his Betters that I yield St. Peter no more than the greatest Champions of the Christian of Old and of the Reformed Religion of late have granted him and yet upon such clear Scripture-Grounds as speak it to be no more than his just Due they that think the Papal Church and Cause advantaged by this Concession may do well to joyn Heads with the Jesuits to whom they are already joyn'd by the Tail and try if with his Ram they can batter down the Walls of our Jerusalem about the ears of them who through God's Grace have hitherto defended her upon this Ground and amongst them by Name that Bl. Martyr Arch-Bishop Laud against Fisher pag. 237. c. For my own part I shall rather be of none than of that Religion which stands in need either of a Lye or the Dissimulation of Truth to support it But to return to St. Luke who though St. Paul's Scribe makes the most honourable mention of St. Peter of any of the Evangelists reciting his being with Christ at his Transfiguration a Privilege which St. Peter himself glories in 2 Pet. 1. 18. Christs praying for him that his Faith should not fail and Injunction to him when himself was converted to strengthen his Brethren Reporting the History of his Denial of his Master more favourably than any of the rest therein omitting the Aggravations of his denying Christ the second time with an Oath the third time with cursing and swearing both which are recorded by St. Matthew's Pen describing St. Peter every way as well instructed as St. Paul in the State of the Controversie betwixt them touching God's accounting the Gentiles holy as well as the Jews touching God's antiquating the Law that put difference of clean and unclean upon Meats and his freeing both Jew and Gentile from the insupportable Yoke of Legal Ceremonies In all which St. Luke reports St. Peter to have been so well instructed as the Synod grounded its Decree touching those things upon the Evidence which St. Peter gave Act. 15. And lastly introducing St. Paul doing the same thing in Effect which he rehuked St. Peter for shaving his Head purifying himself circumcising of Timothy c. and that upon the same Ground that St. Peter pleaded That he might not offend those weak believing Jews who were as yet zealous of the Law and had not learn'd that Liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free A thing which not only scandalized the Pagan Madaurenses and opened the Blasphemous Mouth of Porphyry to accuse St. Paul of Procacity and Partiality but put St. Origen and Chrisostome to their Wits End to answer his Calumnies And occasion'd those sharp bickerings betwixt St. Austin and Jerome as have been a Bone of Contention among the School-men to this Day and like to be till the Last Day Vide August tom 2. Epist. 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 17 18 19. This is such an Argument of Impartiality in the Evangelists as hath no Peer Alexander laid his Finger upon his Scar while Apelles was drawing his Picture Aelian Var Histor. 2. 23. would not give Nicodorus the Mantinean his full Praise because he was affraid thereby to honour the Memory of Diogoras a reputed Atheist who help'd Nicodorus to frame his excellent Laws and Virgil because the Nolanes would not permit him to draw their River over his Grounds expung'd the Name of this City out of his Verses placing instead of that Ora A. Gelii noct attic 7. 20. Talem dives erat Capua vicina Veseno Ora jugo When before that it was Nola jugo Compare the History of the Guelfs and Gibellines the Papal and Imperial Parties the Roman and the Carthaginian Writers the Netherlands and the King of Spain's Favourites Or to come nearer home the London
Taurican Chersonesus who sacrificed all the Strangers they could lay hands on to Diana quoting for this Enripedes That pair-royal of Friends Pylades and Orestes had died no other death if they had slain their Keepers and stolen away the Goddess Lucian Toxaris The next whom Clemens instanceth in are the Thessalians among whom the Inhabitants of Pella sacrifice an Achaean to Releus and Chiron for which he quotes Maninius in his Collection of Wonders The Cretensians among whom the Lycians sacrifice men to Jupiter for this he quotes Anticlides in reditibus The Lesbians who as Dosidas saith pacified Bacchus with humane Hostes. The Phocensians whom Pythocles in his third Book de Concordia affirms to have sacrificed Men to Diana Taurica The Athenians among whom as Demaratus writes in his first Book of Tragical Things Ericthonius for the pacifying of Proserphone sacrificed his own Daughter And the Romans among whom as Dorotheus relates in his fourth Book of the Affairs of Italy Marius sacrificed his Daughter Diis Averruncanis To the Gods that expel mischief Lactantius de falsa Relig. lib. 1. cap. 21. proves this to have been an ancient Custom in Italy to precipitate Men from the Milvian Bridge for the appeasing Saturn's wrath out of Ovid's in Fastis quotannis Tristia Leucadio sacra peracta Deo And to sacrifice to the same God their own Children After whose Dialect Micah 6. 7. the Prophet introduceth apostate Judah querying Shall I give my first born for my trangression the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul to which the Spirit returns this pat answer He hath shewed thee O man what is good and what the Lord requires of thee viz. to do justly and love mercy neither of which can be done in this barbarous inhumanity to thy own Bowels and to humble thy self to walk with thy God not to outrun God in thy hastening to bring forth a Saviour before the fulness of Time c. In the same place the same Lactantius relates out of Poscennius Festus this Story That the Carthaginians being overcome by Agathocles King of Sicily and conceiving that to be the effect of God's displeasure against them for the rendring of Heaven propitious sacrificed two hundred Noblemens Sons Of the same bran saith he are the Rites of the Mother of the Gods whose Priests attone her with the Blood of their Genitals and of Bellona wherein her Priests lance and slash their own shoulders with Swords which they carry in both their hands as they run like frantick men about her Altars the very same Oratory which the Priests of Baal used who in their contest with Elijah when he lent a deaf ear to the sound of their Prayers lifted up to him the voice of their blood as that they doubted not but would obtain for them a favourable audience Herodotus in his Euterpe pag. 128. relates how at Busiris in the Festivals of Isis after the Sacrifice the whole Company being many thousands lash themselves till blood come and that in Papremis the Company that assemble to worship the Deity of that place fall together by the ears and wound yea kill one another Dion Roman histor lib. 43. reports that Julius Caesar to propitiate Mars caused to be sacrificed to him two of those Mutineers who raised a commomotion in the Camp because of Caesar's Prodigality in his exhibiting showes and Plays to the Senate and People grudging that so much water should run beside their Mill for which he saith he had neither Sibylline nor any other express Oracle but only Custom Pliny lib. 36. writes that the Moors sacrificed Men to Hercules others say to Saturn as Plato by name in his Minoe and Dionysius Halicarnassus as also Theodoritus Cyrenaeus Tacitus de moribus Germanorum saith That the Germans do on certain stated days appease Mercury with humane Sacrifices That the Semnones the most ancient Stock of the Suevians on certain anniversary holy Days meet together in a sacred Grove and begin the solemnity of the day with sacrificing a man for the Common Good for so I translate his caeso publicè homine That the Reudigni Aviones Angli Varini Eudoses Snardones Nucthones in the service they perform'd to the Mother of Gods whom they call Hertham that is Earth the very English of the Grecian 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 drowned those that had officiated in the Procession The same Historian Tacitus an 14. fol. 207. tells us that Suetonius Paulinus at the taking of the Ifle of Man found Groves devoted there to bloody Superstition for they used to sacrifice Captives at their Altars and to look into their inwards by way of Auguration Dictys Cretensis who was comrade to Idomenoeus in the Trojan War wrote a Journal of that War which Paxis presented to Nero and Septimius Romanus translated into Latin in which Treatise de Bell. Troj lib. 1. we are told that for the appeasing of Dianas displeasure against Agamemnon for slaying the Hart that was feeding in her Grove his Daughter Iphigenia was required in sacrifice Upon this ground Euryphylus in Virgil perswades the Grecians when they were returning from Troy to appease the angry Deity with humane Blood with the blood of Polixena Aeneid lib. 2. Sanguine placastis ventos virgine caesa Cùm primùm Iliacas Danai venistis ad auras Herodotus Melpomene relates how the Getes the most morallized of all the Scythians send every year to their God Zamolxis a Man whom they had first sacrificed And how the Messagetes immolate in their old Age all Persons of note counting none happy but them that die that kind of death Herod Clio. And lastly how the whole Scythian Nation do sacrifice to Mars whom they esteem the chief God one of every hundred Captives whose Blood they gather into a Basin and with it besmear a Fauchion which with them is the Idol or Representation of Mars Herodot Melpomene This Custom reached to the farthest Western Nations as Plutarch de superstitione observes who if they had Children of their own sacrificed them to Saturn if not bought other mens Children to that purpose as men buy Lambs or Chickens While they were sacrificing their Mothers were to stand by and look on who if they shewed any sign of sorrow they were ever after accounted opprobrious persons Yea as far as the then reputed World's end Hercules Pillars as Timaeus the Historian affirms in his rebus Deliacis for the Inhabitants near to those Pillars saith he use to sacrifice their Kinsfolks if they reach the seventieth year Strabo lib. 11. reports that in Albania a Country near the Caspia◠Sea they used to sacrifice to the Moon their supreme Deity those of their initiated servants that had most of that Goddess in them after they had been sumptuously feasted a whole year before These two last I report upon the Credit of Natalis Comes Mytholog l. cap. 17. de victimis not out of penury for to the best of my knowledge there is not an old Historian extant that gives
lib. 1. cap. 10. 11. But to spare the labour of multiplying Instances that place of Plato I mention'd at the beginning of this discourse is abundantly sufficient where those blessed spirits that descended to take care of Mankind are said to have given them Laws neither that of Origen against Celsus lib. 5. cap. 1. whom he charges in his affirming that never any God or Son of God came down from Heaven to reveal divine Counsels to oppose the Vulgar and received Opinion of Philosophers and proves that charge by many clear instances one of which we have Act. 14. 12. when St. Paul had by a word speaking presently and perfectly cured the man that was born lame the Lystrians conceived him to be Mercury appearing in humane form because he was the chief speaker clearly expressing this to be their Opinion that the healing God was to be the great Gods Messenger and to restore men's discomposed Minds as well as Limbs by his word the very Office which the Prophets assigned to the Messias and the Apostles and Evangelists applyed to Christ A prophet shal the Lord raise unto you of your brethren like unto me as touching his humane but infinitely superiour to me in respect of his divine Nature And that 's the scope of that so much abused Text all thy children shall be taught of God Isa. 54. 13. if Christ be better at expounding Scripture than our new illuminates Who when the Jews excepted against his affirming himself to come down from Heaven because they knew his Father and Mother supposing him to be the Son of Joseph as they said Joh. 6. ver 42. gives them this reply That no man could come to him that is as one that came down from Heaven and whom they were bound to hear under pain of extermination except the Father drew him ver 44. not as a log by main force of hand but as a man by strength of Argument by teaching him the meaning of that Text in the Prophet and they shall all be taught of God ver 45. which cannot be understood of the person of the Father for no man hath seen the father but the son ver 46. Nor of the Spirits teaching for that the Church had from the beginning thou gavest them thy good spirit Nehem. 9. 10. But of the Person of the Son who was in the Fullness of Time to assume Flesh and dwell among us and teach not only Jews but Gentiles what they must do to be saved So as in the last revelation of the divine Will God will no longer deal by proxy but himself in the Person of the Son will speak face to face which you might have learn'd in Hypothesi had you diligently weighed that Text of Isa. and though I in respect of my humane Nature am the son of Mary and as you suppose of Joseph whom you know yet at my Baptism you might have learn'd that I had another Generation for then my Father bare witness by a voice from Heaven that I was the son of God and at my transfiguration having avouched me to be his well beloved Son he gave command that I should be receiv'd as that Prophet whom all are to hear every man therefore that hath heard and learn'd this of my Father concerning me that I am that great Prophet that was to come into the World like to my Brethren as to my Manhood but equal to the Father touching my Godhead will certainly come to me and learn of me as to those whom my Father by these clear convictions and furthermore by that Seal he hath set to my Commission to teach in those Miracles I work does not draw into a full perswasion 't is impossible that they while they are under that obstinacy should come unto me Hence it is that our Saviour so much presseth and layeth so much stress upon the believing that he was he that should come to tell men all things hence St. Paul begins his Epistle to the Hebrews with the proof of this that Jesus of Nazareth was that divine Person the express Image of the Fathers person by whom according to the Prophecies that went before God hath spoak in the last that is the Evangelical Age. § 8. Humane Laws we say are Nets which small fish escape through and great ones break but Christ's Law is so framed his Gospel net so knit as the Vulgar fry stick in it by the Finns and Gills of common Sentiments And the greatest disputers are intangled in it by strugling It takes the poor of this World by the compliance with their innate Notions and the wise in their own craftiness By it Learning was pos'd Philosophy was set Sophisters taken in a Fisher's net Plato and Aristotle were at a loss And wheel'd about again to spell Christ's Cross. As our great British Divine and Divine Poet sings in his Church tit Providence in which Poem as he hath given us an abstract of Church-history so I fear there is a more discerning spirit of Prophecy expressed therein than in all our modern golden Dreams and Comments upon Daniel and the Revelation these Predictions being but guessings at if not perversions of the sence of dark Texts his the applications of as clear menaces as any are in the whole Bible and these too commented upon by the constant method of Providence in the World which usually so shapes its rewards and Punishments to mens demerits as for our knowing what will betide our selves we need not consult ambiguous Oracles but such plain sanctions of the royal Law as have been made good upon and befallen other Churches for examples to us for if we will not be diverted from following Egypt and Greece's steps we must arrive at their dismal end if we by our debaucheries of mind or life put the Gospel from us and draw upon our selves strong delusions a Revelation-Criticism will not secure the one to us nor us from the other But to return from this Digression The constitution of Christian Religion is such as it finds all that is of man left in man a party for it in the Market and all true Philosophy a party for it in the Schools of Philosophers saith Clem. Alexandr Strom. l. 1. pag. 94. whether of the Barbarians or Grecians I mean not the Stoick Platonick Epicurean Aristotelian but whatsoever any Sect rightly taught whatsoever they taught Pious or Just is but a Branch of eternal Truth pluck'd from the Tree of Life the ever-being Word An observation grounded upon these Prophecies I will raise up the tabernacle of David that is fallen and close up the breaches of it and build it as in the days of old build the old wasts raise up the former desolations the foundations of many generations Amos 9. 11. Isa. 61. 4. Isa. 58. 12. and this to the end that the residue of men that is the Gentiles might seek the Lord Act. 15. 16. as St. James expounds the Prophets which inforceth us to interpret those Prophecies not of Persons only but
Israel the remnant of Israel after the flesh that had renounc'd Judaism and become Christians and the spiritual Seed the Gentiles coming in to the Gospel in a full body might be saved In which Interval the carnal Seed were enemies that is in part cast off for the Gentiles sake that they might be grafted in in the room of those four Branches but yet the election the remnant of them that believed beloved for the sake of the Fathers God having a kind of hankering after them even the whole Nation upon the account of their being the Off-spring of his friend Abraham and therefore retaining the Nation by the handle as it were of the Remnant and rejecting them but in part and by degrees till he wholly cast them off and removed his Court from them unto the Gentiles having demolished his Palace amongst them and made the Throne of his Glory a perpetual desolation Hence St. Austin states the Time of the Scepters departure so as he makes Kingdom and Temple and Priesthood and Sacrifice and that Mystical Unction upon the account whereof their Kings were called Christ's or anointed to depart all together at that time when the Resurrection of Christ having been preach'd to and embrac'd by the Gentiles they were subdued by Vespasian From the ceasing of all which then he argues they were only Types of Christ de consensu Evangelist l. 1. c. 13. Nec alia re magis claruit illius Gentis Regnum Templum Sacerdotium Sacrisicium unctionem illam mysticam non fuisse nisi praenunciando Christo deputata quà m quòd occisi Christi Resurrectio postquà m caepit credentibus gentibus praedicari illa omnia cessaverant niscientibus Romanis per quorum victoriam nescientibus Judaeis per quorum subjugationem factum est ut omnia illa cessarent To this our Saviour hath respect and comments upon it in his Prophecy of this Destruction of the Jewish State the Departure of the Scepter St. Mat. 24. 14. where having named some other things that were to precede it he adds this as the last Sign This Gospel of the Kingdom i. e. of the Messiah shall be preach'd to all the world for a witness unto all nations and then shall the end come i. e. the end of the Jewish State when the Gentiles by the preaching of the Apostles through the whole Roman Empire should be gather'd unto Christ then should the Jewish Church-Commonwealth I mean that particular form of Government which God prescribed to them as a Nation admitted to the participation and fellowship of his Grace with Junius de politia Mosis cap. 5. be utterly dissolved which till then had continued united under some Polity or Form of Government under God as their King from its first beginning The Jews as Josephus ant 14. 10 12. affirmeth and proveth out of Strabo that he might not be thought to flatter his own Nation being till then not only in Judaea under the Government of their own Nobles having Judicatures erected by Gabinius the Roman General consisting of their own Elders and proceeding by their own Laws but in Cyrene Egypt and other places of their former Dispersions having Magistrates of their own and using their own Laws no otherwise than in an absolute Commonwealth But was then melted down into and swallowed up by the Roman Empire Euseb. cron deletis Jerusalimis Regnum Judaeorum defecit the learned Scaliger mistakes the meaning of that term animadv ad Eus. Cron. pag. 198. b. for Eusebius means plainly that Jerusalem being destroyed the holy Kingdom which God till then had erected over them ceast Their Thearchy then expired their King-of-old broke up his Court amongst them so as thenceforward they have had no King but Caesar the right Scepter of that Kingdom of Judah which God had wielded over them then visibly departed when the Palace of their great King was finally desolated their holy State and Oeconomy was now rooted up the divine Ordinances once planted amongst them were now extinguished Dr. Lightfoot parergon 178. and themselves banish'd Heaven and Earth coeli soli sui extorres sine homine sine Deo rege Tertul. advers Gent. cap. 21. without either man or God-king And instead of the Kingdom of the Messiah which they expected would have been erected over them at the expiration of that Divine Polity establish'd by Moses and rejected when it was come nigh them they were brought under the Anti-Messiacal if for illustration I may here use that word in place of Antichristian Dominion of Vespasian Judaei non receperunt Christum suscepturi Antichristum Aug. ap de diversis tom 10. in die paschae Repulerunt agnum eligerunt vulpem ideo partes vulpium facti sunt August tom 8. pag. 262. The Jews rejected Christ being afterwards to embrace Antichrist they refused the Lamb and chose the Fox and therefore became the portion of Foxes who had been God's portion For Vespasian whose Vassals they became imposed himself upon them not only as the Emperour of Rome but as their King Messiah and was reputed so not only by the Romans but by Josephus himself and the sober Party of unbelieving Jews vide Dr Hammond's note b. on Mat. 24. and whatever the Zealots thought in secret they were forc'd to make open Abrenunciation of their King of old and to enter a Recognizance to accept of Caesar's Gods in his room by the payment of that half-shekel to Jupiter Capitolinus which was used to be paid to the Temple while God was their King as an acknowledgment of homage upon no other but this new tenure were they allowed the use of their old Laws Xiphilin E. Dione Vespasian pag. mihi 537. ab eodem Tito jussi sunt quotannis didrachma 〈…〉 pendere Jovi Capitolino ii qui patrias leges eorum tuerentur Doubtless we have too much gratified the mis-believing Jews and laid Stumbling-blocks in their way by our conceiving that the departure of the Scepter implies primarily a change of the external Form of their Government or deprivation of liberty to use their own Laws and to enjoy Judges of themselves things but accidental to that Theocraty Government wherein God presided more immediately and specially over them than other Nations which was exercised under several Forms and with such variety as to those Circumstances and external Privileges as sometimes they enjoyed sometimes were deprived of them Grotius de jure pacis belli l. 1. cap. 4. par 7. pun 5. proves that the Manichees taking up Arms against Antiochus can be defended by no Plea but that of extreme necessity not from the Jews 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. For they had been subdued by Nebuchadnezzar and brought under an absolute not conditional Subjection to the Assyrian Empire To which Supremacy over them the Persians first and then the Macedonians succeeded and they did not stipulate with Alexander or his Successors but came without making any Conditions under his and his Successor's Jurisdiction as they
Parents as the Lybians did for the Father We must be baptized after the Marcionist's form in the Name of the unknown Father Irenae l. 1. c. 18. or each man know his own by presensation as Jarchus the Indian King did the Parents of Apollonius Philostratus lib. 3. de vita Apollonii Except being by this levelling Policy turn'd into Terrae silios we be resolv'd with those Earth-born Brethren in the Poet to destroy one another by endless contending Tantum irreligio potuit suadere malorum The irreligious imperswasibleness of the Sceptick which inclines him to cavil at the Churches Testimony to the Truth of Evangelical History and to question his own Christian-name will with more shew of reason induce the World into a disbelief of every man's Sir-name and bury all men's Birth-rights in the rubbish of buzzing Exceptions which strike their venomous Sting deeper into the sides of the State than the Church her Testimony being a better proof of the Gospel's Legitimacy than any man can produce of his own Audacter dico quòd sine fide neque infidelis vivit nam si ab insideli percunctari voluero quem patrem vel quam matrem habuerat protinùs respondebit illum atque illam quem si statim requiram utrùm noverit quando conceptus sit vel viderit quando natus nihil horum vel se nosse vel vidisse fatebitur c. Gregor Dialog l. 4. c. 4. I affirm confidently saith Gregory the great that the very Infidel himself doth not live without faith for if I ask an Infidel who is his Father or Mother he will forthwith answer such a man such a woman and if I then demand of him whether he knew when he was conceived or born he will confess that he knew neither of these but believes that he was begotten by that man whom he calls father of her whom be calls mother upon the account of probable Testimony In se spuit qui in caelum spuit he spits in his own face who spits in Heaven's face as Seneca of old observ'd consol ad Polyb. c. 21. and from him our Companella in his Atheismus triumphatus CHAP. II. The Suffrage of the Adversary to the Testimony of the Church § 1. Pagan Indictments shew what was found Christianity in Pagan Courts § 2. Christian Precepts and Examples civilized the Courts of Heathen Emperours § 3. Pliny ' s Information concerning Christians to Trajan § 4. What it was in Christians that Maximinus hated them for § 1. 1. TUrn over the Examinations the Confessions of Christians in open Court before Pagan Tribunals where the same thing was done before the face of the Heathen World that was done at Baptism in the face of the Church Excepto martyrio ubi tota Baptismi sacramenta complentur Baptizandus confitetur fidem suam coram sacerdote interrogatus respondet hoe martyr coram persecutore facit ille post confessionem vel aspergitur vel intingitur hic vel aspergitur sanguine vel contingitur igne ille confitetur se mundi actibus renunciaturum hic ipsi renuntiat vitae For this cause the ancient Fathers believed Martyrdom to supply the want of Water-baptism because therein were performed all the Rites of Baptism the Martyr confessed before the Persecutor the same Faith which he that was to be baptized confessed before the Priest he after Confession was dipp'd or sprinkled with water the Martyr either sprinkled with blood or plung'd over head and ears in fire he promiseth that he will frsake the life of the World the Martyr renounceth life it self Gennadius de eccles dogmat in appendice ad 3. tom operum sancti Augustini pag. 384. Let us I say examine the Confessions of Martyrs and in them you may find the Substance of the Gospel peruse their Indictments against the Martyrs examine what Crimes they charged Confessors with what it was for which they raised against Christians those Out-cries Christiani ad Leones away with these fellows to the Lyons they are not fit to live they will not worship our Gods they will not sacrifice for the Emperour's health they worship for God one Jesus who was born in Judaea whom Pilate at the request of his own Nation put to death as an Impostor who gave his followers a Law destructive to humane Societies set up an unsociable an unpracticable Religion c. And there we meet with the Sum of Christian Religion St. James his Crime for which Ananas the younger the high Priest and a Saducee put him to death in the vacancy of a Governour betwixt Festus his death and the coming of Albinus was that being ask'd what he thought of Jesus that was crucified he answered why ask ye me of Jesus the Son of Man when as he sitteth at the right hand of the great Power in Heaven and his asserting the Resurrection as saith Aegesippus in Eusebius Ec. hist. 2. 3. which the story that Josephus gives of his death confirms not only telling us that the Jews imputed the Fall of Jerusalem to their sin in slaying that just Person but that the whole body of the religious Jews moved Albinus to put Ananas from the High-priesthood for imbrewing his hands in the blood of so just a man a title conferred upon him by that Party out of an Odium to the Sadducees and because he died in witnessing to those Articles of Christian Faith which oppose Saduceism upon the very same account that they sided with St. Paul The questions upon which Domitian examined the reputed Kinsfolks of our Lord were concerning Christ and his Kingdom in what manner and when and where it should appear to which they answered that it was not Worldly or Earthly but Celestial and Angelical that it should come at the consummation of the World when that he coming in glory shall judg the quick and the dead and reward every man according to his works Eus. ec hist. 3. 19. out of Aegesippus which story together with that of the noble Flavia's banishment for the same Doctrine he tells us he found recorded in the Pagan Histories of that Age. In the persecution of the Gallican Church under Antoninus Verus his bloody Lieutenants writ the cause of their process against those Christians to have been their professing Christ to be God their refusing to give divine Worship to any but God their believing the Resurrection their communicating in the Sacrament of Christ's Body and Blood In their solicitating them to renounce Christ to adore their Pagan Gods In their calumniateing them with Thiestian Banquets for which they had no ground but the confessions of some that fell under the weight of that intollerable Persecution informing their Examiners that in their sacred assemblies they ate and drank the Body and Blood of our Saviour in answer to which misprision the Martyrs would usually argue that it was extremely unlikely that they should devour Infants when their Religion did not suffer them to suck the blood of Beasts nor to
dispencing of it as to several other heads of it While Celsus will needs make the Royal Law useless and needless as to the most part of it There is nothing saith he in the Christian Discipline new or worthy of commendation but is common to it and the Philosophers who before Christ have taught that there is to be expected Rewards of Virtue and Mulcts for Sin in the other World Orig. contr Cel. 1. 4. Christ tell us saith he we ought not to worship Gods made with hands that the Father is to be worship'd in Spirit Why we Philosophers account not Images of the Gods to be Deities we know that the Workmanship of wicked Artificers and villanous men as many times they are that grave these Images cannot be Gods we have learn'd of Heraclitus that they who adore liveless Statues do as simply as they that talk to Walls of the Persians that the Deity is not comprehended within any Structure made with hands and of Zeno Citiensis in his Book of the Common-wealth that he need not build Chappels that prepares the Temple of his own Soul for the entertainment of God Those very Laws which the Madaurencian Philosophers blamed as destructive to humane Societies Celsus mentions with Commendation as far more ancient than Christ. They have also saith he these Laws Thou must not repel injuries If any man smite thee on thy cheek turn the other to him this is an old Dictate long since utter'd by Socrates when he was disputing with Crito and mention'd by Plato in his Timaeus Orig. contr Cel. 7. 17. upon the same account he mentions the commendations which Christ gives to Humility Purity of Heart Pacateness of Spirit c. as better expressed by Plato in his Books of Laws advising him that would be happy to pursue Righteousness with an humble pure and pacate Mind Id lib. 5. cal 8. And the Caution that Christ gives against Covetousness Celsus in the same place affirmeth to have been derived from Plato whose saying that it is impossible for any man to be very rich and very good he parallels to that of Christ It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven The mortiferousness of these Waters is to be cured by casting in that cruze of Salt which I have already exhibited and brought to hand in the second Book where I shewed that whatsoever points of abstruse knowledge occurr in the Schools they are beholding to the Temple for and are but Beams of that Light which Christ or his Spirit in the Prophets communicated to the World the last of which Prophets Writings are near as old as the first of Gentile Philosophers It were endless to enumerate the ecchoes of Christs Law which those Rocks that oppose it so articulately reverberate as a steadily listning Ear may take in the beginning middle and end of every Evangelical Precept from those mock-sounds in Heathen Authors I shall not therefore enlarge this Section with more Instances but conclude it with this Observation That the Adversaries in making reply to our urging them with the excellencie of Christs Law would not have taken that course as puts them upon such self-contradictory Salvoes if they durst for very shame the contrary was so palpable have denied them to be Christs Briefly we find in the Pagan Writers what they took to be Christ's Law and that which they opposed as such is the very same with that that the Gospel presents as such not one Egg is more like another than that Bracelet of Pearls which our Saviour fitted to the necks of his Disciples is to that which these impure Swine trample under their feet CHAP. IV. Every Article of the Apostles Creed to be found as asserted by the Church in those Writings which opposed Christian Religion § 1. Maker of Heaven and Earth § 2. His only Son § 3. Conceived by the Holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary § 4. Suffered under Pontius Pilat c. § 5. Rose again the third day § 6. Ascended into Heaven thence c. § 7. The holy Ghost § 8. Holy Catholick Church c. § 1. 3. THe sum of the Christian Faith taught by Christ and his Apostles is intirely and in every branch of it recorded as such in the Authors that disputed against it For order and brevities sake I shall here instance in the several Articles of it comprised in that most admirable Compendium of it the Apostles Creed which as it has been taken for such by all Christians so it has been opposed as such by all Adversaries Article 1. I believe in God the Father Almighty Maker of Heaven and Earth That this Article as it is now profest by the Church and laid down in the New Testament was from the beginning held forth as a point of that Doctrine which Christ and his Apostles Preach'd and therefore not wrongfather'd upon them is manifest from those quotations out of Pagan Authors who affronted it upon that very account and only Reason because it was Christ's Doctrine Celsus from the practice of the Ophiani Hereticks who worship'd the Serpent as bestowing upon our first Parents the knowledge of good and evil a gift which God envied them as they blasphemously speak objects that Christians contrary to that faith which they profess worship another God than the Creator of all things to wit the Serpent Or. Con. Cels. 5. 16. As Celsus doth here confess that that Doctrine which our Bible exhibites touching Gods prohibiting Adam to eat of the Tree of Knowledge and the Serpents prevailing with Adam to eat of that Tree and the opening of Adam's eyes thereupon to discern good and evil and the Serpents infinuating to Adam that God envied him that knowledge c. was the Doctrine of Christ and his Apostles so his charging upon the Church that impious Practice of these Heriticks misgrounded upon the Churches Faith and which the Church exprest her abhorrencie of was no more equal dealing than that which the Romanists measure out to the British and other Protestant Churches when they lay to her charge the practices of such as are at as great a distance from Communion with her as with them You Christians saith Celsus profess you believe in and worship God the Creator of this Universe but since Plato saith it is hard to find out and know that God and impossible to communicate the knowledge of him to another is it like that you of all other men should attain to the knowledge of this God being fast bound in chains of ignorance so as you cannot see what is pure Idem 7. 14. Compare what the Christians teach with what the Philosophers guess concerning God and the controversie which of us have attained to a more perfect knowledge of God will easily be determined That God created man after his own Image was the Doctrine of Christ and the Primitive Church appears from Celsus his arguing that if the Christans
Proaem Empedocle Plinius sic nobile illud apud Graecos volumen Heraclidis septem diebus feminae exanimis ad vitam revocatae The like does Plutarch report of Aristaeus in his Romulus and of Thespesius de sera numinis vind We have here supererrogated having produc'd Pagan Testimony not only for the proving of matter of Fact to wit that this Article which we now profess was delivered by the Apostles to the Primitive Church but also their Confessions of the possibility of the thing believed § 6. Article 6. He ascended into Heaven and sitteth at the right hand of God The Argument of Christ's Divinity drawn from his assumption into heaven they darken with so great a volly of Examples of their own Hero's as it would tire me to take up those Arrows one by one But that he ascended with that body that was crucified Celsus one while attributed to to delusion it being impossible as he argues that a body can be made immortal that being the Creature of inferiour Nature not of God as the soul is and all other immortal beings This Principle he borrows of the Manichees out of the dispute betwixt Jason and Papiscus concerning Christ lib. 4. cal 22. 23. Another while granting it true he denys it to be a sufficient proof of Christ's Deity because Cleomenes had by what Art God knows obtain'd that agility of body as he could fly up as fast and as far as a dart could even out of sight and that was as far as the Disciples could see Christ ascend But the gift which Christ shed forth after his Ascension spake him to have ascended far above the highest Heavens And as to the truth of this assertion That this was an Article of the Apostolical faith that Christ did ascend into heaven This Epicures carping at it is proof sufficient and his not daring to stand to his first Cavil that it was impossible but flying to another Salvo But it was no more than others before him bad done who yet thereby obtained not the repute of their deserving divine Honours is a tacit Concession to the Truth of the thing it self which is more than I here need to prove I will therefore hasten to the next Article which because of its relation to this I shall annex to the same Section Article 7. From thence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead The Epicurean Beast runs full mouth upon this Article and raiseth this crie It is the common guise of all Fanatick Prophets to profess themselves God or the Son of God or the divine Spirit and to give out such pretences as your Jesus made I am come into the world to save it from those impending judgements that are ready to fall upon it for its sins happy they that believe in me I will appear for their salvation when I come again in glory and great power with the heavenly host at which my coming I will adjudge all that reject me to everlasting Fire and they that now despise my menacies shall then when its too late to repent mourn and lament No Christian Catechist can better express the mind of this Article than this Philosopher here doth lib. 7. cal 3. A man of greater Reading than Celsus will be hard put to it to find one man before Christ's coming who did so much as pretend to his being appointed of God to be the Judge of all men And for those Mock-christ's who afterwards would have rob'd the blessed Jesus of this Prerogative and challeng'd it to themselves not one of them could shew their Commission under Gods hand as he did § 7. Article 8. I believe in the holy Ghost 1. As this implies the Equality and Consubstantiality of the Spirit with the Father and the Son and his being therefore together with them to be worshipped as the Nicen Fathers expound it Porphyrie who for all Celsus his brags that he himself understood the bottom top and middle of our Religion was the best acquainted with our Scriptures both old and new of any Heathen Philosopher parallels it with his Master Plato's Opinion in St. Austin de Civitate 10. 23. quoted by R. vives and thus exprest by Porphyrie as St. Cyril contrà Julianum relates it Plato as well as the Christians held three Subsistences in the divine Essence to wit the All-Good and All-Great God the Father then the Creator God the Son and the third the Soul of the World the holy Ghost Tres Substantias in Essentia divina statuit Deum Opt. Max. deinde Creatorem tertiam Animam Mundi to wit that which moved upon the Waters the Lord and giver of Life as the abovesaid Fathers describe him What Beetle-brow'd Novices in Christianity are the Socinians who will not acknowledge the Revelation of the ineffable sacred Trinity to be communicated in these Evangelical VVritings wherein the Athenian Owls the Pagan Philosophers saw it so plainly exhibited as they not only take notice of it as an Article of our Religion in their Polemical Animadversions but offer to make proof that this point of Doctrine was embraced by their Wisemen even before it was attested by those wonders which God set as his seal for the confirmation of the Gospel So little did they deem it to be against Reason as by the conduct even of Reason they stumbled upon that Divine Notion which the Socinians will not submit their vain Reason to the belief of upon the strongest of all Reasons Divine Revelation proved to be so by the clearest of all evidences the demonstration of power exerted at the first manifest revelation of this Mystery at the Baptism of Christ when the heavens were opened and the Spirit descended upon the Son and a voyce was heard from the Father 2. As it implies still to go along with the same Father the Churches confession of her belief that the holy Ghost spake by the Prophets It is thus assronted by Celsus lib. 8. cal 16. what you boast of the Spirit speaking by your Old and New Testament-prophets we can out-vie if we had a mind to repeat those many Oracles of our Prophets and Prophetesses who sung future things with a Prophetick voice which they suck'd in from the Recesses of the Gods those many which were delivered from the Entrails of Sacrifices and premonstrated from other Prodigies or reveiled by the vive-voyce of the Gods themselves appearing in visible forms How many Cities have been founded by the advice of Oracles and been freed from Famine and Pestilence by following their direction or brought to utter ruine hy forgetting or despising their Counsels How many Colonies have been sent forth upon their Order thriving exceedingly while they followed their counsel To how many Princes and private men has it been fortunate or fatal to observe or sleight them How many barren Women have become fruitful How many maimed persons have recovered the use of their Limbs How many distracted persons the use of their Reason by following the advice of Oracles
have been 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 inopinata praeter omnem expectationem contrà omnium opinionem A word which may seem to have faln into his Pen either from the mouth of the people or the Text of the Evangelist Luke 5. 26. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 we have seen strange things to day unexpected things which we look'd not for from Joseph's Son chap. 4. 22. from him whose Father and Mother and Sisters we know This was the Vulgar Vote though the Christ when he comes will not cannot do greater Miracles than this man doth yet that this man whose Generation we can declare and know it to be so mean should thus speak and work is that which we little expected The whole Nation were now big with expectation of some great Man who should do great Things they looked when the Mountains would bring forth when God would shake the Heavens and thence send the Desire of all Nations while they are thus musing the Branch springs up out of the wither'd Stem the dryed Root of David's Stock without form without comeliness one wherein they could see no beauty here they are as much frustrated of their expectation as those in the Fable were when they saw nothing but a Mouse born of the swelling Mountains But when they see this Mouse gnaw asunder the Cords wherein Satan had kept the Seed of Abraham fast bound when they see this Worm stinging the old Serpent to death when they see this little Stone bearing down all adverse power before it this was as much above what they looked for from so contemptible a Person as his external Form was below that Grandeur they looked for in their Messias Besides Impostures filled their Followers with expectation of great things from them by their boasting of their power to work Miracles they had a Trumpet before them to call men in to see the show Here goes the mighty Power of God who will come and see it exerted was the cry of the Simonists Come with me to the Mount of Olives and I will make the Walls of Jerusalem fall flat to the ground by a Battery of omnipotent Words crys one Go with me to Mount Gerazim there I 'l shew you what has been hid from Ages cries another March with me into the Wilderness and I 'l there do wonders crys another But the Powers of the Kingdom of Heaven exert themselves in the works of our Saviour without ostentation his Miracles I mean those he wrought to convince the Jews before his Passion were unpremeditate and extempore the maladies he kill'd felt the Bullet before the by-standers heard the Crack he rung no Bell to that Dinner he prepared for many thousands of a few Loaves and Fishes his Acts of wonder were without Prologues surprised the Spectators with their suddenness were done before they could forethink he would do them and upon that account 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 strange things they looked not for § 5. And yet Josephus affirms that the Jews had all the reason in the World to expect the doing of such things as Christ did by some Person of note whom God was to raise up for the benefit of that Nation for thus he writes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The divine Prophets having feretold these and other wonderful things concerning him wherein he fully accords with our Evangelists in this main Foundation-point 3. That the Wonders which Jesus of Nazareth wrought were such as the Prophets of God had foretold should be wrought by the Christ when he came A point which is constantly prest by our sacred Historiographers and appealed to by our Saviour in the answer he returned to John the Baptist when he sent his Disciples to enquire whether he were the Christ Go and tell John what you see that the blind see the lame walk the lepers are cleansed the deaf hear the dead are raised c. If these be not the Works assigned to the Messias by the Prophets believe me not that I am he The Miracles that Christ did were not elective Works as those were which false Christs pretended to but fore-appointed and prescribed him by the Spirit of Prophesie and therefore as they point him out to be him that was to come for never man but he applyed himself to work by the Rule of Prophecy and I challenge all Reading to produce one Example of a person beside him that so much as pretended to the doing of those wonders that the Prophets cut out for the Christ. So they clearly evince those VVonders that were reported by common and undoubted Fame in the Age of Josephus to be those very Works of Christ that are specified in the Evangelical History there being none of them but bear this Character are such as the Prophets fore-told the Messias should work and none but those in the Gospel being by any persons fasten'd upon Christ that will abide that Test or have not been reprobated upon that Rule of Trial. The Enemy began betimes to sow the Tares of Forgeries with the good Seed of Evangelical History Some as the Carpocratians reporting other things of Christ than what the Gospel relates upon this pretence that Christ did or taught those things in private to some choice Disciples Irenaeus cont Haeretic lib. 1. And that false Merchant Isidore is not ashamed to feign the holy Bishop Clemens whom St. Paul mentions in his Epistle to the Romans to make the same Plea in his Apostolical Canons Under the same Pretext the Ebionites Gnosticks Carpocratians c. forged the Gospel by St. Thomas St. Andrew St. Philip St. Matthias St. Peter St. Thaddaeus St. James the younger St. Barnaby St. Bartholomew the Book of the Infancy and another of the Nativity of our Saviour of his Mother and her Midwife the Manichees Book called the Foundation Crab. conc tom 1. Gelasii decreta pag. 992. Tertullian in his Prescription against Hereticks affirms that when they could not make good their Conceipts by Scripture they pretended that either the Disciples did not know all that was necessary for the Church Christ telling them he had many things to say unto them which they were not able to bear or else that they did not communicate all they knew to all but that they reserved the greatest Mysteries for them that were perfect Others boasted that what they reported of Christ beside what was contain'd in the Gospel they had from the Apostles by word of mouth This was Artemon's Plea Euseb. 5. 28. Clemens Strom. 7. tells us that Basilides gloried in his having for his Master one Glancias the Interpreter of St. Paul that Valentinus father'd his Fanatick VVhimsies upon Theodate St. Paul's Familiar and that the Marcionites bragged that the Disciples of St. Matthias were their Teachers And Athanasius 2. contrà Arrianos recites this Exordium of a writing of Arrius I have heard these things of the Elect of God of the most knowing and even paced servants of God These they called Depths of knowledge but Christ calls
de emend temp 6. tit quinta pascha pag. 561. being faln into a grievous and in humane appearance incurable Disease sent a Messenger to Jesus with a supplicatory Letter that he would please to come and heal him of these contents Abgarus Prince of Edessa to the propitious Saviour that hath appeared in the Flesh in the Confines of Jerusalem health I have heard of those miraculous Cures which thou doest without application of Medicines and Herbs for it is reported that thou givest sight to the blind causest the lame to walk cleansest the Leprous castest out Devils and unclean spirits curest the most inveterate sicknesses and recallest the dead to life from which I conclude one of these two things that either thou art God come from Heaven and doest those things or the Son of God that bringest such things to pass wherefore by these my Letters I beseech thee to take the pains to come and cure me of my malady wherewith I am sore vexed I have heard moreover that the Jews murmur against thee and go about to mischiefe thee I have here a little City and an honest people which will suffice us both To this Jesus sends this Reply Blessed art thou Agbarus because thou hast believed in me when thou sawest me not for it is written of me that they which see mee shall not believe in me that they which see me not may believe and be saved Concerning that which thou writest unto me that I would come unto thee I let thee understand that all things touching my Message are here to be fulfill'd and after the fulfilling thereof I am to return to him that s 〈…〉 me But after my Assumption I will send one of my Disciples unto thee who shall cure thy Malady and restore life to thee and them that be with thee Out of the same Records Eusebius reports how after our Lords Ascension Thaddaeus one of the seventy was sent to Edessa who cured and converted Agbarus and preach'd the Gospel to his Subjects c. I know that Gelatius in a Council of 70 Bishops Crab. Con. Tom. 1. decret Gelasti pag. 993. decreed those Epistles Apochryphal as he did also the VVritings of Tertullian and Eusebius his Ecclesiastical History to prevent their being received with the like reverence wherewith we embrace the Canonical Scripture but neither he nor any body else either Christian or Pagan question'd the Truth of this Relation till Nicephorus discredited it by his forged additions of Christs sending his Picture to Agbarus drawn on an Handkerchiefe and of the strange Effect that Image had when that City was besieged and those other ridiculous storyes relating to that business The Sceptick I know will except against these last Allegations that their Originals are not extant in answer to which I commend to the Umpirage of common Reason these Queries 1. Whether it stand with Reason that men who stood so much upon their credit as the ancient Christians did would appeal to common Records for the probat of these things had they not then been to be read in those Authors or Chronicles out of which they made their Allegations 2 By what means it came to pass that the Adversaries of our Religion who lived upon the place and had opportunity enough to-examine those Quotations and whom interest would have prompted to enquire into these things did not make their exceptions against the Apologists of the Christian Cause 3. Whether the Christian Church or the Pagan Adversaries were most like to obliterate those Antiquities the Christian whom they favour'd or the Pagan whom they confuted considering what artifices Julian the Apostate used to suppress Learning forbidding Christians to be trained up in prophane Literature Ec. Hist. 3. 10. Socratis Scholast which Facts of Julian Ammianus Marcel though a great admirer of him and the Pagan Religion condemns as worthy to be buried in eternal silence Illud autem inclemens obruendum perenni silentio quod arcebat docere magistros rhetoricos grammaticos ritus Christiani cultores Am. Marcel 22. 10. As that whereby Julian designed to deprive the Christians of the knowledge of those Pagan Writings and Records out of which the Christian Apologists had collected such palpable Testimonies for the defence of Gospel-history and to bury the Originals out of which they had made their Quotations in perpetual oblivion as advantagious to our Cause by their confessing the Truth of the Matter of Fact Lactantius by name whose scope was Quia nondum capere poterat divina prius humana testimonia ethnico offerre id est Philosophorum Historicorum ut suis potissimùm refutaretur Authoribus quo si eruditi homines se conferre caeperint evanituras brevi religiones fallas Because the Heathen World was yet uncapable of Divine first to offer it Humane Testimonies of Heathen Philosophers and Histories that it might at least be confuted by its own Authors Which method if Learned men would take false Religions would quickly vanish See more in Eusebius his Apology for Origen where he shews how he and other Christian Doctors foil'd the Pagans at their own Weapons and Dionysius the Areopagite his Epistle to Polycarp For not dealing in this way but by Texts of sacred Writ with Demetrianus Lactantius blames St. Cyprian Lact. de justicia l. 5. c. 4. Let Julian who was thus careful to suppress Pagan records bring up the Rear of Gentile Witnesses to the Truth of the Evangelical Writings as to their being rightly Father'd upon those Authors whose Names they bear who as Cyril Contra Julianum lib. 10. testifieth Apertè fatetur Petri Pauli Mathaei Marci Lucae esse ea quae Christiani legunt iisdem nominibus inscripta confesseth That the Books which the Christians read inscribed with the names of Peter Paul Mathew Mark Luke are the genuine Writings of those men § 5. I should put the utmost of my Readers patience to trial should I shew the Prints of Old-Testament-stories in the Antiquities of the Heathen I will therefore content my self with these few particulars and for the rest refer him to Blundel Vossius c. The History of Joseph was presented in the Aegyptian Apis saith Ruffinus lib. 2. historiae Ecclesiast and produceth Pagan Writers affirming that a certain King or Steward of Aegypt in a time of Famine relieved the people out of his Storehouses to whom therefore after his Decease they built a Temple wherein an Ox was kept at the publick Charge as an Embleme of the best Husbandman a creature saith Diodorus Siculus l. 1. cap. 2. exceeding helpful to Husbandmen which Varro l. 2. c. 5. de re rusticâ stiles the Husbandman's Companion and the servant of Ceres Upon which consideration was grounded that Athenian Law that no man should kill an Oxe that Plowed the ground 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Because he is a kind of Husbandman and a partaker with man in his labour Aelianus var. hist. l. 5. c. 14. and therefore Appianus de belis Mithridat makes it an
particulars as Symmachus in that conference tell Lamprius that he had transcribed all those things out of the Mysteries of the Hebrews § 7. The same Author de solertia animalium interweaves the Story of Deucalion with the mention of a Dove which being sent out of the Ark by her returning gave notice that the Flood was not yet allay'd and by her not returning when she was sent out the second time signified that the Waters were abated This Story of Noah's Ark and the Flood saith Josephus antiq lib. 1. all Gentile Writers mention Berosus the Caldaean Hieronimus the Egyptian Muaseus also and many more and Nicholas Damascenus lib. 96. The History of Eden's Apples and the Serpent is manifestly recorded by Hyginus in his Poeticon astronomic titulo serpens That of Balaams Ass is plainly couch'd in his Story of that Ass which Bacchus rode upon to the Oracle of Dodona which spake with Man's voyce and disputed with Priapus about Nature titulo Aselli And that of Sampson's conquering the Philistines with the Jaw-bone of an Ass which God shewed him as plainly in his relation how that Hercules being opprest with multitudes of Barbarians and having spent all his Arrows Jove taking pitty of him procured a great many Stones to lay at his feet wherewith he defended himself and put the Barbarians to flight titulo Ergonasia Menander in the Gests of Ithobal King of Tyre Ahabs Contemporary speaks of that Drought that happened in Ahab's Reign Joseph antiquit l. 8. cap. 7. The same Author contrà Appionem lib. 1. sheweth how the Truth of the Jewish Histories was attested to by forreign Writers even of such Nations as most hated and emulated the Jews and produceth the Tyrian Annals in confirmation of Solomon's building the Temple of his being aided therein by Hiram of his wise Questions and Answers there being then when Josephus wrote in the Tyrians hands many Letters which Solomon and Hiram wrote one to another for which also he alledgeth the History of Dius concerning the Phenicians But I refer my Reader for fuller satisfaction in this point to that excellent Defender of the Jewish Antiquities Josephus himself who not only in his Discourse against Appron but in his Jewish Antiquities lib. 1. prosecutes this Argument quoting Abydenus writing the same Story that Moses doth touching the Flood And Marethus Berosus Molus Hestiaeus Hieronimus Egyptius the Phenician Chronicles Hesiod Hecataeus Elaricus Acasilaùs Ephorus and Nicholas affirming that the Ancient Heroes lived 1000 years for that they being the friends of God and using a more wholesome Diet than could he had after the Flood must in Reason be supposed to live longer than their Successors and besides that they might find out Arts profitable for future Generations as Astrology Geometry c. they had a longer life bestowed upon them seeing it was not possible that they could observe the several Faces of the Stars in less than six hundred years which space is therefore called the great year of Revolution And Abydenus for the proof of Moses his History of the building of the Tower of Babel And Sibyl for the Confusion of Languages thus speaking When men were all of one Language they attempted to build a Tower that might reach up to Heaven but the Gods beat down the Tower with Tempests which from the wonderful Confusion of Tongues was called Babel And Hestiaeus making this mention of the Plain of Sinar The Priest who escaped sacrificed to Jove in the Vale of Sinar and the Language of men being confounded they began to inhabit divers parts of the World But I am weary of transcribing consult Josephus and Eusebius de praeparatione Evangelica lib. 9. cap. 1. whose title is that many forreign Writers have admired the Jewish Nation Cap. 2. The Testimony of Haecateus Cap. 3. The Testimony of Clearchus to Jewish Antiquities Cap. 4. That many forinsick Authors agree with the Truth of the Hebrew History CHAP. X. The Adversaries forced upon very great Disadvantages to their own Cause by reason that they could not for very shame resist the Evidences brought in defence of sacred History § 1. Christ accused of working by the Prince of Devils that Accusation withdrawn in open Court and this Plea put in against him that he made himself a King and therefore was an Enemy to Caesar. § 2. Petty Exceptions rebound upon the heads of their Framers § 3. The Modern Scepticks half-reasons too young to grapple with old Prescription § 4. Christ's Works God's Seal to his Mission § 5. The present Age as able to judge of the Nature of those Works as that was wherein they were done § 6. Aheistical exceptions against particular points of Religion an Hydra's head yet they all stand upon one neck and may be cut off at one blow by proving the Divine original of Religion § 1. THese are all the kinds of Testimonies that Matters of Fact are capable off and so full and impartial as I am sure our Modern Disputers cannot produce the like for the probat of any Matters of Fact except those which we have account of in the Gospel I might therefore here conclude But that I may leave the Sceptick without not only all possibility of Reply but of Excuse for his Pertinacy if he hath the face to question the validity of this Argument I shall add this weighty Consideration That the Adversaries of the Christian Religion in their discoursing upon that Subject were put upon exceeding great inconveniencies meerly upon this Reason because they could not for very shame resist those Evidences were brought in defence of the Evangelical History To begin with the Jewish we find the chief of them consulting what they should do to hinder the Progress of the Gospel when they saw such notable Miracles effected by Christ and his Disciples as could not be denyed and fore saw that the whole World would run after them if some stop were not put to this rowling Stone The first Obstacle they lay in its way was the calumniation of those great Works as being done not by the Finger of God but the Hand of Beelzebub But whatever Prestigiator was read of in any History so qualified as Christ was the Institutor of a Society accomplish'd with all Gravity and Virtue a Praeceptor of most sincere and true Doctrine as Eusebius challengeth the Pagan Objectors Demonst. Evang. 3. 8. The only colour of a proof they bring for this for their Fables of Christ's going into Aegypt to learn Magick of his having the Tetragrammaton sown in his Thigh have not the least shew of Probability was the seeming Contradiction betwixt the Law of Moses and of Christ it being on all hands confess'd that Moses was sent of God and assisted in the Wonders he wrought in confirmation of his Mission by a Divine Power and therefore what Christ did in proof of his Doctrine must needs be as they blasphem'd by a Diabolical But when he attempts at the araignment of our Saviour and
from that Crown at their coming out of Aegypt three hundred years before this demand Why did you not recover them all that while Jud. 11. 26. be grounded as Civilians say upon Principles of natural Honesty Grotius de jure 2. 4. 2. If Isocrates his Plea against resigning up their right in Messina drawn from the Spartans having had the uninterrupted possession thereof from before the erection of the Persian Empire and the building of the greatest part of the Grecian Cities be grounded upon the general Sentiment of all men That Possession confirm'd by long Prescription is as good as inheritance Isocrat Archidamus pag. 287. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And so valid as to dispute against it is branded by Historians as meer babling and beating the Air. Tacitus annal 6. Among whom do these novel Disputers against the Truth of Gospel-History after the Prescription of so many hundreds of years think their Allegations will be of any force but persons that have renounc'd all Principles of Reason Equity Humanity Polity and common Sence I would therefore advise them to bespeak themselves an Audience in the Sister-hood of tatling Gossips and silly Women who are not able to comprehend the weight of that sharp retort of St. Austin restat ut ipsi velint esse testes de Christo qui sibi auferunt meritum sciendi quid loquatur loquendo quod nesciunt August tom 4. pag. 162. de consensu Evang. 1. 8. It remains that we take those mens Testimony of Christ who by speaking those things which they are ignorant of deprive themselves of the benefit of knowing what to speak while I lay open the mortal Wounds which the Jew his not daring to deny the Matter of Fact hath given his Brother in iniquity the Gentile Philosopher who having so much Reason as to think it unreasonable that he who was not an Eye-witness should except against the Evidence of Eye-witnesses touching those things which Eye-witnesses and as great enemies to the Gospel as himself had not been able to make any substantial exception against was forc'd to grant the Truth of the History and had nothing left worthy of a Philosopher to object but this § 4. That the Works Christ did did not speak him to be God but only a good Man and familiar with the Gods by converse with whom he learn'd the Art or obtain'd the Power of working Miracles I use this Dis-junctive because Porphyrie held the faculty of doing Miracles may be attain'd by Art but Jamblychus will have it the free gift of God bestowed on those that are most conformable to and conversant with him exploding all Arts tending that way as Diabolical as Ficinus ex Jamblicho de mysteriis relates pag. 78 79. c. But let them dissent or agree as they please that the stupendious Works of Christ were the effects of Divine Magick and such as he could not have wrought had not God been with him was confest by the unanimous consent of all the Philosophical Opponents of the Christian Faith who all subscribed to that of Porphyrie Porphyrius dixit Christum summè religiosum immortali animâ post corpus incedere animâ sapientiae gratiâ honore affectâ dâ—â—s carâ c. Euseb. demonstr Evang. 3. 8. Who said that Christ was a very religious Person and subsisted after bodily death in an immortal soul a soul exalted to honour for the sake of that wisdom it was indowed with dear to the Gods c. Only they excepted against the Miracles as no sufficient Indications of Christ's Deity nec uâ—â—s competentibus signis tanâ—â— Majestatis indicia clarescunt quoniam larvalis illa purgatio debilium curae reddita vita defunctis haec alia si cogites Deo parva sunt August Volusian Epist. 2. It appears not by any competent signs of a Divine Majesty attending him that your Jesus was God for his casting out of Devils his curing the sick his restoring the dead to life if these and other strange things done by him be duly weighed are too mean for him to manifest his glory by whom you stile the Lord and Governour of the Universe said the Gentile Philosophers in that Conference of which Volusianus gave St. Austin an Account I will not so far anticipate my intended discourse about Christ's Miracles as here to give a full Answer to this Argument but only glance at that which St. Austin returns him It 's true indeed such things as these have been done by men Elias and Elisha raised the dead 1 Reg. 17. 22. 2 Reg. 4. 36. but whether the Heathen Magicians ever raised any from death let them inquire who will needs maintain Apuleius did so contrary to that defence himself makes against the imputation of that as a Crime To be sure in his being born of a Virgin in his raising himself from death in his Ascension into Heaven he out did all men And he that thinks these things too mean for God I cannot tell what he can expect more except he thinks Christ should have done such things as are inconsistent with his being made Man In the beginning was the word and the word was with God and the word was God and all things were made by him Ought he therefore being made Man to have made another World to convince men that he was he by whom the World was made But a greater than this or one equal to this could not have been made in this World and had he either made another World out of this the making of that would have been no evidence to the Inhabitants of this for it would have been out of their sight or a less World than this in this the Sceptick would have had the same objection that it was less than became God to make seeing therefore it was not meet he should make a new World he made new things in the old World his Virgin-birth his Resurrection and Ascension are works of greater Power perhaps than making the World If here they answer that they do not believe these things what shall we do with such men as contemn the least and dis-believe the greatest of his Miracles They believe he raised the dead because that hath been done by others and that 's too mean for God his taking Flesh of a Virgin and lifting it up from death unto eternal Life above the Heavens is therefore not believed because no man ever did it and its fit for God to do To return to our Heathen Philosophers The Reason they gave why they thought those things reported of Christ in the Gospel not clear enough evidences of his Deity was because some of those amongst themselves who were reputed most holy Men had done the like things and therefore Christ being a very wise and holy Person and who convers'd intimately with God might obtain that favourable Gift at the bountiful hand of Heaven What an infinite disparity both in respect of the things done and the credibility of the stories there is betwixt the
will attest the intire sum and compleat form of sound Words to have been from Heaven For God by granting Miracles to be wrought by Christ and his Apostles in Christ's Name did immediately seal to Gods sending Christ and Christ's sending his Apostles as Heavens Plenipotentiaries to treat with the World about the Matters of Eternal Life The miraculous descension of the holy Ghost upon our Saviour at his Baptism was to point him out to his Fore-runner John the Baptist as that true Light which according to Prophecy and the general expectation of the Jews was come into the World he it is upon whom thou shalt see the Spirit descend Upon seeing of which and hearing that voyce from Heaven This is my well-beloved Son the Baptist asserts him to be that Prophet which God promised to send to communicate his whole pleasure to the sons and daughters of men Christ's transformation in the holy Mount was to confirm the three Apostles in the Truth of that Voyce they heard This is my Son hear him that is whatever he shall speak in my Name what terms soever he shall propound to the World what way soever he shall chalk out to reconciliation let them be observ'd let no other be expected For I have made him my Ambassadour and given him full power to treat with the World When the Apostles returned from working Miracles the Question that Christ propounded to them was Whom do men say I am and the question he put to such as upon hearing or seeing the miraculous Cures he wrought on others applyed themselves to him for Cure was Believest thou that I am be Infinite Examples might be produc'd But this Proposition Miracles do immediately confirm the Divine Authority of the Speaker and consequently the Truth of whatsoever he delivers is so evident as it needs no proof 4. Lastly Matters of Fact granted and the Supernaturalness of any one thing done in confirmation of the Gospel proved affords Christians of the meanest Capacities ability sufficient to confirm themselves in a full assurance of the Truth of all Gospel assertions to convince the subtilest Gain-sayers as that Laick did the Arrians in the Council of Nice and to answer all Objections that ever were made or can be invented from those seeming absurdities impossibilities contradictions c. which the wittiest Sophister can make himself believe he finds in the Evangelical Religion For there cannot be yea and nay with God nor any thing impossible to him to whom it is possible to raise the dead and to do such stupendious Works as were wrought for the demonstration of the Divine Authority of the Gospel Si Ratio contrà Scripturarum authoritatem redditur quamlibet acuta sit fallit verisimilitudine nam vera esse non potest rursùs si manifestissime certaeque rationi velut Scripturarum authoritas objicitur non intelligit qui hoc facit non Scripturarum sensum ad quem penetrare non potest sed suum potiùs objicit veritati nec quod in eis sed quod in seipso velut pro eis invenit opponit August Marcellino Ep. 7. If Reason be alledged against the Authority of divine Scripture be it never so acute it is not true but deceives us with an appearance of Truth with a shadow of Reason Again if the Authority of Scripture seem to oppose manifest and certain Reason he that alledgeth that Authority does not understand the Text he quoteth and objects against that Truth which Reason presents not the sence of Scripture which he is not able to dive into but his own conceipt Neither doth he oppose against such Reason what he finds in the Text but his own gloss and Comment which he frames to himself And therefore when that Affricane Light thought he found any thing in Scripture that seemed contrary to Truth he concluded That it was but either a shew of Truth or a shew of Scripture and that either the Copy was corrupt or the Translation false or that he himself did not understand the Text aright August Hieron Ep. 19. vel mendosum ese codicem vel interpretem non esse assecutum quod dictum est vel me minimè intellexisse The same Purity and infinite Perfection of the Divine Nature that makes it impossible for God to lye makes it impossible that he should give his approbation and the Imprimatur to a self-contradicting absurd or unreasonable Book § 6. Judicious Plutarch in his Treatise of the Fortune of Alexander compares his attempt to subdue the World to Hercules his Combat with Hydra in that though he had no sooner dispatch'd one War but another sprung up yet by searing the places of the neck where the heads grew which he cut off he prevented the pullulation of fresh heads from those places that is by fortifying the places he gain'd with Garrisons he prevented the rising of the conquer'd at his back by which means at last he conquer'd all Nations Of like difficulty and immense labour is the undertaking to subdue Atheism in an heart posfest with which is a world of Devices and a Tongue prompted by such an heart is a World of Iniquity if not Epicurean infinite Worlds Jacob. 3. 6. Three of this Hydra's most lofty and blasphemous Heads are already dispatch'd and the Topicks whence they were rais'd the necks on which they grew sear'd by so feeling an application of each Argument to the Serpents only beloved temporal and earthly concerns as it may be hoped his delicacy will hardly indure the pain of a new fracture in those tender parts by the reviving of those Arguments against the Gospel which speak him a mere Novice in the great affairs of the World and not to know the State of that virile Age of the Roman Empire when the Gospel was first publish'd or render him uncapable of knowing when to hum when to kiss in a Play-house or of maintaining his right to what he challengeth as his Fathers Heir as his Mothers Son It may be some daunting to the Atheists some encouragement to the Church to see so many heads lye gasping at the feet of the meanest of her Sons And perhaps satisfie the expectations of modest persons as to what my Title promiseth to see three of those Horns that have with the greatest spite and disdain been pushing at the Gospel cast out by one so unskilful a Carpenter A work for three of the ablest Artists for God allows to every Horn a Carpenter Zech. 1. 20. Had this Monster no more Horns than Zechary saw in that prophetical Vision had this Hydra no more heads than Alexander's World had Kingdoms than that Lernean Serpent which Hercules flew had heads be they seven according to Naucrates Erythraeus nine according to Zenodotus or fifty according to Heraclides Ponticus his opinion my success hitherto might give me hopes at last to excind the last of them But how many Heads this Monster of Monsters hath he only knows before whom Hell is bare-fac'd and who searcheth the above-measure
Where not only as to their Operation but Being are the Gods of Hamath and of Arphad Where are the Gods of Sephervaim Hena and Iva shall I say or the Gods of Europe Asia Affrica The Aegyptian Nile spawned Fish-Gods their Land brought forth Gods of Grass and Gods that eat Grass their Air was darkned with vollies of winged Deities In Greece the Genius of every species of Animals and Vegetives In Rome Pallor and Terror the Fever and Jaundice grew into Gods They had their he and she-deities for Conception Birth Puberty Marriage Merchandice c. Gods of the Closet of the Market Gods of the Close-stool and Chamber-pot such as 't is a wonder their own Jove did not thunder-strike the adorers of such as one would think Hercules might have scar'd into the holes of the earth with the shadow of his Club or blown away with his Fly-flap But that in the Exile of the lawful Soveraign every one has an equal right to the Crown and in that parity there is not a chip to chose betwixt a Peer and a Peasant a Calf will serve the Israelites for a God when they have forgot him that brought them out of Aegypt When men delight not to retain the Former of all things in their mind every Man will be a God-wright and frame an Image of the Deity of any thing that comes off the Wheel of his ever-running Imagination Yea Philosophy it self in those Times of Ignorance could not castrate the rank Fancies of Democritus and Epicurus of this prolifick God-teeming humour but that they spawn'd as many Gods that is eternal Beings as there are Atoms in their conceipted infinite Worlds In which particular I should think Laertius and Tully to have wronged their memories If I did not see in this Age of improved Learning and divine Light some mens Wind-mill-heads grinding the God head of the one eternal into as many and small grains as there are moats in the Universe If I did not see those Leviathans who make sport with and take their pastime in deriding the Notions of created Spirits and of the adorable Trinity of Persons in that one uncreated Essence as finding no bottom of that immense Ocean which Faith makes fordable to the meanest Christian themselves introducing an Hypothesis of more Spirits for take Divisibility from Matter and nothing remains but an Incorporeal Substance and he that talks of a crooked an hooked a three-corner'd Atome may with as much reason tell us of a Square or Triangular Circle except he can impose upon the World a new Grammar as well as Philosophy or perswade all Greece to forget its Mother-tongue than can stand betwixt York and Lancaster I could make infinite more room for them upon the Cartesian Ground but that is a Field large enough for all the Host of Heaven to incamp in and I shall enlarge their Quarters in my Reflections upon the other Hypothesis which the Doctrine of Atoms introduceth to wit as many Persons in the One Eternal Being as many distinct individual Subsistencies in the one Essence of Eternal Matter as we can imagine Moats in the Sun-beams should they dart themselves ten hundred thousand millions of times further upwards towards the Emperial Heaven than they do downwards to this Globe of Earth and spread themselves round about that vast Circumference in comparison of which this of our habitation is but an Atome For give Eternity to Matter and you give it the Essence of God make it subsist in Atomes each one distinguish'd from another and the result will be so many distinct Subsistencies in that one Essence Give to these Subsistencies a power of moving themselves which you must grant them or say they are moved by another and what can be elder than Eternity or by Chance Chance must be then before them and it must be the life of Reason and that will make e-every Atome an individual Person a Rational Hypostasis So that instead of God the Father Son and Holy Ghost subsisting in one undivided eternal Godhead This new Divinity commends to us more millions of divine Persons than could be reckon'd up in an age should all the men of that Age betake themselves all their life to their Counters That which we interpret A Troop cometh in the Story of Gad's Birth Gen. 30. 11. some Hebrews expound Fortune cometh upon which our learn'd Antiquary expends the first Chapter of his 1 Syntagme de Dais Syriis I will not undertake to determine which is the best Translation perhaps they may both stand with that Text though not better than their conjunction would suit the Birth of the Doctrine of Atomes For since Leah that blear-eyed purblind Epicuraean Philosophy grown under the Age of the Gospel past child-bearing hath upon the knees of her handmaid Zilpah Modern Atheism brought forth into the Christian Air her Son Gad or Fortune as that which made the eternal Atomes so happily meet as to fall into all those comely Forms whereof the World consists Gad or a Troop comes shall I say or a Legion or a Myriad of Troops of Deities God the crooked God the hooked God the obtuse God the sharp God the long God the short Atome for it would be a taking of that Name in vain to apply it to those infinite Forms into which those mens Fancies cast those eternal Beings which notwithstanding they call Atoms with a far greater Solecism than he committed with his Finger who pointed it to the Earth when he was speaking of the glorious Furniture of Heaven and shall rather bestow my time in transcribing that Exclamation which our divine Poet snbjoynes to the History of those and such like vanities of the Polytheists Ah! what a thing is Man devoid of Grace Adoring Garlick with an humble face Begging his food of that which he may eat Starving the while he worshippeth his meat Who makes a Root his God how low is he If God and man be sever'd infinitelie What wretchedness can give him any room Whose House is foul while he adores his Broom Let my stammering Muse add Nor dares not sweep't least from his foot arise So many Motes so many Deities Certainly Epicurus if he were true to his own Principles must have been a nasty Sloven and one whose disciples well deserv'd that compellation which the Satyrist gives them Epicuri de grege porci The Hoggs of Epicurus his Stie For he and his Litter of Followers must lie battening in their own Dung for fear of disquieting that eternal Matter a thing which the Deity does most abominate in their opinion and therefore does not interest it self in the affairs of the World but busies it self in dancing and frisking about and suffers it self to be carried whither Fortune pleaseth and not the Scavinger's Broom or Dung-rake I do not call Cartesius an Atheist though doubtless his Philosophy has made many but I think I may well enough call his a Feminine Philosophy in comparison of that of Plato or Aristotle grounded upon Principles
which actuated the Divining Faculty of the Mind as the Light doth the Eye and made it exert it self in prophesying which in time were either wasted or diverted to some other place as it happens to Fountains which in length of time either dry up or flit by reason that the subterranean Fire which distills them either goes quite out for want of fuel or Creep after its fomes till it meet with matter enough to feed it and caverns long enough to be Limbecks for such distillations A Salvo which is neither broad enough for the sore for it cannot be a sufficient reason why all the Oracles should at once be silenc'd nor consist with common Principles touching those delusive Responds and exploded by Cicero de divinat nor comparable to that which the Christian brings and the Oracle of Apollo himself was forc'd to acknowledge though so much against his will As when the obstinate Pagans would not rest satisfied with that answer but labour'd to overcome his obstinate silence and by Charms extort a better Respond from his Tripos that he might be no longer forc'd to speak so much to his own disgrace he stifled his Prophetess whom against her will they thrust into the Cave when by all ordinary dumb shows he had first exprest his dislike of their making enquiry at his Oracle the Victim standing still as without sense at the first libations and scarce shrugging when they rain'd powr'd whole showers of water upon him What could the poor dumb Idol do more towards the rebuking the madness of the enquirers that would still be asking questions of him after he had so often and with so much passionate grief told the world he was tongue-tied from giving any other answer then this That he was forbid by an higher power the Hebrew Child whom all Gods are commanded to obey and worship to give answers What could the poor dumb Beast do more towards the stopping them in that prohibited way than to stand stone still neither winnying as we say in the North nor wagging the Taile neither tossing her horns nor shaking her ears when water was poured on her head it being a received Maxim in the Pontifical Schools That when the Libations proceeded not Canonically it was an infallible sign of the aversion of the Daemon of his dislike of what they were about Capram argui frigida affusa si non moveatur Non enim esse animae secundùm naturam affectae non moveri atque affici cum libamenta inverguntur Constanter verum est litare signum esse exiturae sortis non litando demonstrari responsum nullum exiturum iri Plut. ibid. 677. And a Principle with the Delphick Priests that if the Sacrifice during the libation did not furiously rage and fling about not her head only but her whole body it was a demonstration that Apollo would give no answer had no mind to speak at that time Quos perdere vult Jupiter dementat whom God intends mischief to he takes sense from and therefore though the G 〈…〉 sullen stupidity spake Apollo's sullen silence yet Pythia must down into the Cell she must take the question and fit brooding upon the Tripos to hatch an Answer but no Answer she receives from the Daemon saving that which stopt her own breath and all future access to Delphos For at her first entrance into the prophetick Cave she was replete with a malignant and dumb Spirit and by hideous shrieks exprest she was not able to bear the burthen of the enraged Daemon by whom after she had been every way tost she was at last hurl'd up to the mouth of the Den in so ghastly a posture and with so terrible a clamour as frighted away not only the inquirers but the whole College of the Priests and Nicander the Wizzard This is the last news we hear in Pagan Authors of the Delphick Oracle § 6 Of the hitherto-accomplishment of the last Branch of those kind of prophetick Texts viz. That where the Gospel comes it utterly abolisheth all Pagan Idols so as they shall never get footing there again our eyes may inform us if we carry them through those Countries where Christian Religion hath once been establish'd though many of them have by publick Sanction since exploded it yet we shall find Christ still keeping possession of those Countries by parties professing the Gospel there in all Mahometan Nations there is a remnant of Christians And though Christian Religion be discountenanced by the Secular Power yet hath there not been any where a restauration of any of the Pagan Gods or any God allowed to be worship'd but the God of Israel the God that made Heaven and Earth Though the Christian World be deplorably immers'd in Metophorical Idolatry of Pride and Self-adoration of Avarice and making Gold its hope and delight of sensuality and making a God of the Belly which is in us the same translated foolery that the worshipping of Garlick was in the old Aegyptians Though the School-doctrine touching the worshiping of Angels Images and Saints departed bids fair for the restauration of the Pagan Doctrine of Daemons and would bring the vulgar into extream peril of as gross as senseless Idolatry as any the Heathens committed if it were practised which I add because I think the veriest Ideot a wiser man than to follow the Dictates of those great Clarks who always musing in their Cells bring forth sometimes through want of concourse with men as inform Notions as those lumps of Flesh or concealed Menstrâ—a's which some Virgins are delivered of without the knowledge of Man when the Passive Seed of that Sex betaking it self to the Matrix obstructed and wanting the Plastick male Sperm to digest it into form piles it self into a rude heap So monstrous are some of the Issues of these mens brains brought forth upon this subject as Cassander that wise and yet zealous Papist cannot lick them into any tollerable or practicable Form and therefore adviseth Charles the Fifth that Biel's Doctrine which substitutes the Virgin Mary or other Saints in the Office of Christs Mediatorship might be exploded that those Titles given her of Queen of Heaven Queen and Mother of Mercy our Life our Hope Light of the Church Advocate and Mediatrix might be laid aside that those Liturgical forms wherein a power is ascribed to her to command Christ now Reigning in Heaven might be expung'd Such as these Ora matrem jube filio If you pray to the Mother you command the Son Oh faelix puerpèra Nostra pians scelera June matris impera Redemptori That he would wholly prohibit all ostentation of Reliques and take care that the people might be taught to reverence the true Reliques of Saints only to wit the Examples of their Piety and Vertues And as to the Worshipping of Images he wisheth that the German and Gallican Churches had still persisted in the Opinion of the Ancient Church and of their Progenitors for it is saith he more manifest than that
Infidels into the Abyss The Goats are cast into it after they are convict by the Covenant of Grace White Throne New Heaven and Earth Flames of Fire divided § 6. They that are in Christ rise first but Infidels are first Judged The Objection from their being in termino § 7. The Jews Septimum Millenarium is the eternal Sabbaoth The days of a Tree Isa. 65. 28. The Text Paraphrased § 1 THat this loosing of Satan shall not be till the Dawning of the Day of Judgement touching which I humbly submit to the candid Censure of the Church these my conjectures with my Reasons for them That Text Rev. 20. He shall gather them together from the four corners of the Earth seems to allude to Mat. 24. 31. and to be subsequent to that gathering of the Elect. He shall send his Angels with a great sound of a Trumpet and they shall gather his elect from the four winds and from the one end of the heaven unto the other touching which first gathering of the Elect St. Paul tells us it shall be in order to their meeting of Christ in the day of Judgment at the sound of which Trumpet the dead in Christ shall rise first and then those Christians whom that day shall find alive shall in the twinckling of an eye be changed into the same form and condition of body with those that arose from the Dead and be caught up in the Air to meet Christ. Qui merebantur compendio mortis per demutationem expunctae concurrere cum resurgentibus Tertul. de resur cap. 41. They who obtained by that short cut of death cancel'd by change the priviledge to run together with them that rise to the place of Judgment And the ancient Church generally thought that the Center to which this gathering of the Saints should be is the Valley of Jehoshaphat whither she expected Christ would come to judge the World and in testimony of that her expectation and that she might in all her religious Assemblies be found waiting for that appearance of her Lord and be mindfull of that our general gathering unto Christ she turn'd her face while she worship'd toward that point of the Earth and therefore the sacred Places of Publick Worship were built with their Chancells where the Communion-Table the visible Throne of Grace stood at the East end if the place were Westward but at the West end of their Church if the place were East of that Valley that so in what coast soever the Name of Christ was invocated their Eyes and Minds might be directed thither this is the very reason why the Chancel of the Patriarchall Church of Antioch stood at the West-end and without doubt all the Churches within that Patriarchat that stood East of Judea were conformable to the Mother-Church as that was to the Practise of the Universal which from every point of the Circumference had its Lines drawn to that Navel of the Earth that Center of the general Assembly And therefore Socrates is out in his giving the standing of the Chancel of that Church contrariwise to the Chancels of the European and Natolian Churches for an Instance of the different Usages and Rites of some Churches from others for though in the rest of the Examples that he produceth one Church differ'd from another without breach of Charity or contempt of Religion yet in this Ceremony of looking towards the Valley of Jehosaphat there was an Universal Conformity no Church having so little manners as to turn her breech upon the place of Judgment while she worshipp'd the Judge and made Confession of her belief that she dayly expected his appearance over that place where at his ascension he was taken out of the sight of his Disciples into heaven and his Angels after that assured them that he should so come in like manner as they had seen him go into Heaven Which among other circumstances must imply that of the Place if not mean that above any other For as to other manner of his second Coming it will be with a far greater Train of Angels than they then saw him ascend with and in far greater Glory § 2. The Elect that is all that have profest the Worship of the true God or as David calls them Gods Saints that have made a Covenant with him by Sacrifice being gather'd to the place of Judgment or during their gathering thither For it seems Tertullian thought the Pagans would be at the heels of the rising Saints and that they might not surprise the Saints then living they should be changed in a moment and in the twinkling of an eye be in readiness to march up to the place of Judgement with those that are risen before the Antichristian party both of the then living and immediately to be rais'd could seize upon them Hujus gratiae privilegium illos manet qui ab adventu Domini deprehendentur in carne propter duritias temporum Antichristi moriebuntur compendio mortis c. Tertull. Ibidem This Election I say being gathered or a gathering to the place of Judgements the reprobates that is all Idolaters the whole Pagan World that have lived and died in Gentilism shall be raised and those that are living shall be changed And Satan now let loose the whole Church waiting in the Air the Judges coming will re-enter upon his old Demesne and drive all the Cattle he there finds as his own as weises and strays from the great Shepherd of Souls and perswading them perhaps that he raised them from the dead and would now at last be reveng'd on Christ and his Saints and dequoying them into an opinion that they had a fair opportunity of making havock of the City and People of God altogether of swallowing up the little Flock of Christ at one morsel now they were all in a body and a body so contemptible in comparison of those multitudes which he headed being as the Sand on the Sea-shore or by whatsoever insinuations he will prevail with them to march up under his and his Angels conduct from all parts of the World Gog and Magog tectum intectum as St. Jerom expounds Ezek. 28. and 29 the hidden Climes of the lower the known World of the upper Hemisphere against the holy Land and the Camp of the Saints which while they are encompassing the Judge appears and with that devouring fire that goes before him destroyes them in a moment For they being taken in the act of Rebellion as Cora and his Complices divine justice shall not need to proceed against them in a formal way of trial but the Earth chapt with this Fire of the last Conflagration cleaves asunder opens her mouth and receives them with the dregs of the whole Creation into that Abyss whither that Deluge of Fire to which the Heaven and Earth that now are are reserved shall drive them Judicium quod est retributio pro peccatis omnibus competit judicium quod est discussio meritorum solis fidelibus nullo
the Illumination of Faith could not understand what Christ meant when he spake to them of his Resurrection and were ready to give up their hopes that he was he that should redeem Israel when they saw him giving up the Ghost and hanging down his Head upon the Cross as St. Thomas though he had seen Lazarus rais'd from the dead and heard it reported by credible Witnesses that Christ was risen would not believe it As Celsus Orig. cont Cels. l. 2. cal 41. rather than grant the Truth of the Christian Hypothesis denied the possibility of it As it seemed good to the holy Ghost to confirm the report of Christs Resurrection by all those Signs which the Apostles wrought after his Ascension by the name of the Holy Child Jesus while with great power they gave witness of his Resurrection Acts 4. 33. Yea so much did divine Goodness condescend to Humane imbecility as to give a fuller proof of that point so far above Reasons comprehension and much more out of the Sphere of Natural Power than the report of Eye-witnesses than the Confession of Adversaries than the Seal of those Miracles afforded by that Grace that was upon all the Publishers and fell upon all the Receivers of that Doctrine a Grace enabling them to live up to the Gospel and to bring forth those Fruits of Holiness Righteousness Temperance Meekness as sufficiently commended to the morallized part of the World that Root of Faith from whence they issued as far outstript the most glorious glittering productions of the Moral Philosophers as infinitely transcended the results of fantastick Credulty and put all other Religions to the blush at the sight of their own impotency CHAP. XII The Supernatural Power of Salvifick Grace § 1. The Church triumphs over the Schools § 2. Christianity layes the Axe to the Root § 3. The Rule imperfect before Christ. § 4. The Discipline of the Schools was without Life and Power § 5. Real exornations before Verbal Encomiums § 1. HEre Christian Reader I must crave thy help and beg thy aid towards the convincing the World of the Divine Original of Christian Religion which though it apparently bear the stamps of heavenly Wisdome in its Prophecies of in finite Power in its Miracles commends it self more to the Consciences of men by engaging its Fautors to a Conversation answerable to its Sacred Rules than by affording the most substantial Grounds of discoursing in its Defence by any other Arguments Religion is better maintain'd by Living than Disputing A Gospel-becoming Converse falls under the Observation and speaks to the Hearts of all men even of those who are not able to fathom the depth nor feel the ground of the most rational verbal Discourse well exprest by the Apostle of the Circumcision 1 Pet. 3. 1. Dr. Hammond annot in the Argument whereby he perswades Christian Matrons to be in subjection to their own though Gentile Husbands that if any obeyed not the Word submitted not to the Gospel upon the Demonstration of the Spirit and of Power they also without the Word which the Apostles preach'd in confirmation of the Resurrection of Christ might be won by the Conversation of their Wives while they beheld their chaste Conversation that Modesly which the true fear of God Christian Religion which alone rightly Disciplines persons in that fear taught them In his motive 1 Pet. 2. 12 13. to Christian Subjects to yield obedient subjection to their Heathen Magistrates and in that point particularly to lead an honest life among the Gentiles that whereas they were evil spoken of as Jews by reason of the turbulency and frequent rebellions of their Countrymen the Gentiles might see that Christian-Jews were of another spirit than the rest of that Nation and upon that account might revere them for their good works and glorifie God the Author of a Religion that had made them so much more meek regular and quiet under the Heathen Government which was over them than the other Jews were when the Proconsuls should be sent to make enquiry of the Commotions made by the unbelieving Party of that Nation It was by this Argument that the old Laic-Confessor silenc'd convinc'd and converted that proud and subtile Philosopher who bore up himself against all the Reasonings of the Learned Teachers of the Nicence Council Crab. tom 1. pag. 249. In the name of Jesus Christ saith he O Philosopher hear the Dictates of Truth There is one God Maker of Heaven and Earth who Created all things visible and invisible by the power of his Word and confirm'd them by the Sanctity of his Spirit This Word therefore which we call the Son of God having mercy on Mankind vouchsafed to be born of a VVoman to converse with Men and die for them and will come again to give sentence upon the Lives of all men By the belief of those things we Christians are freed from Error and from that Religion wherein Men live like Beasts into a state of living like Men. Upon this the Philosopher cries out that he is a Christian and assures his Fellows he was drawn to it not upon light grounds but by that ineffable Vertue which attended the embracing of Christianity In this Argument the ancient Patrons of the Christian Cause triumph'd over all other Religions and Disciplines The Christian Churches saith Origen contr Cels. lib. 3. cal 8. compared with other Societies are really the Lights of the VVorld who is there that must not confess if he make an impartial collation of them that the worst part of the Church excells vulgar assemblies for the Church of God at Athens for instance is meek and quiet c. the Pagan Assemblies seditious turbulent c. And to that Calumny of Celsus that the Christians invited the worst of sinners Origen makes this Reply that the Christian Philosophy did dayly reform the most degenerate Natures not by converting one or two in so many Ages as Phaedo who coming Piping hot out of the Stewes into Plato's School took those impresses from his Doctrine as Plato in his Dialogues brings Phaedo in discoursing of the Immortality of the Soul Or Palemon who by attending to Philosophical Discipline became of a Ruffian so temperate as he succeeded Xenocrates in his School but great multitudes Christs Fishers of men caught them by whole shoales when these Philosophical Anglers drew them up by unites Tertullian apolog 46. outvies the greatest Philosophers with common Christians Thales one of the seven VVisemen could not satisfie Craesus when he askt him what God was but required time for the return of an answer and the more he thought upon it was further off from finding a solution when every Mechanick Christian hath found and can shew all that can be askt concerning God though Plato says the framer of the Universe is neither easie to be found out nor to be exprest If we compare them in point of Chastity we read that one part of the Attick sentence against Socrates condemn'd him of Sodomy
fifteenth of Tiberius wherein our great High Priest was officiating in the Temple and within the Veil of his Flesh It is Doctor Lightfoot's Observation that St. John in that half hours silence alludes to the People waiting silently at the Door while the Priest was officiating in the holy place Peace was then continued for other thirty Years even unto the fourth of Nero It remains now that we prove that during that last thirty Years of silence the Line of the Gospel was drawn out not only through all the Earth the Land of Jury but to the ends of the World the utmost Bounds of the Roman Pale Would the Atheist for proof of this acquiess in sacred Testimony I would alledge that of St. Paul Ro. 15. 19. where he writes that in his own line he had proceeded from Jerusalem the Center round about unto Illyricum fully preaching the Gospel so as he had no place left in those parts over which the Line of some Apostle had not been sttretch'd And then leave him to compute though St. Paul labour'd more than they all and therefore must have twelve to one reckoned to his proportion how far the lines of all the rest were stretched out before the general Peace was broke seeing the single Line of one of them had reach'd so far in Nero's second Year as Doctor Lightfoot dates that Epistle But to deal with the Atheist at his own Weapon I shall urge him with the Testimony of Tacitus who having occasion thereof ministred to him from Nero's charging Christians with the setting Rome on fire speaks of our Religion as famously known and by multitudes embrac'd at Rome long before that bloody Edict in Nero's twelfth The common People saith he call them Christians from one Christ who in the Reign of Tiberius was put to death by Pontius Pilate Governour of Judaea whose Religion though by Edicts suppressed presently upon its appearance yet grew under those Weights and brake out again not in Judaea only where it had its Original i. e. the Center whence its Line was drawn but even in Rome it self having reached so far and got so many Proselytes as though the Vulgar looked upon Christians as Persons of an execrable Religion as Enemies to Humane Kind and deserving the Extremities of most inhumane Afflictions and Punishments yet there was none of them so hard hearted as not to relent to see such huge Multitudes of them led to the Slaughter grieving that so much humane though as they thought Malignant blood should be poured out Tacit. annal 15. 233. Ergo abolende rumori Nâ—ro subdidit reos quaesitissimis paenis affecit quos per stagitium risos vulgus Christiarios appellabat auctor ejus nominis Christus qui Tiberio imperitante per procuratorem Pontium Pilatum supplicio affectus erat repressaque in praesens exitiabilis superstitio rursus erumpebat non modo per Judaeam originem ejus whence their Liâ—e went out sed per Urbem etiam Igitur primo correpti qui fatebantur deinde Ingens eorum multitudo haud perinde in crimine incendâ—â— quam odio humani generis connicti sunt unde quanquam adversus sontes novissima exempla meritos miseratio oriebatur Nay to that height was Christian Religion grown at Rome in the beginning of Nero's Reign as Suetonius Sueton. Nero 16. reckons his making Edicts for the suppressing of it among those Reformations he made at his coming to the Crown It will be in vain to urge to our Scepticks St. Paul's Testimony that the Gospel had got footing in Nero's Family yet it may perhaps seem to him less improbable that that Grain of Mustard-seed should sprought up in that barren Soil and malignant Influence if he be minded of the State of Affairs under Aurelian and that in spight of that Juncture our Religion so throve even in the Court as he suspects the Christian Party even among his Senators impeded the passing of the Decree for consulting the Sibylline Books when the Marcomanni invaded the Empire by that handsome Evasion that the Emperour was so valiant as he needed not consult the Gods which though Vopiscus interprets as a point of Flattery yet the Emperour laid it to another Father in that Letter he sent to the Senate to hasten their passing that Decree in these words transcribed by Vopiscus Miror vos sancti Patres tamdiu de aperiendis Sibyllinis dubitasse libris perinde quasi in Christianorum ecclesia non in Templo Deorum omnium tractaretis I wonder holy Fathers that you should be so long debating the question whether Sybill ' s Books in this Exigent should be consulted like as if you were handling this point in the Church of Christians and not in the Capitol the Temple of all the Gods If he had reason to suspect there was so great a Party in his Council of Christians so soon after the persecution raised by Valerianus as they might possibly impede the passing of that Decree what reason have we to conceive it unlikely that Christ should have his Church in Nero's House Vopiscus Aurelian And if notwithstanding the opposition it there found Christianity had gained that rooting in Rome it selfe as so huge a number dare seal the truth of it with their dearest Blood I dare refer it to all unbiassed Minds to think how it must spread in those parts of the Empire that were nearer Judaea as the main body of it was and less under inspection and then to pass their judgment whether Heathen History does not Eccho to that of the Apostle where he saith that not only the Christian Faith was known at Rome but the Faith of the Roman Christians was famous through the World at his writing his Epistle to them which bears date the second of Nero. CHAP. IX The Judean Stirs were the Empires Advantage against Surprisal § 1. Objections from the Commotions in Judea answered and retorted Those inconsiderable and not so great as that delicate and repining People would represent them § 2. The Stirs that were in Judea put the Ministers of State upon a more diligent enquiry into what there fell out whereby they got a more full information of the state of that great Controversie between the Jews and Christians § 3. The Judean Commotions drew the Imperial Eagle to fix her eye more narrowly upon Emergencies there as things of highest State-concern in respect of that then famous Eastern Prophecy of one to arise at that time in Judea who should be King of the Universe § 4. At that time when the Erection of an Universal Monarchy was according to that Prophecy expected appeared Persons of a more Lordly Spirit amongst the Romans than any former Age had brought forth Caesar and Pompey ' s Ambition sprung from this Prophecy The then greatest Spirits courted the Jews favour and used means that they might be that oriundus in Judaea § 5. The arts which the Roman Candidates for the Universal Monarchy used to bring the World into
an opinion that they were designed by Heaven to something extraordinary Julius his Dream his cloven-footed Horse his Mules his Triton his pressing to have the Title of King because the Sybils had prophesied one at that time would be King of all the World The Fathers quotations of Sybils vindicated § 6. Augustus had his Education amongst the Velitri who had a Tradition of the tendency with the Eastern Prophecy that one of that City should obtain the Kingdom of the whole World The Roman Prodigy before his Birth His Mother Atia conceives him by Apollo Her Snake-mole Nero ' s Bracelet Atias Dream of her Entrals Nigidius his Prognistication The Prediction of the Thracian Priests His Fathers Vision Cicero ' s Dream § 7. Tiberius his Omens Scribonius ' s Prediction Livias crested Chick The Altars of the conquering Legions His Dye cast into Apon ' s Well Galba ' s Mock-prophecy § 8. Titus and Vespasian ' s Motto Amor deliciae in English the desire of the Nations The Prodigie of Mars his Oak The Gypsies Prediction Dirt cast by Caligula into his Shirt The Dog bringing a Man's hand The Oracle of the God of Carmel His curing the Blind and Lame c. § 1. I Would therefore here draw this Argument to a Conclusion but that I am jealous that the first Branch of it may possibly be excepted against and that Age we are speaking of denied to have been so calm as we have reported it to be and that because of the frequent mention of Troubles in Judea made by Josephus Philo c. I shall therefore chuse rather to incurr the censure of being tedious than of omitting what is necessary towards the stopping the Mouths of unruly talkers or depriving the Atheist of all possibility of Subterfuge from the force of this Argument while I demonstrate that this Objection does not only not diminish from but adds to its strength 1. The Commotions in Jury the uneavenness of that hilly Country no more hinder the smoothness of the Universe than Mountains those Wens of the Earth hinder the roundness of it being no more considerable in so vast a Body than a few Nail-heads on the Rim of a Wheel a point Mathematically demonstrable in the Moons Eclipse upon whose Body the Earth notwithstanding those Exuberances casts the shadow of hers so exactly circular as the most piercing Eye cannot detect it of the least inequality This is the highest account these Judean Stirs can amount to though we cast into the sum those perhaps over-weight Aggravations thrown into the Scales either by Philo on purpose to heighten Caligula's Tyranny and the Divine Indulgence to his Nation in preserving it from ruine under his Oppressions Philo de legatione ad Caium Valeant igitur humana praesidia quae nos deserunt modò in anima spes firma maneat Deum nobis servatorem non defore qui saepe gentem hanc eripuit exitio pag. 637. Or by Josephus that he might present the sufferings of that People equivalent to their sin which he equals to Sodoms telling us he believes the Land was so polluted as had not the Romans purged it by the fire of that desolating War God would have expiated the sins of it by Fire and Brimstone poured down from Heaven upon it Joseph de bel Jud. 6. 16. Si Romani contra noxios venire tardassent aut hiatu terrae devorandam fuisse civitatem puto aut dilâ—â—io perituram aut fulminum ut Sodomae incendia passuram multo enim magis impiam progeniem tulit quà m illa pertulerat But if we weigh them in an equal Ballance they will be found so short as they could not for any considerable time â—ay so slight as they could not at all dam up the Current of Intelligence as being rather Contusions than Wounds no Blood almost but Christian following those Blows as might be evinc'd out of both these Jewish Authors in those passages where they interweave not Passion with their History But I shall rather call Tacitus as one less partial and without all exception to hold the Scales who giving an account of the affairs of Judea states them thus Tacit. lib. 5. 346. Sub Tiberio Judaeis quies Jussi a Caesare Caligula effigiem ejus in Templo locare arma potiùs sumpsere quem motum Caesaris mors diremit Felix per omnem sevitiam libidinem jus regium servili ingenio exeruit duravit tamen patientia Judeis usque ad Gessium Florum The Jews had peace during the Empire of Tiberius under Caligula his command to erect his Image in the Temple caused no small stirs but by his timely death they were allayed before they came to blows Towards the latter end of Claudius and the beginning of Nero ' s Reign Felix indeed with a servile Genius as a beggar on horse-back vapoured over them in all kind of licentiousness and cruelty yet the patience of the Jews held out and they did not make insurrection until Florus became Governour of Judea in Nero ' s 11. year § 2. This blustering in Jewry was so far from being an Euroclydon to overturn to the Packet-boats or a cross Wind to stop Intelligence as it proved as fair a gale as could blow to wast over the knowledge of what fell out there touching our Saviour into the rest of the Empire and rendered it still less possible to the Apostles to delude the World to whose Doctrine had it been the wild Oats of their own Invention these blasts would have proved a fanning Wind and have scatter'd it as chaff before them 1. For these Stirs being about Religion Christo impulsore as Suetonius states them Sueton. Claud. 25. Judaeos impulsore Christo assiduè tumultuantes Roma expulit the blind man stumbling upon the true sence of Christ's Menace I am come to send fire on the Land or as Lysias states them to Agrippa Questions Altercations Debates touching their own Superstition and one Jesus administred occasion to those that were interested in taking cognizance of these Debates to bring those matters to the severest Test. While the Jew clamoured against the Christian as unworthy to live and impleaded him at the Bar of the Roman Ministers of State and the Imperial Law prohibited the proceding against the accused indictâ causâ Lex Sempronia nè quis indictâ causâ Cicero pro Cluentio till he had been heard what he could say for himself the Roman Magistrates before whom these Contests were determinable are necessitated to bring the Antagonists face to face and to hear the Business in question disputed pro con by Plaintiff and Defendant by Jew and Christian. Act. 25. 16. It is not the manner of the Romans to deliver any man to die to grant this favour to the Plaintiff that the Defendant should be be given up to ruin 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 before he be permitted to speak for himself having his adversaries face to face Thus Lysias the chief Captain finding all Jerusalem in an