Plato and Pythagoras attributed the origine of evil to the malignity of matter and so they make evils to be necessarily consequent upon the Being of things For thus he delivers expresly the opinion of Pythagoras qui ait existente providentia mala quoque necessario substitisse propterea quod sylva sit eadem sit malitia praedita Platonemque idem Numenius laudat quod duas mundi â—â—mas autumet Unam beneficentissimam malignam alteram sc. Sylvam Igitur juxta Platonem mundo bona sua Dei tanquam Patris liberalitate collata sunt mala vero matris sylvae vitio cohaeserunt But Plutarch will by no means admit that Plato attributes the Origine of evil meerly to matter but he makes the principle of evil to be something distinct from matter which he calls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a confused infinite self-moving stirring principle which saith he he else where calls Necessity and in his de Legibus plainly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a disorderly and malignant Soul which cannot be understood of meer matter when he makes his Hyle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Without form or figure and destitute of all qualities and power of operation and it is impossible saith he that that which is of its self such an inert principle as matter is should by Plato be supposed to be the cause and principle of evil which he elsewhere calls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Necessity which often resisted God and cast off his reins So that according to Plutarch Plato acquits both God and Hyle from being the Origine of evil 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and therefore attributes it to that malignant spirit which moves the matter and is the cause of all the disorderly motions in the world But what this spirit should be neither he nor any one else could ever understand what darkness and ignorance then was there among the wisest of Philosophers concerning the Origine of evil when they were so consused and obscure in the account which they gave of it that their greatest admirers could not understand them But though Plato seemed so ambiguous in his judgment of the Origine of evil whether he should attribute it to the Hyle or some malignant spirit in it the Stoicks were more dogmatical and plainly imputed the cause of evil to the perversity of matter So Chalcidius tells us that the Stoicks made matter not to be evil in its self as Pythagoras but that it was indifferent to either perrogati igitur unde mala perversitatem seminarium malorum causati sunt they made the perversity of matter the Origine of evil but as he well observes nec expediunt adhuâ— undeâ—â—psa perversitas cum juxta ipsos duo sint initia rerum Dâ—â—â—â— sylva Deus summum praecellens bonum sylva ut censent nec bonum nec malum They give no rational account whence this perversity of matter should arise when according to the Stoicks there are but two principles of things God and matter whereof the one is perfectly good the other neither good nor evil But this perversity they tell us is something necessarily consequent upon the Generation of things 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 these are affections viz. the disorders in the world which follow the Generation of things as rust comes upon brass and filth upon the body as the counterfeit Trismegistus speaks so Maximus Tyrius saith that evils in the world are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not any works of art but the affections of matter Non potest artifex mutare materiam saith Seneca when he is giving an account why God suffers evils in the world and elsewhere gives thâ—s account why evils came into he world non quia cessat ars sed quia id in quo exercetur inobsequens arti est So that the Origine of evil by this account of it lyes wholly upon the perversity of matter which it seems was uncapable of being put into better order by that God who produced the world out of that matter which the Stoicks supposed to be eternal And the truth is the avoiding the attributing the cause of evil to God seems to have been the great reason why they rather chose to make it matter necessary and coexistent with God and this was the only plausible pretence which Hermogenes had for following the Platonists and Stoicks in this opinion that he might set God far enough off from being the author of sin but I cannot sâ—e what advantage comes at all by this Hypothesis but it is chargeable with as many difficulties as any other For 1. It either destroyes Gods omnipotency or else makes him the approver of evil so that if he be not auctor he must be assentator mali as Tertullian speaks against Hermogenes because he suffered evil to be in matter for as he argues aut enim potuit emendare sed noluit aut voluit quidem verum non potuit infirmus Deus si potuit noluit malus ipse quia malâ— savit fic jam habetur ejus licet non instituerit quia tamen si noluisset illud essâ— non esset ipse jam fecit esse quod noluit non esse quo quid â—st â—urpius si voluit esse quod ipse noluit fecisse adversum semetipsum egit cum voluit esse quod noluit fecisse noluit fecisse quod voluit esse So that little advantage is gained for the clearing the true origine of evil by this opinion for either God could have taken away evil out of matter but would not or else would but could not this latter destroyes Gods omnipotency the former his good-ness for by that means evil is in the world by his consent and approbation for if God would not remove it when he might the Being of it will come from him when if he would have hindred it it would not have been and so God by not rooting out of evil will be found an assertor of it male si per voluntatem turpiter si per necessitatem aut famulus erit mali Deus aut amicus if Gods will were the cause why sin was it reflects on his goodness if Gods power could not hinder it it destroyes his omnipotency So that by this opinion God must either be a slave or a friend to evil 2. This principle overturns the foundations of Religion and all transactions between God and mens souls in order to their welfare because it makes evil to be necessarily existent in the world which appears from hence in that evil doth result from the Being of matter and so it must necessarily be as matter is supposed to be for whatever results from the Being of a thing must be coexistent with it and so what flows from what doth necessarily exist must have the same mode of existence which the Being its self hath as is evident in all the attributes of God which have the same immutability with his nature now then if evil did exist
away the rational grounds of faith and placing it on self-evidence Of the self-evidence of the Scriptures and the insufficiency of that for resolving the question about the authority of the Scriptures Of the pretended miracles of Impostors and false Christs as Barchochebas David el David and others The rules whereby to judge true miracles from false 1. True Divine miracles are wrought to confirm a Divine testimony No miracles necâ—ssary for the certain conveyance of a Divine testimony proved from the evidences that the Scriptures could not be corrupted 2. No miracles Divine which contradict Divine revelation Of Popish miracles 3. Divine miracles leave Divine effects on those who believe them Of the miracles of Simon Magus 4. Divine miracles tend to the overthrow of the devils power in the world the antipathy of the doctrine of Christ to the devils designs in the world 5. The distinction of true miracles from others from the circumstances and manner of their operation The miracles of Christ compared with those of the Hâ—athen Gods 6. God makes it evident to all impartial judgments that Divine miracles exceed created power This manifested from the unparalleld miracles of Moses and our Saviour From all which the rational evidence of Divine revelation is manifested as to the persons whom God imployes to teach the world pag. 334 BOOK III. CHAP. I. Of the Being of God The Principles of all Religion lie in the Being of God and immortality of the soul from them the necessity of a particular Divine revelation rationally deduced the method laid down for proving the Divine authority of the Scriptures Why Moses doth not prove the Being of God but suppose it The notion of a Deity very consonant to reason Of the nature of Idea's and particularly of the Idea of God How we can form an Idea of an infinite Being How far such an Idea argues existence The great unreasonableness of Atheism demonstrated Of the Hypotheses of the Aristotelian and Epicurean Atheists The Atheists pretences examined and refuted Of the nature of the arguments whereby we prove there is a God Of universal consent and the evidence of that to prove a Deity and immortality of souls Of necessity of existence implyed in the notion of God and how far that proves the Being of God The order of the world and usefulness of the parts of it and especially of mans body an argument of a Deity Some higher principle proved to be in the world then matter and motion The nature of the soul and possibility of its subsisting after death Strange appearances in nature not solvable by the power of imagination pag. 360 CHAP. II. Of the Origine of the Universe The necessity of the belief of the creation of the world in order to the truth of Religion Of the several Hypotheses of the Philosophers who contradict Moses with a particular examination of them The ancïent tradition of the world consonant to Moses proved from the fonick Philosophy of Thales and the Italick of Pythagoras The Pythagorick Cabbala rather Aegyptian then Mosaick Of the fluid matter which was the material principle of the universe Of the Hypothesis of the eternity of the world asserted by Ocellus Lucanus and Aristotle The weakness of the foundations on which that opinion is built Of the manner of forming principles of Philosophy The possibility of creation proved No arguing from the present state of the world against its beginning shewed from Maimonides The Platonists arguments from the goodness of God for the eternity of the world answered Of the Stoical Hypothesis of the eternity of matter whether reconcilable with the text of Moses Of the opinions of Plato and Pythagoras concerning the praeexistence of matter to the formation of the world The contradiction of the eternity of matter to the nature and attributes of God Of the Atomical Hypothesis of the Origine of the Universe The World could not be produced by a casual concourse of Atoms proved from the nature and motion of Epicurus his Atoms and the Phaenomena of the Universe especially the production and nature of Animals Of the Cartesian Hypothesis that it cannot salve the Origine of the Universe without a Deity giving motion to matter pag. 421 CHAP. III. Of the Origine of Evil. Of the Being of Providence Epicurus his arguments against it refuted The necessity of the belief of Providence in order to Religion Providence proved from a consideration of the nature of God and the things of the world Of the Spirit of nature The great objections against Providence propounded The first concerns the Origine of evil God cannot be the author of sin if the Scriptures be true The account which the Scriptures give of the fall of man doth not charge God with mans fault Gods power to govern man by Laws though he gives no particular reason of every Positive precept The reason of Gods creating man with freedom of will largely shewed from Simplicius and the true account of the Origine of evil Gods permitting the fall makes him not the author of it The account which the Scriptures give of the Origine of evil compared with that of heathen Philosophers The antiquity of the opinion of ascribing the Origine of evil to an evil principle Of the judgment of the Persians Aegyptians and others about it Of Manichaism The opinion of the ancient Greek Philosophers of Pythagoras Plato the Stoicks the Origine of evil not from the necessity of matter The remainders of the history of the fall among the Heathens Of the malignity of Daemons Providence vindicated as to the sufferings of the good and impunity of bad men An account of both from natural light manifested by Seneca Plutarch and others pag. 470 CHAP. IV. Of the Origine of Nations All mankind derived from Adam if the Scriptures be true The contrary supposition an introduction to Atheism The truth of the history of the flood The possibility of an universal deluge proved The flood universal as to mankind whether universal as to the earth and animals no necessity of asserting either Yet supposing the possibility of it demonstrated without creation of new waters Of the fountains of the deep The proportion which the height of mountains bears to the Diameter of the earth No mountains much above three mile perpendicular Of the Origine of fountains The opinion of Aristotle and others concerning it discussed The true account of them from the vapours arising from the mass of subterraneous waters Of the capacity of the Ark for receiving the Animals from Buteo and others The truth of the deluge from the Testimony of Heathen Nations Of the propagation of Nations from Noahs posterity Of the beginning of the Assyrian Empire The multiplication of mankind after the flood Of the Chronology of the LXX Of the time between the flood and Abraham and the advantages of it Of the pretence of such Nations who called themselves Aborigines A discourse concerning the first plantation of Greece the common opinion propounded and
Carmina saith Heinsius i. e. dicta Philosophorum causa est quia dictailla brevia quibus sententias suas de Deo deque reliquis includebant 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 dieebant i. e. Carmina When Poetry came first into request among the Graecians is somewhat uncertain but this is plain and evident that the intention of it was not meerly for instruction but as Strabo expresseth it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the more gently to draw the people on to Idolatry For as he saith it is impossible to perswade women and the promiscuous multitude to religion by meer dry reason or Philosophy 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but for this saith he there is need of superstition and this cannot be advanced without some fables and wonders For saith he the Thunderbolt Shields Tridents Serpents Spears attributed to the gods are meer fables and so is all the antient Theology but the Governours of the Common-wealth made use of these things the better to awe the silly multitude and to bring them into better order I cannot tell how far this might be their end since these things were not brought in so much by the several Magistrates as by the endeavours of particular men who thought to raise up their own esteem among the vulgar by such things and were imployed by the great deceiver of the world as his grand instruments to advance Idolatry in it For which we are to consider that although there were gross Ignorance and consequently Superstition enough in Greece before the Poetick age of it yet their Superstitions and Idolatrous worship was not so licked and brought into form as about the time of Orpheus from whom the Poetick age commenceth who was as great an instrument of setting up Idolatry as Apollonius was afterwards of restoring it being both persons of the highest esteem and veneration among the heathen Much about the same time did those live in the world who were the first great promoters of Superstition and Poetry as Melampus Musaeus Arion Methymnaeus Amphion of Thebes and Eumolpus Thrax none of whom were very far distant from the time of Orpheus Of whom Clemens Alexandrinus thus speaks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 These under a pretence of Musick and Poetry corrupting the lives of men did by a kind of artificial Magick draw them on to the practice of Idolatry For the novelty and pleasingness of Musick and Poetry did presently insinuate its self into the minds of men and thereby drew them to a venerable esteem both of the persons and practises of those who were the Authors of them So Conon in Photius tells us that Orpheus was exceedingly acceptable to the people for his skill in Musick which the Thracians and Macedonians were much delighted with From which arose the Fable of his drawing trees and wild beasts after him because his Musick had so great an influence upon the civilizing that people who were almost grown rude through Ignorance and Barbarism and so Horace explains it Sylvestres homines sacer interpresque Dâ—orum Caedibus victu foedo deterruit Oâ—pheus Dictus ob hoc lenire Tigres rapidosque Leones This Orpheus by Mythologists is usually called the son of Calliope but may with better reason be called the father of the whole Chorus of the Muses then the son of one of them since Pindar calls him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and Iohn Tzâ—â—zes tells us he was called the Son of Calliope 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the inventer of Poetical elegancy and the sacred hymns which were made to the gods Which the old Romans called Assamenta and Iustin Martyr calls him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the first teacher of Polytheism and Idolatry For this Orpheus having been in Aegypt as Pausanias Diodorus and Artapanus in Eusebius all confess he brought from thence most of the Magical rites and superstitious customs in use there and set them up among the Graecians so Diodorus acknowledgeth in the same place and is likewise evident by what Aristophanes saith in his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Orpheus first instructed them in the sacred mysteries and to abstain from slaughter which is to be understood of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the killing of beasts in sacrifice which probably was in use among them before as a remainder of antient tradition till Orpheus brought his Aegyptian doctrine into request among them The mysteries of Osiris saith Diodorus were transplanted into Greece under the name of Dionyfius or Bacchus and Isis under Ceres or Magna Mater and the punishment and pleasures after this life from the rites of sepulture among them Charons wasting of souls from the lake Acherusia in Aegypt over which they were wont to send the dead bodies Pausanias tells us that the Spartans derived the worship of Ceres Cthonia from Orpheus and the Aeginatae the worship of Hecate Besides which he instituted new rites and mysteries of his own in which the initiated were called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and required a most solemn oath from all of them never to divulge them which was after observed in all those prophane mysteries which in imitation of these were set up among the Greeks Strabo thinks the mysteries of Orpheus were in imitation of the old Cotyttian and Benedidian mysteries among the Thracians but Herodotus with more probability parallels them and the Dionysian with the Aegyptian from which we have already seen that Orpheus derived his who is conceived by Georgius Cedrenus and Timothaeus in Eusebius to have lived about the time of Gideon the judge of Israel but there is too great confusion concerning his age to define any thing certainly about it Which ariseth most from the several persons going under his name of which besides this were in all probability two more the one an Heroick Poet called by Suidas Ciconaeus or Arcas who lived two Ages before Homer and he that goes under the name of Orpheus whose Hymns are still extant but are truly ascribed to Onomacritus the Athenian by Clemens Alexandrinus Tatianus Assyrius Suidas and others who flourished in the times of the Pisistradidae at Athens We are like then to have little relief for finding out of truth in the Poetick Age of Greece when the main design of the Learning then used was only to insinuate the belief of Fables into the people and by that to awe them into Idolatry If we come lower down to the succeeding Poets we may find Fables increasing still in the times of Homer Hesiod and the rest which made Eratosthenes a person of great Iudgement and Learning whence he was called alter Plato and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because he carried if not the first yet the second place in all kind of Literature condemn the ancient Poetry as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a company of old wives tales which were invented for nothing but to please silly people and had no
writers speak so much of viz. of dreams and visions the inspirations of the Holy Spirit the gradus Mosaicus the external voyce c. Now in every one of these degrees the Prophet could go no further then his present revelation extended and therefore Aquinas determines that the understandings of the Prophets were instrumenta deficientia respectu principalis agentis i. e. that in prophetical illumination the mind of the Prophet was so moved by the Spirit of God as an instrument in the hand of an Artificer which bears no proportion with the skill of the workman And therefore the mind of a Prophet is moved sometimes only to apprehend the thing represented which they call instinctus divinus of which they say a Prophet may have no certainty whether it comes from God or no sometimes it is moved so far as to know certainly that this revelation is from God this they call lumen Propheticum sometimes a Prophet may be moved to speak those things which he fully understands so it was with most of the true Psophets but sometimes men may be moved to speak that which they understand not as is plain in Caiaphas and probable in Balaam Sometimes a thing was represented to the fancy of one without any possibility of understanding the meaning of those imaginary species as in Pharaohs and Nebnchadnezzars dreams and to another may be given the true judgement of those motions of fancy without the representation of the things to them as in Ioseph and Daniel Now in these and many other different impressions of this prophetical spirit the Prophets to whom the things were revealed could go no further then the degree of the revelation made to them did extend God did not always reveal to the Prophets the internal counsels and decrees of his own will but often only the method and series of his providence in the administration of things in the world Which is the ground of that three-fold distinction of Prophecy in the Schools into prophetia praedestinationis prophetia praescientiae and prophetia comminationis which is taken from the ordinary gloss upon Matth. 1. where they are thus explained the Prophecie of Predestination is when the event depends wholly upon Gods will without any respect to ours as the Prophecie of the Incarnation of Christ the Prophecie of Praescience is of such things as depend upon the liberty of mans will and the Prophecie of Commination only denotes Gods denunciations of heavy judgements against a people But Aquinas doth better reduce the two former to one and so the ground of the difference is to be fetched from the different ways whereby God knows things in the world which is either as they are in their causes and so they note the order and series of things in the world with the mutual respects and dependencies they have one upon another and this refers to Gods administration of things in the world or else God looks upon them as they are in themselves or according to his own positive determinations of them and now in this sense they are unalterable but in the other they are not but God may alter those respects of things when he pleaseth Now though this different manner of knowledge can never be conceived separate from one another in the Divine understanding yet in the revelation made to the mind of a Prophet they may be disjoyned from each other because God doth not always reveal things in the highest degree to the Prophets for no free agent doth always act as far as he can And therefore prophetical revelation is sometimes a representation of Gods internal decrees and then they always take effect and sometimes only the order of causes and effects and they may admit of an alteration and the prophecie nevertheless be true because then it referred only to the series of causes in the world according to which the events would follow if God himself did not interpose These things being thus premised we come to particular resolutions which must arise from the evidences that may be given when prophetical predictions did express Gods internal purpose and decree and when only the order of causes in the world for in these latter it is apparent that events might not answer predictions and yet the Prophet be a true Prophet which is a matter of greater difficulty viz. to find out the exact differences of these two till the event hath made it apparent which came from Gods unalterable purpose and which not But though it be a subject little spoken to either by Iewish or Christian Writers yet we are in hopes there may be some such clear notes of distinction discovered between them even à priori which may sufficiently clear Gods faithfulnes and the Prophets truth though the event be not always correspondent to the words of a prediction I begin then with the evidences that may be given when predictions do flow from internal purpose and decree Every prediction confirmed by a present miracle doth not express meerly the order of causes but the determinations of Gods will because there can be no sufficient reason given why the order of causes in nature should be altered to express the dependences of things on each other for herein a miracle would rather ten d to weaken then strengthen faith because the end of the miracle would be to confirm their faith as to events following upon their causes but now the medium used for that end seems to prove the contrary viz. that God can alter the series of causes when he pleases himself by working miracles and therein going contrary to the course of nature and therefore a miracle seems to be a very incongruous argument in this because its self is an evidence that may be which it comes to prove shall not be But when Prophets come to declare the internal purposes of the will of God concerning future contingencies no argument can be more suitable to demonstrate the truth of what is spoken then the working of a present miracle for this demonstrates to the senses of men that however unlikely the event may be to them which is foretold yet with God all things are possible and that it is very unlikely God would send such a messenger to declare a falshood whom he entrusted so great a power with as that of working miracles Thus it was in that remarkable prophecie concerning Iosias by the man of God at Bethel 260 years before his birth which though it were to come to pass so long after God confirmed it by a sign which was the renting of the altar and the pouring out of the ashes upon it and the withering of Jeroboams hand We cannot therefore in reason think that God would set so clear a seal to any deed which he did intend himself to cancel afterward Praedictions express Gods inward purpose when the things foretold do exceed all probabilities of second causes in which case those words of Tertullian seem very harsh credo quia
but give them in the lump to the main question without fitting them to their several places they do more disservice to the main of the battel by the disorder of their forces then they can advantage it by the number of them 3. Another great pretence the Atheist hath is that religion is only an invention of Politicians which they aw people with as they please and therefore tell them of a God and another world as Mothers send young children to school to keep them in better order that they may govern them with the greater ease To this I answer 1. Religion I grant hath a great influence upon the well-governing the world nay so great that were the Atheists opinion true and the world perswaded of it it were impossible the world could be well governed For the Government of the world in civil societies depends not so much on force as the sacred bonds of duty and allegiance which hold a Nation that owns religion as true in far surer obligations to endeavour the peace and welfare of a Nation then ever violence can do For in this case only an opportunity is watched for to shake off that which they account a yoke upon their necks whereas when mens minds are possessed with a sense of duty and obligation to obedience out of conscience the rains may be held with greater ease and yet the people be better managed by them then by such as only gall and inrage them So that I grant true religion to be the most serviceable principle for the governing of civil societies but withal I say 2. It were impossible religion should be so much made use of for the governing of people were there not a real propensity and inclination to religion imprinted on the minds of men For as did not men love themselves and their children their estates and interests it were impossible to keep them in obedience to Laws but doth it follow because Magistrates perswade people to obedience by suiting Laws to the general interest of men that therefore the Magistrates first made them love themselves and their own concerns So it is in religion the Magistrate may make use of this propensity to religion in men for civil ends but his making use of it doth suppose it and not instill it For were religion nothing else in the world but a design only of Politicians it would be impossible to keep that design from being discovered at one time or other and when once it came to be known it would hurry the whole world into confusion and the people would make no scruple of all oaths and obligations but every one would seek to do others what mischief he could if he had opportunity and obey no further then fear and force constrained him Therefore no principle can be so dangerous to a state as Atheism nor any thing more promote its peace then true religion and the more men are perswaded of the truth of religion they will be the better subjects and the more useful in civil societies As well then may an Atheist say there is no such thing as good nature in the world because that is apt to be abused nor any such thing as love because that may be cheated as that religion is nothing but a design because men may make it stalke to their private ends Thus we see how the Atheist by the force of those principles on which he denyes a God must be forced to deny other things which yet by his own confession are apparently true So I come to the third Proposition which is That we have as certain evidence that there is a God as we can have considering his nature When we demand the proof of a thing our first eye must be to the nature of the thing which we desire may be proved For things equally true are not capable of equal evidence nor have like manners of probation There is no demonstration in Euclide will serve to prove that there are such places as the Indies we cannot prove the earth is round by the judgement of sense nor that the soul is immortal by corporeal phantasmes Every distinct kind of Being hath its peculiar way of probation and therefore it ought not to be at all wondered at if the Supreme and infinite Being have his peculiar way of demonstrating himself to the minds of men If then we have as evident proofs of the existence of God as we can have considering the infinity of his nature it is all which in reason we can desire and of that kind of proofs we have these following For 1. If God hath stamped an universal character of himself upon the minds of men 2. If the things in the world are the manifest effects of infinite wisdome goodness and power 3. If there be such things in the world which are unaccountable without a Deity then we may with safety and assurance conclude that there is a God 1. That God hath imprinted an universal character of himself on the minds of men and that may be known by two things 1. If it be such as bears the same importance among all persons 2. If it be such as cannot be mistaken for the character of any thing else 1. I begin with the first whereby I shall prove this character to be universal because the whole world hath consented in it This argument we may rely on with the greater security because it was the only argument which retained the Deity in the ancient School of Epicurus which could he have thought of as easie way of evading it as he thought he had found out as to the Origine of the universe he was no such great friend to the very name of a God as to have retained it as an Anticipation or Prolepsis of humane nature And this argument from the universal consent of the world was that which bore the greatest sway among the Philosophers who went by nothing but dictates of natural light which they could not so clearly discover in any things as in those which all mankind did unanimously consent in Two things I shall make out this by 1. That no sufficient account can be given of so universal a consent unless it be supposed to be the voyce of nature 2. That the dissent of any particular persons is not sufficient to controul so universal an agreement 1. That no sufficient account of it can be given but only by asserting it to be a dictate of nature In so strange a dissent as there hath been in the world concerning most of those things which relate to mankinde in common as the models of government the Laws they are ruled by the particular rites and customs of worship we have the greatest reason to judge that those common principles which were the foundations on which all these several different customs were built were not the effect of any positive Laws nor the meer force of principles of education but something which had a deeper root and foundation in the principles of nature
there being no prevalency at all in any one particle above another in bigness or motion it is manifest that this universal matter to whom motion is so essential and natural will be ineffectual for the producing of any variety of appearances in nature for nothing could be caused by this thin and subtile matter but what would be wholly imperceptible to any of our senses and what a strange kind of visible world would this be From hence then it appears that there must be an infinitely powerful and wise God who must both put matter into motion and regulate the motion of it in order to the producing all those varieties which appear in the world And this necessity of the motion of matter by a power given it from God is freely acknowledged by Mr. Des Cartes himself in these words Considero materiam sibi libere permissam nullum aliunde impulsum suscipientem ut plane quiescentem illa autem impellitur à Deo tantundem motus five translationis in ea conservante quantum abinitio posuit So that this great improver and discoverer of the Mechanical power of matter doth freely confess the necessity not only of Gods giving motion in order to the Origine of the Universe but of his conserving motion in it for the upholding it So that we need not fear from this Hypothesis the excluding of a Deity from being the prime efficient cause of the world All the question then is concerning the particular manner which was used by God as the â—fficient cause in giving being to the world As to which I shall only in general suggest what Maimonides sayes of it Omnia simul creata â—rant postea successive ab invicem separata although I am somewhat inclinable to that of Gassendus majus â—st mundus opus quam ut assâ—qui mens humana illius molitionem possit To which I think may be well applyed that speech of Solomon Then I beheld all the work of God that a man cannot finde out the work that is done under the Sun because though a man labour to seck it out yea further though a wise man think to know it yet shall he not be able to sinde it CHAP. III. Of the Origine of Evil. Of the Being of Providence Epieurus his arguments against it refuted The necâ—ssity of the belief of Providence in order to Religion Providence proved from a consideration of the nature of God and the things of the world Of the Spirit of nature The great objections against Providence propounded The first concerns the Origine of evil God cannot be the author of sin if the Scriptures be true The account which the Scriptures give of the fall of man doth not charge God with mans fault Gods power to govern man by Laws though he gives no particular reason of every Positive precept The reason of Gods creating man with freedom of will largely shewed from Simplicius and the true account of the Origine of evil Gods permitting the fall makes him not the author of it The account which the Scriptures give of the Origine of evil compared with that of Heathen Philosophers The antiquity of the opinion of ascribing the Origine of evil to an evil principle Of the judgment of the Perâ—â—ans Aegyptians and others about it Of Manichaism The opinion of the ancient Greek Philosophers of Pythagoras Plato the Stoicks the Origine of evil not from the necessity of matter The remainders of the history of the fall among the Heathens Of the malignity of Daemonâ— Providence vindicated as to the sufferings of the good and impunity of bad men An account of both from natural light manifested by Senecâ— Plutarch and others IT being now manifest not only that there is a God but that the world had its Being from him it thence follows by an easie and rational deduction that there is a particular band of Divine providence which upholds the world in its Being and wisely disposeth all events in it For it is a most irrational and absurd opinion to assert a Deity and deny providence and in nothing did Epicurus more discover the weakness and puerility of his judgment then in this Indeed if Epicurus had no other design in asserting a Deity then as many ancient Philosophers imagined to avoid the imputation of direct Atheism and yet to take away all foundations of Religion he must needs be said to serve his Hypothesis well though he did assert the Being of an excellent nature which he called God while yet he made him sit as it were with his â—lbows folded up in the heavens and taking no â—â—gnizâ—nce of humane actions For he well knew that if the belief of Divine providence were once rooted out of mens minds the thoughts of an excellent Being above the Heâ—vens would have no more aw or power upon the hearts and lives of men then the telling men that there are Iâ—wels of inestimable value in the Indies makes them more ready to pay taxes to their Princes For that Philosopher could not be ignorant that it is not worth but power nor speculation but interest that rules the world The poor Tenant more regards his petty Landlord then the greatest Prince in the world that hath nothing to do with him and he thinks he hath great reason for it for he neither fears punishment nor hopes for reward from him whereas his Landlord may dispossess him of all he hath upon displeasure and may advantage him the most if he gains his favour Supposing then that there were such an excellent Being in the world which was compleatly happy in himself and thought it an impairing of his happiness to trouble himself with an inspection of the world Religion might then be indeed derived à relegendo but not à religando there might be some pleasure in contemplating his nature but there could be no obligation to obedience So that Epicurus was the first sounder of a kind of Philosophical Antinomianism placing all Religion in a veneration of the Deity purely for its own exâ—â—llency without any such mercenary eye as those who serve God for their own ends as they say are apt to have to reward and punishment And I much doubt that good woman whom the story goes of who in an Enthusiastick posture ran up and down the strects with emblems in her hands fire in the one as she said to burn up Heaven and water in the other to quench Hell that men might serve God purely for himself would if she had compassed her design soon brought Proselites enough to Epicurus and by burning Heaven would have burnt up the cords of Religion and in quenching Hell would have extinguished the aw and fear of a Deity in the world Indeed the incomparable excellency and perfection which is in the Divine nature to spirits advanced to a noble and generous height in Religion makes them exceedingly value their choice while they disregard what ever rivals with God for it but were it not for
rejected The Hellens not the first inhabitants of Greece but the Pelasgi The large spread of them over the parts of Greece Of their language different from the Greeks Whence these Pelasgi came that Phaleg was the Pelasgus of Greece and the leader of that Colony proved from Epiphanius the language of the Pelasgi in Greece Oriental thence an account given of the many Hebrew words in the Greek language and the remainders of the Eastern languages in the Islands of Greece both which not from the Phaenicians as Bochartus thinks but from the old Pelasgi Of the ground of the affinity between the Jews and Lacedaemonians Of the peopling of America pag. 533 CHAP. V. Of the Origine of the Heathen Mythology That there were some remainders of the ancient history of the world preserved in the several Nations after the dispersion How it came to be corrupted by decay of knowledge increase of Idolatry confusion of languages An enquiry into the cause of that Difficulties against the common opinion that languages were confounded at Babel Those difficulties cleared Of the fabulousness of Poets The particular ways whereby the Heathen Mythology arose Attributing the general history of the World to their own Nation The corruption of Hebraisms Alteration of names Ambiguity of sense in the Oriental languages Attributing the actions of many to one person as in Jupiter Bacchus c. The remainders of Scripture history among the Heathens The names of God Chaos formation of man among the Phaenicians Of Adam among the Germans Aegyptians Cilicians Adam under Saturn Cain among the Phaenicians Tubalcain and Jubal under Vulcan and Apollo Naamah under Minerva Noah under Saturn Janus Prometheus and Bacchus Noahs three sons under Jupiter Neptune and Pluto Canaan under Mercury Nimrod under Bacchus Magog under Prometheus Of Abraham and Isaac among the Phaenicians Jacobs service under Apollo's The 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from Bethel Joseph under Apis. Moses under Bacchus Joshua under Hercules Balaam under the old Silenus pag. 577 CHAP. VI. Of the Excellency of the Scriptures Concerning matters of pure divine revelation in Scripture the terms of Salvation only contained therein The ground of the disesteem of the Scriptures is tacite unbelief The Excellency of the Scriptures manifested as to the matters which God hath revealed therein The excellency of the discoveries of Gods nature which are in Scripture Of the goodness and love of God in Christ. The suitableness of those discoveryes of God to our natural notions of a Deity The necessity of Gods making known himself to us in order to the regulating our conceptions of him The Scriptures give the fullest account of the state of mens souls and the corruptions which are in them The only way of pleasing God discovered in Scriptures The Scriptures contain matters of greatest mysteriousness and most universal satisfaction to mens minds The excellency of the manner wherein things are revealed in Scriptures in regard of clearness authority purity uniformity and perswasiveness The excellency of the Scriptures as a rule of life The nature of the duties of Religion and the reasonableness of them The greatness of the encouragements to Religion contained in the Scriptures The great excellency of the Scriptures as containing in them the Covenant of Grace in order to mans Salvation pag. 599 ERRATA PAge 11. l. 15. r. existence p. 17. l. 28. r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 21. l. 19. r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 22. l. 21. r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 27. l. 14. r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 31. l. 2. r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 35. l. 16. r. 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The obscurity and defect of Ancient History The knowledge of truth proved to be the most natural perfection of the rational soul yet error often mistaken for truth the accounts of it Want of diligence in its search the mixture of truth and falshood Thence comes either rejecting truth for the errors sake or embracing the error for the truths sake the first instanced in Heathen Philosophers the second in vulgar Heathen Of Philosophical Atheism and the grounds of it The History of Antiquity very obscure The question stated where the true History of ancient times to be found in Heathen Histories or only in Scripture The want of credibility in Heathen Histories asserted and proved by
of Nabonasser Which if we should be so greedy of all empty conjectures which tend to our purpose as to take them for truths would be a very strong evidence of the falshood and vanity of the Chaldeans in their great pretences to antiquity But as the case stands in reference to their history we finde more evidence from Scripture to assert their just antiquity then ever they are able to produce out of any undoubted records of their own Which yet hath been endeavoured by an Author both of some credit and antiquity the true Berosus not the counterfeit of Annius whose vizard we shall have occasion to pull off afterwards This Berosus was as Iosephus and Tatianus assure us a Priest of Belus and a Babylonian born but afterwards flourished in the isle of Co and was the first who brought the Chaldean Astrology in request among the Greeks in honour to whose name and memory the Athenians who were never backward in applauding those who brought them the greatest news especially i suitable to their former superstition erected a statue for him with a guilded tongue A good emblem of his history which made a fair and specious shew but was not that within which it pretended to be especially where he pretends to give an account of the most antient times and reckons up his two Dynastyes before the time of Belus but of them afterwards It cannot be denyed but some fragments of his history which have been preserved from ruine by the care and industry of Iosephus Tatianus Eusebius and others have been very useful not only for proving the truth of the history of Scripture to the heathens but also for illustrating some passages concerning the Babylonian Empire as making Nabopolasser the Father of Nebucadonosor of which Scaliger hath fully spoken in his notes upon his fragments Far be it from me to derogate any thing even from prophane histories where they do not enterfere with the Sacred history of Scripture and it is certainly the best improvement of these to make them draw water to the Sanctuary and to serve as smaller Stars to conduct us in our way when we cannot enjoy the benefit of that greater light of Sacred history But that which I impeach these prophane histories of is only an insufficiency as to that account of antient times wherein they are so far from giving light to Sacred records that the design of setting of them up seems to be for casting a cloud upon them Which may seem somewhat the more probable in that those monstrous accounts of the Aegyptian and Chaldean Dynastyes did never publickly appear in the world in the Greek tongue till the time that our Sacred records were translated into Greek at Alexandria For till that time when this authentick history of the world was drawn forth from its privacy and retirement being as it were lookt up before among the Israelites at Iudea into the publick notice of the world about the time of Ptolomaeus Philadelphus these vain pretenders to antiquity thought not themselves so much concerned to stand up for the credit of their own Nations For till that time the onedulous world not being acquainted with any certain report of the creation and propagation of the world was apt to swallow any thing that was given forth by those who were had in so great esteem as the Chaldean and Aegyptian Priests were Because it was supposed that those persons who were freed from other avocations had more leasure to inquire into these things and because of their mysterious hiding what they had from the vulgar were presumed to have a great deal more then they had But now when the Sun of righteousness was approaching this Horizon of the world and in order to that the Sacred history like the day-star was to give the world notice of it by which the former shadows and mists began to fly away it concerned all those whose interest lay in the former ignorance of mankind as much as they could to raise all their ignes fatui and whatever might tend to obscure that approaching light by invalidating the credit of that which came to bespeak its acceptance It is very observable to consider what gradations and steps there were in the world to the appearance of that grand light which came down from heaven to direct us in our way thither how the world not long before was awakened into a greater inquisitiveness then ever before how knowledge grew into repute and what methods divine providence used to give the inquisitive world a taste of Truth at present to stay their stomacks and prepare them for that further discovery of it afterwards In order to this that Nation of the Iews which was an inclosed garden before was now thrown open and many of the plants removed and set in forraign Countries not only in Babylon where even after their return were left three famous Schools of learning Sora Pombeditha and Neharda but in Aegypt too where multitudes of them by Alexanders favour were setled at Alexandria where they had opportunity to season those two great fountains whence the current of knowledge ran into the rest of the world And now it was not in Iewry only that God was known but he whose name was great in Israel did make way for the knowledge of himself among all the Nations of the earth And that allwise God who directed the Magi by a star to Christ making use of their former skill in Astronomy to take notice of that star which came now on a peculiar errand to them to lead them to their Saviour The great God condescending so far to mankind as to take advantage of particular inclinations and to accommodate himself to them for which purpose it is very observable that he appeared in another way to the Wisemen then to the poor Shepherds the same God made use of the curiosity and inquisitiveness after knowledge which was in Ptolomaeus Philadelphus which he is so much applauded for by Athenaeus and others to bring to light the most advantageous knowleage which the world ever had before the coming of Christ in the slesh And that great Library of his erecting at Alexandria did never deserve that title till it had lodged those Sacred records and then it did far better then the old one of Osymanduas of which Historians tells us this was the Inscription 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The shop of the souls Physick But this being a matter of so much concernment in order to our better understanding the original of these vast accounts of time among the Chaldaeans and Aegyptians and a subject not yet touched by any we shall a little further improve the probability of it by taking a more particular account of the time when the Scriptures were first translated and the occasion might thereby be given to these Aegyptians Chaldaeans to produce their fabulous account into the view of the world Whether the Scriptures had been ever before translated into the Greek
the sense saith he is clear 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 according to thâ— Chaldee account comprehends 222. months which come to â—ighteen years and sixth months therefore 120. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 make 2220. years and therefore he adds for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I read leaving out the last 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Now according to this sense of 120. Sari to comprehend the sum of 2220. years it will be no difficult matter to reduce the fragment of Berosus concerning the ten Kings before the flood reigning 120. Sari to some degree of probability As to which I shall only suppose these two things First that the ancient Chaldeans had preserved among them some tradition of the number of the chief persons before the flood for we find them exactly agreeing with the Scriptures as to the number though differing as to the names of them which may be seen in the fragments of Africanus preserved in Eusebius his Greek Chronica Secondly that Berosus from whom Apollodorus and Alexander Polyhistor deliver these computations might as to the account of the times of those persons follow the translation of the Septuagint For I have already made it evident that Berosus did not publish his History till after the Septuagint was abroad now according to the computation of the Septuagint of the ages before the flood these 120. Sari of the ten Kings will not much disagtee from it For these make 2220. years of these ten persons and the Septuagint in all make 2242. so that if in stead of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Suidas we only read it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 we have the exact computation of the Septuagint in these 120. Sari but of this let the learned judge We now to come to the Aegyptian Dynastyes of Manetho as to which I doubt we must be fain to take the same course that Eusebius did with the Chaldean 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not to trouble our selves overmuch in seeking to reconcile Fables to truth Great pains is taken by some very learned men to reduce the disorderly Dynastyes of Manetho to some probable account but I must confess upon an impartial examination of them that I think they have striven if not to make an Ethiopian white yet an Aegyptian to speak truth concerning his own Country which are almost of an equal impossibility Ioseph Scaliger who first in this latter age of the world pâ—oduced them into the light out of Georgius Syncellus hath a more favourable opinion of them then of the Aegyptian History of Herodotus Diodorus and others but upon what account I cannot imagine Is it because four Dynastyes according to his own computation exceed the creation of the world according to the true account for which he is fain to make use of his Tempus prolepticum and Iulian period which reacheth 764. years beyond the age of the world and was invented by him from the multiplication of the great Cycle into the indiction i. e. of 532. into 15. Or is it because for sooth Manâ—tho hath digested all into better order and reckoned up the several Dynastyes which lay consused in other authors but this only shews him a more cunning impostor who saw the former accounts given by others would not serve the turn and therefore pretends to more exactness and diligence that he might more easily deceive his readers But setting aside those things which have been said already concerning Manetho I have these things which make me reject his Dynastyes as fabulous first the vast difference between Manetho his accounts and all others who have written the Aegyptian History in the order and names of his Dynastyes Where do we ever read of the several Dynastyes of the Thinites Memphites Suites Diospolitans and many others but in himself It is very strange that neither Herodotus nor Eratosthenes nor Diodorus who have all written a succession of the Egyptian Kings should neither by their own industry nor by all the interest they had in Egypt get any knowledge of these methodically digested Dynastyes Besides had there been any historical certainty in these Dynastyes of Manetho whence comes it to pass that they should be so silently passed over by those who were Egyptian Priests themselves and undertook to write the History of Egypt Such were Chaeremon who was an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a sacred scribe and Ptolomaeus Mendesius who was an Egyptian Priest as Eusebius tells us and comprehended the history of Egypt in three books Now had this History been so authentical as is pretended whence come so many and great contradictions between them in so much that Iosephus saith If that which they report were true it were impossible they should so much differ but they labour in the invention of lyes and write neither agreeably to the truth nor to one another So that it is next to a miracle almost to see how prodigiously fond of these Dynastyes Kircher is and what pains he hath taken to no purpose about them scio multos esse â—aith he qui hujusmodi Dynastias meras nugas commenta putant very true but why is not he of the same mind too he confesseth himself to have been so once but since he had conversed more with the Oriental traditions he hath found them not to be so fabulous as many make them It seems then the Basis of the Aegyptian Dynastyes as well before the flood as after must lye in this Oriental tradition a thing which some to shew their great skill in those Eastern languages are grown very fond of But as far as I can yet see they sail to Ophir not for gold but Peacocks and the next Legend the world hath should be called Legenda Orientalis For can any thing be more irrational absurd and fabulous then those Arabick traditions which that author scrapes as much for as Aesops Cock did on the Dunghill but there is no jewell to be found among them Unless we should take those 15. hard names of men for such which by the Arabick writers are said to have succeeded each other in Egypt before the flood viz. Nacraus Nathras Mesram Henoah Arjak Hasilim Husal Tatrasan Sarkak Schaluk Surith who they say built the Pyramids Hugith Manaus Aphrus Malinus Abn Ama Pharaun in whose time they say the flood came But should we be so little befriended by reason as to grant all this what advantage will this be to Manetho who speaks not of Kings but whole Dynastyes so that it still appears these Dynastyes are fabulous not being attested by any credible witnesses Secondly All those who profess to follow Manetho differ strangely from one another as Iosephus Africanus Eusebius George the Syncellus of the patriarchs of Tarasius and Scaliger who hath taken so much pains in digesting of them yet he is condemned by others since and Isaac Vossius gives a particular caution to his reader In his Dynastiis compingendis nequaquam esse sequendum ordinem calculum Scaligeri What should be the
reason of this diversity but that they thought them not so authentick but they might cut off alter and transpose as they saw occasion which is most plain and evident in Eusebius who makes no difficulty of â—utting of one whole Dynasty and dividing another into two only to reconcile the distance between Thuoris the Egyptian King and Tentamus the Assyrian Emperour and the destruction of Troy and therefore leaves out 4. Assyrian Kings and a whole Dynasty of the Egyptians to make a Synchronisme between those three But yet there hath been something very fairly offered to the world to clear the truth if not Manetho in order to his Dynastyes viz. that the subtle Egyptian to inhance the antiquity of his own Country did take implicite years for solid and place those in a succession which were cotemporary one with another This indeed is a very compendious way to advance a great sum of years with a very little charge Wherein he hath done saith Cappellus as if a Spaniard in the Indies should glory of the antiquity of the Dynastyes of Spain and should attribute to the Earles of Barcinona 337. years to the King of Arragon 498. to the King of Portugal 418. to the King of Leo 545. of Castile 800. years and yet all these Dynastyes rise from the years of our Lord 717. when the Saracens first entred Spain There are very few Nations but will go near to vie antiquity with the Egyptians if they may thus be allowed to reckon successively all those petty royalties which antiently were in most Nations as might be particularly instanced in most great Empires that they gradually rise from the subduing and incorporating of those petty royalties into which the several Nations were cantonized before And there seems to be very strong ground of suspition that some such thing was designed by Manetho from the 32. Dynasty which is of the Diospolitan Thebans for this Dynasty is said to begin from the tenth year of the 15. Dynasty of the Phaenician Pastours in the time of Saites now which is most observable he that begins this Dynasty is of the very same name with him who begins the very first Dynasty of Manetho who is Menes and so likewise his son Athothis is the same in both Which hath made many think because Menes is reckoned first not only in both these but in Diodorus Eratosthenes and others that this Menes was he who first began the Kingdom of Egypt after whose time it was divided into several Dynastyes Which makes Scaliger say illa vet ustissima regna fuerunt instar latrociniorum ubi vis non lex aut successio aut suffragia populi reges in solio regni collocabant This opinion of the coexistence of these Dynastyes is much embraced by Vossius both Father and Son and by the Father made use of to justifie Scaliger from calumniatours who made as though Scaliger did in effect overthrow the authority of the Scriptures by mentioning with some applause the Dynastyes of Manetho But to this opinion how plausible soever it seems I offer these exceptions First As to that Menes who is supposed to be the first founder of the Aegyptian Kingdom after whose death it is supposed that Aegypt was divided into all these Dynastyes I demand therefore who this Menes was was he the same with him whom the Scripture calls Misraim who was the first Planter of Egypt this is not probable for in all probability his name must be sought among the Gods and not the mortals that raigned If we suppose him to be any other after him it will be hard giving an account how he came to have the whole power of Egypt in his hands and so soon after him it should be divided For Kingdoms are ofttimes made up of those petty royalties before but it will be very hard finding instances of one persons enjoying the whole power and so many Dynastyes to arise after his decease and to continue coexistent in peace and full power so long as these several Dynastyes are supposed to do Besides is it not very strange that no Historian should mention such a former distribution of several principalities so antiently in Egypt But that which to me utterly overthrows the coexistence of these Dynastyes in Egypt is by comparing with them what we finde in Scripture of greatest antiquity concerning the Kingdom of Egypt which I cannot but wonder that none of these learned men should take notice of When the Egyptian Kingdom was first founded is not here a place to enquire but it is evident that in Abrahams time there was a Pharaoh King of Egypt whom Archbishop Usher thinks to have been Apophis not Abimelech the first King of Egypt as Constantinus Manasses reports in his Annals by a ridiculous mistake of the King of Gerar for the King of Egypt This Pharaoh was then certainly King of all the Land of Egypt which still in Scripture is called the Land of Misraim from the first planter of it and this was of very great antiquity and therefore Funccius though improbably thinks this Pharaoh to have been Osiris and Rivet thinks Misraim might have been alive till that time here then we find no Dynastyes coexisting but one Kingdom under one King If we descend somewhat lower to the times of Iacob and Ioseph the evidence is so undoubted of Aegypts being an entire Kingdom under one King that he may have just cause to suspect the â—yes either of his body or his mind that distrusts it For what more evident then that Pharaoh who preferred Ioseph was King of all the Land of Aegypt Were not the seven years of famine over all the Land of Aegypt Gen. 41. 55. Was not Joseph set by Pharaoh over all the Land of Aegypt Gen. 41. 41 43 45. And did not Joseph go over all the Land of Aegypt to gather corn Gen. 41. 46. Nay did not he buy all the Land of Aegypt for Pharaoh Gen. 47. 20. Can there possibly be given any fuller evidence of an entire Kingdom then these are that Egypt was such then Afterwards we read of one King after another in Egypt for the space of nigh two hundred years during the children of Israels slavery in Egypt and was not he think we King over all Egypt in whose time the children of Israel went out thence And in all the following history of Scripture is there not mention made of Aegypt still as an entire Kingdom and of one King over it Where then is there any place for these co-temporary Dynastyes in Aegypt Nowhere that I know of but in the sancies of some learned men Indeed there is one place that seems to give some countenance to this opinion but it is in far later times then the first Dynastyes of Manetho are supposed to be in which is in Isai. 19. 2. Where God saith he would set the Aegyptians against the Aegyptians and they shall fight every one against his brother City against City and Kingdom
so great uncertainty and confusion so much partiality and inconsistency with each other It remains now that I proceed to demonstrate the credibility of that account of ancient times which is reported in the Sacred Scriptures which will be the second part of our Task BOOK II. CHAP. I. The certainty of the Writings of Moses In order to the proving the truth of Scripture-history several Hypotheses laid down The first concerns the reasonableness of preserving the ancient History of the world in some certain Records from the importance of the things and the inconveniences of meer tradition or constant Revelation The second concerns the certainty that the Records under Moses his name were undoubtedly his The certainty of a matter of fact enquired into in general and proved as to this particular by universal consent and settling a Common-wealth upon his Laws The impossibility of an Imposture as to the writings of Moses demonstrated The plea's to the contrary largely answered HAving sufficiently demonstrated the want of credibility in the account of ancient times given by those Nations who have made the greatest pretence to Learning and Antiquity in the world we now proceed to evince the credibility and certainty of that account which is given us in sacred Screptures In order to which I shall premise these following Hypotheses It stands to the greatest reason that an account of things so concerning and remarkable should not be always left to the uncertainty of an oral tradition but should be timely entred into certain Records to be preserved to the memory of posterity For it being of concernment to the world in order to the establishment of belief as to future things to be fully setled in the belief that all things past were managed by Divine providence there must be some certain Records of former ages or else the mind of man will be perpetually hovering in the greatest uncertainties Especially where there is such a mutual dependence and concatenation of one thing with another as there is in all the Scripture-history For take away but any one of the main foundations of the Mosaical history all the superstructure will be exceedingly weakened if it doth not fall quite to the ground For mans obligation to obedience unto God doth necessarily suppose his original to be from him his hearkening to any proposals of favour from God doth suppose his Apostacy and fall Gods designing to shew mercy and favour to fallen man doth suppose that there must be some way whereby the Great Creator must reveal himself as to the conditions on which fallen man may expect a recovery the revealing of these conditions in such a way whereon a suspicious because guilty creature may firmly rely doth suppose so certain a recording of them as may be least liable to any suspicion of imposture or deceit For although nothing else be in its self necessary from God to man in order to his salvation but the bare revealing in a certain way the terms on which he must expect it yet considering the unbounded nature of Divine goodness respecting not only the good of some particular persons but of the whole society of mankind it stands to the greatest reason that such a revelation should be so propounded as might be with equal certainty conveyed to the community of mankind Which could not with any such evidence of credibility be done by private and particular revelations which give satisfaction only to the inward senses of the partakers of them as by a publick recording of the matters of Divine revelation by such a person who is enabled to give the world all reasonable satisfaction that what he did was not of any private design of his own head but that he was deputed to it by no less then Divine authority And therefore it stands to the highest reason that where Divine revelation is necessary for the certain requiring of assent the matter to be believed should have a certain uniform conveyance to mens minds rather then that perpetually New revelations should be required for the making known of those things which being once recorded are not lyable to so many impostures as the other way might have been under pretended Revelations For then men are not put to a continual tryal of every person pretending Divine revelation as to the evidences which he brings of Divine authority but the great matters of concernment being already recorded and attested by all rational evidence as to the truth of the things their minds therein rest satisfied without being under a continual hesitancy lest the Revelation of one should contradict another For supposing that God had left the matters of Divine revelation unrecorded at all but left them to be discovered in every age by a spirit of prophecy by such a multitude as might be sufficient to inform the world of the truth of the things We cannot but conceive that an innumerable company of croaking Enthusiasts would be continually pretending commissions from heaven by which the minds of men would be left in continual distraction because they would have no certain infallible rules given them whereby to difference the good and evil spirit from each other But now supposing God to inspire some particular persons not only to reveal but to record Divine truths then what ever evidences can be brought attesting a Divine revelation in them will likewise prove the undoubted certainty and infallibility of those writings it being impossible that persons employed by a God of truth should make it their design to impose upon the world which gives us a rational account why the wise God did not suffer the History of the world to lye still unrecorded but made choice of such a person to record it who gave abundant evidence to the world that he acted no private design but was peculiarly employed by God himself for the doing of it as will appear afterwards Besides we finde by our former discourse how lyable the most certain tradition is to be corrupted in progress of time where there are no standing records though it were at first delivered by persons of undoubted credit For we have no reason to doubt but that the tradition of the old world the flood and the consequences of it with the nature and worship of the true God were at first spread over the greatest part of the world in its first plantations yet we see how soon for want of certain conveyance all the antient tradition was corrupted and abused into the greatest Idolatry Which might be less wondered at had it been only in those parts which were furthest remote from the seat of those grand transactions but thus we finde it was even among those families who had the nearest residence to the place of them and among those persons who were not far off in a lineal descent from the persons mainly concerned in them as is most evident in the family out of which Abraham came who was himself the tenth from Noah yet of them it is said that they
served other Gods How unlikely then was it that this tradition should be afterwards preserved entire when the people God had peculiarly chosen to himself were so mixed among the Aegyptians and so prone to the Idolatries of the Nations round about them and that even after God had given them a written Law attested with the greatest miracles what would they have done then had they never been brought forth of Aegypt by such signs and wonders and had no certain records left to preserve the memory of former ages Thus we see how much it stands to the greatest reason that so memorable things should be digested into sacred records We have as great certainty that Moses was the author of the records going under his name as we can have of any matter of fact done at so great a distance of time from us We are to consider that there are two very distinct questions to be thought of concerning a Divine revelation to any person at a considerable distance of time from us and those are what evidences can be given that the matters recorded are of a true divine revelation and what evidence we have of the truth of the matter of fact that such things were recorded by such persons They who do not carefully distinguish between these two questions will soon run themselves into an inextricable labyrinth when they either seek to understand themselves or explain to others the grounds on which they believe the Scriptures to be the Word of God The first step in order to which must be the proving the undoubted certainty of the matter of fact or the truth of the History that such persons were really existent and did either do or record the things we speak of After this succeeds the other to prove not only the real existence of the things but that the persons who recorded the things were assisted by an infallible spirit then there can be no reason at all to doubt but those records are the Word of God The first of these is that which at present we enquire after the certainty of the matter of fact that the records under the name of Moses were undoubtedly his And here it will be most unreasonable for any to seek for further evidence and demonstration of it then the matter to be proved is capable of But if they should I suppose we have sufficient reason to demonstrate the folly of such a demand and that on these accounts 1. Whoever yet undertook to bring matters of fact into Mathematical demonstrations or thought he had ground to question the certainty of any thing that was not proved in a Mathematical way to him Who would ever undertake to prove that Archimedes was kild at Syracuse by any of the demonstrations he was then about or that Euclide was the undoubted Author of the Geometry under his name or do men question these things for want of such demonstrations Yet this is all we at present desire but the same liberty here which is used in any thing of a like nature 2. I demand of the person who denyes this moral certainty to be sufficient for an assent whether he doth question every thing in the world which he was not present at the doing of himself If he be peremptorily resolved to believe nothing but what he sees he is fit for nothing but a voyage to Anticyrae or to be soundly purged with Hellebore to free him from those cloudy humours that make him suspect the whole world to be an imposture But we cannot suppose any man so destitute of reason as â—o question the truth of every matter of fact which he doth not see himself if he doth then firmly believe any thing there must be supposed sufficient grounds to induce him to such a belief And then what ground can there be to question the certainty of such things which have as great evidence as any of those things have which he most firmly believes and this is all we desire from him 3. Do we not see that the most concerning and weighty actions of mens lives are built on no other foundation then this moral certainty yet men do not in the least question the truth of the thing they rely upon As is most evident in all titles to estates derived from Ancestors either by donation or purchase In all trading which goes upon the moral certainty that there are such places as the Indyes or France or Spain c. In all journyings that there is such a place as that I am going to and this is the way thither for these we have but this moral certainty for the contrary to both these are possible and the affirmatives are indemonstrable In eating and drinking there is a possibility of being poisoned by every bit of meat or drop of drink do we therefore continually doubt whether we shall be so or no Chiefly this is seen in all natural affection and piety in Children towards Parents which undoubtedly suppose the truth of that which it was impossible they could be witnesses of themselves viz. their coming out of their Mothers wombs And doth any one think this sufficient ground to question his mother because the contrary is impossible to be demonstrated to him In short then either we must destroy all Historical faith out of the world and believe nothing though never so much attested but what we see our selves or else we must acknowledge that a moral certainty is a sufficient foundation for an undoubted assent not such a one cui non potest subesse falsum but such a one cui non subest dubium i. e. an assent undoubted though not infallible By which we see what little reason the Aâ—heist on one side can have to question the truth of the Scriptures to the History of it and what little ground the Papists on the other side have to make a pretence of the necessity of infallibility as to the proposal of such things where moral certainty is sufficient that is to the matter of fâ—ct Which I now come to prove as to the subject in hand viz. that the writings of Moses are undoubtedly his which I prove by a twofold argument 1. An universal consent of persons who were best able to know the truth of the things in question 2. The setling of a Commonwealth upon the Laws delivered by Moses 1. The universal Consent of persons most capable of judging in the Case in hand I know nothing the most scrupulous and inquisitive mind can possibly desire in order to satisfaction concerning any matter of fact beyond an universal Consent of such persons who have a greater capacity of knowing the truth of it then we can have And those are all such persons who have lived nearest those times when the things were done and have best understood the affairs of the times when the things were pretended to be done Can we possibly conceive that among the people of the Iews who were so exceedingly prone to transgress the Law
meer Câ—nto a confused mixture of the Christian Platonick and Aegyptian doctrine together So that we could hardly maintain the justness of the repute of the antient Aegyptian Learning from any thing now extant of it but yet we see no reason to question it especially since it is so honourably spoken of in Sacred Writ and seems in it to have been made the standard and measure of humane wisdom For which we have this observable testimony that when the wisdom of Solomon is spoken of with the greatest advantage and commendation it is set forth with this character that it exceeded the wisdom of all the children of the East Countrey and all the wisdom of Aegypt Whence it is most natural and easie to argue that certainly their learning must be accounted the greatest at that time in the world or else it could not have been inferred that Solomon was wiser then all men because his wisdom excelled theirs unless we suppose their wisdom to have been the greatest in that age of the world when the wisdom of the Graecians although in that time Homer is supposed to flourish was not thought worthy the taking notice of We see from hence then as from an irrefragable testimony that the wisdom of the Aegyptians antiently was no trivial Pedantry nor meer superstitious and Magical rites but that there was some thing in it solid and substantial or it had not been worth triumphing over by the wisdom of Solomon It being true of that what Lipsius faith of the Roman Empire Quicquid dignum vinci videbatur vicit caetera non tam non potuit quam contempsit it was an argument of some great worth that it was over-top'd and conquered by it Thus we see how just the repute of the antient Aegyptian Learning is from Testimony and we shall find as great reason for it when we conâ—ider the great advantages the Aegyptians had for promoting of Learning among them Two waies men come to knowledge either by tradition from others or by observation of their own what the Aegyptians had the first way will be spoken to afterwards we now consider the latter of these All knowledge arising from observation must be either of those Sciences which immediately conduce to the benefit of mens lives or such whose end is to improve mens rational faculties in the knowledge of things The former necessity will put men upon the finding out the latter require secessum otia freedom from other imployments a mind addicted to them and industry in the study of them and a care to preserve their inventions in them The study of Geometry among the Aegyptians owed its original to necessity for the river Nile being swelled with the showers falling in Aethiopia and thence annually over-flowing the Countrey of Aegypt and by its violence overturning all the marks they had to distinguish their lands made it necessary for them upon every abatement of the flood to survey their lands to find out every one his own by the quantity of the ground upon the survey The necessity of which put them upon a more diligent enquiry into that study that thereby they might attain to some exactness in that which was to be of such necessary constant and perpetual use Thence we find the invention of Geometry particularly attributed by Herodotus Diodorus Strabo and others to the Aegyptians This skill of theirs they after improved into a greater benefit viz the conveying the water of Nile into those places where it had not overflown to so great a height as to give them hopes of an ensuing plenty which they did by the artificial cutting of several Channels for that end wherein saith Strabo the Aegyptians Art and Industry out-went Nature its self By this likewise they observed the height of the over-flowing of the river whereby they knew what harvest to expect the following year which they did by a well near Memphis from the use of it called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 upon the walls of which were the marks of several cubits which they observe and publish it to all that they might provide themselves accordingly We see what grounds there are even from profit and advantage to make us believe that the Aegyptians were skilled in Geometry and the knowledge relating thereto And for the promoting of all other knowledge whose end is Contemplation the very constitution of their Commonwealth did much conduce thereto For thereby it was proved that they should always be a sufficient number of persons freed srom all other employments who might devote themselves to a sedulous enquiry into the natures of things Such were the Aegyptian Priests who by the peculiar nature of the Aegyptian Superstitions were freed from that burdensome service of sacrificing beasts which the Priests of other Nations were continually employed about and so they enjoyed not only an easie but a very honourable employment for they were the persons of the greatest honour esteem and authority among the Aegyptians of which rank as far as I can find all were accounted who were not Souldiers Husbandmen or Artificers For Strabo mentions no Nobility at all in Aegypt distinct from the Priests for he divides the whole Commonwealth into Souldiers Husbandmen and Priests And telling us that the other two were employed about matters of war and the Kings revenues in peace he adds 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Priests minded the study of Philosophy and Astronomy and conversed most with their Kings And after speaking of their Kings being studied in their arts as well as others of the Priests he adds 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with whom they spent most of their lives Agreeably to this Plutarch tells us that the Kings themselves were often Priests and adds out of Hecataeus that the Kings used to drink wine by measure 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because they were Priests for as he saith the Kings of Aegypt were always chosen either out of the rank of Priests or Souldiers 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 those two orders being of the greatest honour the one for valour and the other for wisdom and if the King were chosen out of the Souldiers he was presently entred among the Priests to learn their mystical Sciences Diodorus indeed seems to reckon some great persons after the Priests and distinct from the Souldiery but if he means by these any other then some of the chief of the other two professions I must say as Causabon doth in another case of Diodorus Sanè Strabonis anctoritas mult is Siculis apud me praevalet Diodorus his testimony is not to be weighed with Strabo's From hence we may understand the reason why that Potiphera whose daughter Ioseph married is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which some render the Priest others the Prince of On but these two we see are very consistent their Priests being their great Princes and Heliopolis or On of which Potipherah was Prince or Priest being the chief Seat and University of the Priests
therein should be afterwards confirmed Was the Scripture an infallible rule of faith while this was wanting in it Did Christ and his Apostles discharge their places when they left something unrâ—vealed to us Was this a duty before these miracles or no if it was what need miracles to confirm it if not Christ hath not told us all necâ—ssary conditions of salvation For whatever is required as a duty is such as the neglect of it runs men upon damnation Lastly mens faith will be left at continual uncertainties for we know not according to this principle when we have all that is necessary to be beliâ—ved or do all that is necessary to be practised in order to salvation For if God may still make new articles of saith or constitute new duties by fresh miracles I must go and enquire what miracles are wrought in every place to see that I miss nothing that may be necessary for me in order to my happiness in another world If men pretend to deliver any doctrine contrary to the Scripture then it is not only necessary that they confirm it by miracles but they must manifest the falsity of those miracles on which that doctrine is believed or else they must use another miracle to prove that God will set his seal to confirm both parts of a contradiction to be true Which being the hardest task of all had need be proved by very sufficient and undoubted miracles such as may be able to make us believe those are miracles and are not at the same time and so the strength of the argument is utterly destroyed by the mâ—dium produced to prove it by By this discourâ—e these two things are clear First that no pretences of miracles are to be hearkened to when the doctrine we are to believe is already established by them if those miracles tend in the least to the derogation of the truth of what was established by those former miracles Secondly that when the full doctrine we are to believe is established by miracles there is no necessity at all of new miracles for confirmation of any of the truths therein delivered And therefore it is a most unreasonable thing to demand miracles of those to prove the truth of the doctrine they deliver who do first solemnly profess to deliver nothing but what was confirmed by miracles in the first delivery of it and is contained in the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament and secondly do not pretend to any immediate Commission from heaven but do nothing but what in their consciences they think every true Christian is bound to do much more all Magistrates and Ministers who believe the truth of what they profess which is in their places to reform all errours and abuses which are crept into the doctrine or practice of Christianity through the corruption of men or times And therefore it is a most unjust and unreasonable demand of the Papists when they require miracles from our first reformers to prove the truth of their doctrine with Had they pretended to have come with an immediate commission from heaven to have added to the Doctrine of the Gospel there had been some plea for such a demand but it was quite otherwise with them Their only design was to whip the buyers and sellers out of the Temple to purge the Church from its abuses And although that by Ierome was thought to be one of our Saviours greatest miracles yet this by us is conceived to be no other then the duty of all Magistrates Ministers and private Christians these by their prayers Ministers by their doctrine and Magistrates by their just authority CHAP. IV. The fidelity of the Prophets succeeding Moses In order of Prophets to succeed Moses by Gods own appointment in the Law of Moses The Schools of the Prophets the original and institution of them The Cities of the Levites The occasion of their first institution The places of the Schools of the Prophets and the tendency of the institution there to a prophetical office Of the Musick used in the Schools of the Prophets The Roman Assamenta and the Greek Hymns in their solemn worship The two sorts of Prophets among the Jews Lieger and extraordinary Ordinary Prophets taken out of the Schools proved by Amos and Saul BUt although now under the Gospel the revelation of Gods will being compleated by Christ and his Apostles we have no reason either to expect new Revelations or new miracles for confirming the old yet under the Law God training up his people by degrees till the comming of Christ there was a necessity of a new supply of Divine Messengers called Prophets to prepare the people and make way for the comming of Christ. As to whom these two things are considerable First Those Prophets whose work was to inform the people of their duties or to reprove them for their sins or to prepare them for the comming of the Messias which were their chief tasks had no need to confirm the truth of their doctrine or commission from heaven by the working of miracles among them And that on these two accounts First Because God did not consummate the revelation of his mind and will to the Jews by the Ministry of Moses but appointed a succession of Prophets to be among them to make known his mind unto them Now in this case when the prophetical â—ffice was established among them what necessity was there thaâ— every one that came to them upon an errand from God should prove his testimony to be true by miracles when in the discharge of his office he delivered nothing dissonant from the Law of Moses It is one argument God intended a succession of Prophets when he laid down such rules in his Law for tâ—e judging of them and to know whether they were truly inspired or no Deut. 15. 21 22. And in that same place God doth promise a succession of Prophets Deut. 18. 15 18. A Prophet will the Lord God raise up unto thee like unto me to him shall ye hearken Which words though in their full and compleat sense they do relate to Christ who is the great Prophet of the Church yet whoever attends to the full scope of the words will easily perceive that the immediate sense of them doth relate to an order of Prophets which should succeed Moses among the Iewes between whom and Moses there would be a great similitude as to their Birth Calling and Doctrine though not a just equality which is excluded Deut. 34. 10 11. and the chief reason why it is said there that the other Prophets fell so much short of Moses is in regard of the signs and wonders which he wrought as is there largely expressed Nor may it seem strange that by a Prophet should be understood an order or succession of Prophets when it is acknowledged by most Protestants that by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Antichrist is understood a rank and succession of several persons in the same name function And that it is
they shall teach Iacob thy statutes and Israel thy Law Which notwithstanding what Abarbinel and others say must certainly comprehend as well the moral as the ceremonial part of Moses his Law And the Priests lips are said to preserve knowledge and God saith they should seek the Law at his mouth for he is the messenger of the Lord of Hosts Do these things import no more then meer deciding the cases of the ceremonial Law But whatever Gods intention in the institution of the Levites was we find not much in Scripture of what they did for the promoting the moral and spiritual part of divine worship but it is no news to hear that Societies instituted for good and pious ends should degenerate from the first intention of the Founders of them and thus it is probable it was with the Levites who finding the most of their benefit and advantage to come in by the ceremonial cases might grow more negligent of the moral part of divine service which brought no secular emolument to them And thence we read not of these Schools of the Prophets which were Societies in order to spiritual in struction till about the time of Samuel and many think him to have been the first Author of them For it is evident that about his time the Priesthood was grown to a great degeneracy and men thereby estranged from the worship of God so that there seemed almost a necessity then of restoring some Societies who might have a special eye to the spiritual part of Gods worship and service The occasion of the inâ—titution of them seems to have been from the resort which the people had to the high places for sacrificing during the captivity or uncertain abode of the Ark of God after the desolation of Shiloh now the people resorting to these places to perform their solemnities it was so ordered that a company of Prophets should be there resident to bless the sacrifices and instruct the people Two of these places with these Societies in them we finde mentioned in the time of Samuel The first mentioned 1 Sam. 10. 5 10 which cannot be the same with Ramah although the Syriack and Arabick versions so render it For Samuel had his own residence in Ramah whither Saul went to him 1 Sam. 9. 18 19. but in this chapter we finde Samuel sending Saul on a journey from him beyond Bethel and the plain of Tabor and there tells him he should meet with the company of Prophets upon the hill of God ver 5 Some think it was called the Hill of God because of its height as the Cedars of God and the mountains of God for the highest so Tirinus understands it but Menochius far more probably quia in ea erat caetus veluti schola prophetarum The Chaldee Paraphrast renders it ad collem in quo arca Domini R. Solomon makes this hill to be Kirjath-jearim and therefore called the hill of God because the Ark was there in the house of Abinadab in the hill But Lyra thinks he hath proved that before this time the Ark was removed from Kirjath-jearim to Mizpah but Abulensis more probably conceives it was never removed thither and withal thinks this hill of God to be no other then Gibea of Benjamin where Saul inhabited and thence the wonder was the greater to see him Prophecy among those who had known his former life and education The other place is Naioth in Ramah where was a high place whither the people came to sacrifice this Ramah seems to have been the place of Samuels nativity called Ramathaim Sophim which the Syriack version renders collis specularum some who would be ready to improve every thing for their purpose would think it was so called in allusion to the imployment of the young Students there So Heinsius conceives 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be understood Numb 23. 14. the place of watchmen from which word saith he without doubt the Greeks derived their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 who were wont in such high places to observe the course and motions of the heavens But to pass by such frivolous conjectures It seems a great deal more probable that this Ramah which the Septuagint by a light mutation of the initial letters calls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was the same with Arimathaea the Town of Ioseph mentioned in the Gospel But the place where the school of the Prophets was seems to have been with greatest conveniency for a place of education at some distance from the Town Vatablus conceives it was built in the fields of Ramah and the word Naioth saith Pet. Martyr properly signifies pastures and some remote places quae fere sunt studiis aptissima The Chaldee Paraphrast renders Naioth by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Colledge or School of prophetical education over this Colledge Samuel himself was President as most understand that place 1 Sam. 19. 20. And when they saw the company of Prophets prophecying and Samuel standing as appointed over them Ionathan renders it Semuelem stantem docentem super eos To which we may well apply the words of Philo speaking of the Iewish manner of instruction 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The President going before and teaching the rest increasing in goodness and improving in life and manners Neither can we think so good and useful an institution should presently degenerate or be turned into another channel and therefore some conceive that the most noted Prophets to the time of David were the Presidents of these Colledges such as besides Samuel were Hâ—lcana Gad Nathan Heman and Ieduthun and that they selected out the choycest and most hopeful of the young Levites and here educated them together with the Nazarites which came out of other tribes And it seems very probable that in all the most noted high places whether they went to sacrifice there were such Schools erected after the first institution of them Thence we read of such multitudes of the Prophets together in the time of Ahab 1 Kings 18. 4. for when Iezabel cut off the Prophets of the Lord Obadiaâ— took an hundred and hid them in caves certainly their number was very great when an hundred might be saved without missing The chief places where they resided seem to have been Bethel 2 Kings 2. 3. and Iericho which was a large Colledge for therein we read of fifty sons of the Prophets standing together out of their number 2 Kings 2. 5 7 15. and Gilgal which had been a place of Religion from the first entrance into Canaan there we finde the sons of the Prophets sitting before Elisha 2 Kings 4. 38. It seems most probable that the purity of Gods worship among the ten tribes after the defection in the time of Ieroboam was preserved by the Prophets in their several Schools and places of habitation which hath sufficient foundation in that place 2 Kings 4. 23. where the Shunamites husband asks her wherefore she would go to the man of
God that day seeing it was neither new-moon nor Sabbath Whereby it is both evident that the Prophets did undertake the office of instructing the people on their solemn Festivals and that it was their custom to resort to them for that end Thus we see what care God took for the instruction of his people in a time of so general an Apostacy as that of the ten tribes was when the Church of God could not be known by that constant visibility and oâ—tward glory which some speak so much of but was then clouded in obscurity and shrouded it self under the mantlâ—s of some Prophets which God continued among them and that not by any lineal succession neither though the Iews would fain make the gift of Prophecy to be a kind of Cabala too and conveyed in a constant succession from one Prophet to another Neither were these Schools of the Prophets only in Israel but in Iudah likewise was God known and his Name was great among these Schools there In Ierusalem it self there was a Colledge where Huldah the Prophetess lived 2 Kings 22. 14. some render Mishna in secunda urbis parte for Ierusalem was divided into the upper and nether part of the City Abulensis and Lyra will have it refer to the three walls of the City in which the three chief parts of it were comprized in the first the Temple and the Kings Pâ—lace in the second the Nobles and the Prophets houses and in the third the common people Iosephus seems to favour the devision of the City into three parts but Pineda thinks the second part of the City was most inhabited by Artificers and that the Prophets and the wise men and such as frequented the Temple most dwelt in the City of David within the first wall and therefore he conjectures that the Colledge was upon Mount Sion and so properly called Sion Colledge and he explains that house which wisdom is said to have built and hewn out her seven pillars Prov. 9. 1. by this Colledge which he supposeth was built by Solomon in Mount Sion and thence ver 3. she is said to cry upon the highest places of the City Thus much may serve concerning the original and institution of these Schools of the Prophets I now come to the second thing promised concerning the Schools of the Prophets which is that it was Gods ordinary method to call those persons out of these Schools whom he did employ in the discharge of the prophetical office Two things will be necessary for the clearing of this First what tendency their education in those Schools had towards the fitting them for their prophetical office Secondly what evidence the Scripture gives us that God called the Prophets out from these Colledges The first of these is very requisite to be cleared because the prophetical office depending upon immediate inspiration it is hard to conceive what influence any antecedent and preparatory dispositions can have upon receiving the prophetical spirit It is commonly known how much the generality of Iewish Writers do insist on the necessity of these qualifications antecedent to a spirit of prophecie 1. An excellent natural temper 2. Good accomplishments both of with and fortunes 3. Separation from the world 4. Congruity of place which they make proper to Iudaea 5. Opportunity of time 6. And divine inspiration These are so largely discoursed of by many learned men from Iewish Writers that it will be both tedious and impertinent to recite much of their opinions concerning them who since they have lost the gift of prophecie seem to have lost too that wisdom and natural understanding which they make one of the most necessary qualifications of a Prophet It is not easie to imagine what subserviency riches could have to a prophetical spirit unless the Iews be of Simon Magus his opinion that these gifts of the Holy Ghost may be purchased with money and if so they think themselves in as likely a way to bid fair for a prophetical spirit as any people in the world Or is it that they thiâ—k it impossible any without them should have that fâ—ee cheerful and generous spirit which they make so necessary to a prophetick spirit that it is an axiome of great authority with them Spiritus sanctus non residet super hominem moestum and they think Elisha his fit of passion did excuss his prophetick spirit from him which he was fain to retrive again with a fit of Musick There are only two sorts of those antecedent dispositions which seem to bear any affinity with the prophetick spirit And those are such as tended to the improvement of their natural faculties and such as tended to their advancement in piety and consequently to the subduing all irregular motions in their souls Not that either of these did concur by way of efficiency to the production of a spirit of prophecie which is an opinion Maimonides seems very favourable to but that God might make choise particularly of such persons to remove all prejudices against them in those they were sent unto For nothing could possibly dissatisfie them more concerning divine inspiration then if the person who pretended to it were of very weak and shallow intellectuals or known to be of an irregular conversation In order therefore to the fuller satisfaction of men concerning these two qualisications this Institution of them in the Schools of the Prophets was of great subserviency because therein their only imployment was to improve in knowledge and especially in true piety This latter being the most necessary disposition since the Apostle hath told us that the Prophets were Holy men who spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost And in order to this the greatest part we can find of the exercises of those who were educated in these Schools of the Prophets were instructions in the Law and the solemn celebration of the praises of God Which appears in Scripture to have been their chief employment as Prophets and by which they are said to prophecie So at Gibeah at the Oratory there we find a company of Prophets coming down from the high place with a Psaltery a Tabret and pipe and a Harp before them and prophecying It may seem somewhat strange to consider what relation these Musical instruments had to the prophecying here mentioned Are Musical notes like some seeds Naturalists speak of which will help to excite a prophetick spirit Or do they tend to elevate the spirits of men and so put them into a greater capacity of Enthusiasm Or is it because Musick is so excellent for allaying the tumults of inward passions and so fitting the soul for the better entertainment of the Divine Spirit Or was all this prophecying here spoken of nothing else but vocal and instrumental Musick So some indeed understand it that it was only the praising God with spiritual songs and melody wherein one as the Praecentor began a hymn which the rest took from him and carried on
put too great a restraint upon the boundless spirit of God For sometimes as will appear afterwards God sent the Prophets upon extraordinary messages and then furnished them with sufficient evidence of their Divine commission without being beholding to the Testimonials of the Schools of the Prophets But besides these God had a kind of Leiger-Prophets among his people such were the most of those whom we read of in Scripture which were no pen-men of the sacred Scripture such in Davids time we may conceive Gad and Nathan and afterwards we read of many other Prophets and Seers among them to whom the people made their resort Now these in probability were such as had been trained up in the Prophetick Schools wherein the spirit of God did appear but in a more fixed and setled way then in the extraordinary Prophets whom God did call out on some more signal occasions such as Isaiah and Ieremiah were We have a clear foundation for such a distinction of Prophets in those words of Amos to Amaziah Amos 7. 14 15. I was no Prophet neither was I a Prophets son but I was a herdman and a gatherer of Sycamore fruits And the Lord took me as I followed the stock and the Lord said unto me Go prophecie to my people Israel Some understand the first words I was not a Prophet that he was not born a Prophet as Ieremiah was not designed and set apart to it from his mothers womb but I rather think by his not being a Prophet he means he was none of those resident Prophets in the Colledges or Schools of them not any of those who had led a prophetick life and withdrawn themselves from converse with the world nor was I saith he the son of a Prophet i. e. not brought up in discipleship under those Prophets and thereby trained up in order to the prophetick function Non didici inter discipulos Prophetarum as Pellican renders it nec institutione qua filii Prophetarum quasi ad donum Prâ—phetiae à parentibus praeparabantur saith Estius Non à puero educatus in Schol is Propheticis so Calvin and most other modern Interpreters understand it as well as Abarbinel and the Jewish Writers Whereby it is evident that Gods ordinary way for the Prophets was to take such as had been trained up and educated in order to that end although God did not tye up hmself to this method but sometimes called one from the Court as he did Isaiah sometimes one from the herds as here he did Amos and bid them go prophecie to the house of Israel There was then a kind of a standing Colledge of Prophets among the Israelites who shined as fixed Stars in the Firmament and there were others who had a more planetary motion and withall a more lively and resplendent illumination from the fountain of prophetick light And further it seems that the spirit of prophecie did not ordinarily seize on any but such whose institution was in order to that end by the great admiration which was caused among the people at Sauls so sudden prophecying that it became a proverb Is Saul also among the Prophets which had not given the least foundation for an adage for a strange and unwonted thing unless the most common appearances of the spirit of Prophecie had been among those who were trained up in order to it Thus I suppose we have fully cleared the first reason why there was no necessity for the ordinary Prophets whose chief office was instruction of the people to prove their commission by miracles because God had promised a succession of Prophets by Moses and these were brought up ordinarily to that end among them so that all prejudices were sufficiently removed from their persons without any such extraordinary power as that of miracles CHAP. V. The tryal of Prophetical Doctrine Rules of trying Prophets established in the Law of Moses The punishment of pretenders The several sorts of false Prophets The case of the Prophet at Bethel discussed The tryâ—l of false Prophets belonging to the great Sanhedrin The particular rules whereby the Doctrine of Prophets was judged The proper notion of a Prophet not forâ—telling future contingencies but having immediate Divine revelation Several principles laid down for clearing the doctrine of the Prophets 1. That immediate dictates of natural light are not to be the measure of Divine revelation Several grounds for Divine revelation from natural light 2. What ever is directly repugnant to the dictates of nature cannot be of Divine revelation 3. No Divine revelation doth contradict a Divine positive Law without sufficient evidence of Gods intention to repeal that Law 4. Divine revelation in the Prophets was not to be measured by the words of the Law but by the intention and reason of it The Prophetical office a kind of Chancery to the Law of Moses THE second reason why those Prophets whose main office was instruction of the people or meerly foretelling future events needed not to confirm their doctrine by mirales is because they had certain rules of tryal by their Law whereby to discern the false Prophets from the true So that if they were deceived by them it was their own oscitancy and inadvertency which was the cause of it God in that Law which was confirmed by miracles undoubtedly Divine had established a Court of tryal for Prophetick Spirits and given such certain rules of procedure in it that no men needed to be deceived unless they would themselves And there was a greater necessity of such a certain way of tryal among them because it could not otherwise be expected but in a Nation where a Prophetick Spirit was so common there would be very many pretenders to it who might much endanger the faith of the people unless there were some certain way to find them out And the more effectually to deterre men either from counterfeiting a Prophetick Spirit or from hearkâ—ning to such as did God appointed a severe punishment for every such pretender viz. upon legal conviction that he be punished with death Deut. 18. 20. But the Prophet which shall presume to speak a word in my name which I have not commanded him to speak or that shall speak in the name of other Gods shall surely dye The Iews generally understand this of strangling as they do alwayes in the Law when the particular manner of death is not expressed And therein a salse Prophet and a seducer were distinguished each from other that a meer seducer was to be stoned to death under sufficient testimony Deut. 13. 6 10. But the false Prophet is there said in general only to be put to death Deut. 13. 1 5. The main difference between the seducer and false Prophet was that the seducer sought by cunning perswasions and plausible arguments to draw them off from the worship of the true God but the false Prophet alwayes pretended Divine revelation for what he perswaded them to whether he gave out that he had that revelation
from him an eternal and immutable obligation First then as to the matter of the Law and here it must be supposed that in the matter of controversie between us and the Iews the question is not of any of those things which are therefore commanded because they are intrinsecally good as the precepts of the natural or moral Law but of those things which are therefore only good because God commands them i. e. things meerly positive whose worth and value ariseth not from the intrinsick weight of the things but from the external impress of divine authority upon them Now it is no question on either hand whether God may require these things or no nor whether these things will be acceptable unto God so long as he requires them but whether when once required the obligation to them can never cease Such kind of things among the Iews we suppose all the rites and ceremonies of the Law to be viz. circumcision distinction of meats and days customes of sacrificing and such like and whatever other Laws respected them as a distinct and peculiar Common-wealth All these we say are such as do not carry an immutable obligation along with them and that on these accounts First because these things are not primarily required for themselves but in order to some further end Things that are required upon their own account carry an indispensable obligation in them to their performance but where things are commanded not for themselves but the Legislator doth express some particular grounds of requiring them there the end and intention of the Legislator is the measure of their obligation To which purpose Maimonides excellently speaks when he saith That the particular manner of worship among the Jews as sacrifices and oblations were secundum intentionem secundam Dei Gods secondary intention and design but prayer invocation and the like were nearer Gods primary intention Now saith he for the first they are no further acceptable to God then as all the circumstances of time place and persons are observed which are prescribed by God himself but the latter are acceptable in any person time or place And for this cause saith he it is that we find the Prophets often reproving men for their too great sedulity in bringing oblations and inculcating this to them that God did not intend these as the principal instances of his worship and that God did not need any of these things So 1 Sam. 15. 22. Behold to obey is better then sacrifice and to hearken then the fat of rams Isa. 1. 11. To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices unto me saith the Lord. And especially Ierem. 7. 22 23. For I spake not to your Fathers nor commanded them in the day that I brought them forth out of the Land of Aegypt concerning burnt-offerings but this thing I commanded them saying Obey my voice and I will be your God and ye shall be my people Of which words Maimonides saith Scrupulum moverunt omnibus quos mihi videre aut audire contigit For say they how can it be that God did not commandthem concerning sacrifices when great part of the Law is about them But Maimonides well resolves the doubt thus That Gods primary intention and that which he chiefly looked at was obedience but Gods intention in sacrifices and oblations was only to teach them the chief thing which was obedience This then is of the number of those things which are spoken absolutely but to be understood comparatively as I will have mercy and not sacrifice My doctrine is not mine but his that sent me It is not you that speak but the holy Ghost c. So that we see all the goodness which is in these things is conveyed into them by that which is morally good which is obedience and God did never regard the performance of those Laws any further then as it was an expression of obedience and it was conjoyned with those other moral duties which were most agreeable to the Divine nature And in this sense many understood that difficult place Ezek. 20. 25. And I gave them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 statutes that were not good i. e. say they comparatively with these things which were simply and in themselves good to which purpose they give this rule aliquid negatur inesse alicui quod alterius comparatione existimatur exiguum But I rather think that which the Chaldee Paraphrast suggests and others explain further to be the meaning of that place viz. that by the precepts that were not good is meant the cruel and tyrannical impositions of those enemies God for their sins did deliver them over to which were far from being acceptable to them which is frequently the sense of good in Scripture Thus we see one reason why the ceremonial precepts do not in themselves imply an immutable obligation because they are not commanded for themselves but in order to a further end Because God hath frequently dispensed with the ceremonial precepts when they were in greatest force if the end of them could be attained without them Thus the precept of circumcision slept during the Israelites travels in the wilderness Thus David eat of the shew-bread which is expresly forbidden in the Law the Iews think to evade this by distinguishing between the bread of confession in the Eucharistical offering mentioned Levit. 7. 13. and the proper shew-bread Now they say David eat only of the first and not of the second but this is glossa Aurelianensis which overthrows the Text for it is expresly said that the ground why the Priest gave him holy bread was because there was none there but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the shew-bread 1 Sam. 21. 6. A like violation of the Law without reproof is commonly supposed by the Iews to have been in the siege of Iericho viz. in the case of the Sabbath But it is more plain in that Anomalous Passeover observed by Hezekiah which many of the Iews themselves acknowledge was not observed as the second Passeover provided by the Law to be celebrated on the 14 day of the second moneth by those who were debarred of the first for their legal uncleanness but they suppose it to have been intended for the legal Passeover only because the fourteenth of Nisan was passed before the sanctification of the Temple was finished lest they should celebrate none at all that year they tell us that Hezekiah with the consent of the Rulers did make an Intercalation that year of a whole moneth and so Nisan was reckoned for the second Adar and Iiar for Nisan from whence they say that Hezekiah did intercalate Nisan in Nisan that is added another Nisan to the first But where do we read any such thing permitted in the Law as the celebrating the first Passeover the 14 of the second moneth But granting that it was observed as a second Passeover because of the want of legal sanctification both in Priests and people yet we find
great irregularities in the observation of it for it is expresly said That a multitude of the people had not cleansed themselves yet they did eat the Passeover otherwise then it was written And yet it is said upon Hezekiah's prayer that the Lord hearkened to Hezekiah and healed every one So that we see God himself did dispense with the strict ceremonial precepts of the Law where men did look after the main and substantial parts of the worship God required from them Nay God himself hath expresly declared his own will to dispense with the ritual and ceremonial Law where it comees to stand in competition with such things as have an internal goodness in them when he saith he desired mercy and not sacrifice and the knowledge of God more then burnt-offerings Thus we plainly see that the ceremonial Law however positive it was did yield as to its obligation when any thing that was moral stood in competition with it And so the Iews themselves suppose an open violation of the judicial Law to have been in the hanging up of Sauls sons a long time together directly contrary to Deut. 21. 23. which they conceive to have been from the 16. of Nisan to the 17. of Marchesvan which is as much as from our March to September whereas the Law saith expresly that the body of one that is hanged shall not remain all night upon the tree but thou shalt in any wise bury him that day One of the Iewish Rabbies as G. Vorstius tells us is so troubled at this that he wisheth that place in Samuel expunged out of Scripture that the name of God might be sanctified But whether this were done 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by the command of the Oracle or no or whether only by a general permission we see it was acceptable unto God for upon that the Gibeonites famine was removed and God was intreated for the Land Thus we have now proved that there is no immutable and indispensable obligation which ariseth from the things themselves Secondly it is no ways inconsistent with the wisdom of God to repeal such a Law when once established The main argument of that learned R. Abravanel whereby he would establish the eternity of the Law of Moses is fetched from hence That this Law was the result of the wisdom of God who knows the suitableness of things he appoints to the ends he appoints them for as God hath appointed bread to be the food of mans body Now we are not to enquire why God hath appointed bread and no other thing to be the food of man no more saith he are we to enquire why God hath appointed this Law rather then another for the food of our souls but we are to rest contented with the counsels of God though we understand not tht reasons of them This is the substance of that argument which he more largely deduceth To which we answer that his argument holds good for obedience to all Gods positive precepts of what kind or nature soever they be so long as we know their obligation to continue but all the question is whether every positive precept must always continue to oblige And thus far his similitude will hold good that whatever God doth command we are to look upon it to be as necessary to our souls as bread to our bodies but hence it follows not that our souls must be always held to the same positive precepts any more then our bodies to the same kind of food Nay as in our bodies we find some kind of food always necessary but the kind of it to alter according to age health and constitutions so we say some kind of Divine revelation is always necessary but God is graciously pleased to temper it according to the age and growth of his people so he fed them as with milk in their nonage with a ritual and ceremonial Law and trained them up by degrees under the Nursery of the Prophets till the Church was grown to age and then God fed it with the strong meat which is contained in Gods revelation of his will by the Gospel of his Son And therein was abundantly seen Gods 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 his variegated wisdom that he made choise of such excellent and proportionable wayes to his peoples capacity to prepare them gradually for that full and compleat revelation which was reserved for the time of the appearance of the true Messias in the world For can any thing be more plain then the gradual progress of Divine revelation from the beginning of the world That fair resemblance and portraicture of God himself and his will upon his word if I may so express it had its ground work laid upon mans first Apostacy in the promise made Gen. 3. 15. whereon some further lines were drawn in the times of the Patriarchs but it had its 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it was shadowed out the most in the typical and ceremonial Law but was never filled up to the life nor had its perfect 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 till the Son of God himself appeared unto the world If then it be inconsistent with the wisdom of God to add any thing to the Law of Moses why not to the revelation made to Adam or the Patriarchs or especially to the seven precepts of Noah which they suppose to have been given to all mankind after the flood If it were not repugnant to the wisdom of God to superadd rituals and ceremonials to morals and naturals why shall it be to take down the Scaffolds of Ceremonies when Gods spiritual Temple the Church of God is come to its full height Is there not more reason that rituals should give place to substantials then that such should be superinduced to morals There are only two things can be pleaded by the Iewes why it should be more repugnant to the wisdom of God to add to the Law of Moses then to any former revelation which are the greater perfection they suppose to be in this revelation above others and that God in the promulgation of it did express that he would never alter it But both these are manifestly defective and insufficient in order to the end for which they are produced For first what evidence is there that the Law of Moses contained so great perfection in it as that it was not capable of having any additions made to it by God himself We speak not now of the perfection of the Moral Law which it is granted contained in it the foundation of all positive precepts for this we never contend for the abrogation of but the ritual Law is that we meddle with and is it possible any men should be so little befriended by reason as to think this to be the utmost pitch of what God could reveal to the world as to the way of his own worship Let any indifferent rational person take the precepts of the Gospel and lay them in the ballance with those of the
for which he saith they were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 reproached by the Heathens because their Laws and Polity were so different from the custom of other Nations Thus we see then that many precepts of the Ceremonial Law were founded neither on the goodness of the things themselves nor on any unalterable reason but were enforced on a peculiar reason on the people of the Iews at that time as they were a people separated from the rest of the world for the worship of the true God And for the other great offices wherein their Religion did so much consist viz. Sacrifices distinction of meats observation of Festivals circumcision and such like The particular account and reason of them is either evident in the Law its self or fully acknowledged by their own Writers that it is here superfluous to insist on them Especially since so many have done that so largely already particularly Grotius whose Labours I intend not to transcribe I come therefore to the second thing which is that the Ceremonial Law was so far from being founded on an immutable reason that while it was in its greatest force such a state of things was plainly foretold with which the observation of that Law would be inconsistent For which we are to consider that though the Law of Moses seemed outwardly to respect the temporal advantages of the people embracing it in the Land of Canaan yet there was a Sâ—ring of Spiritual Promises whose head was higher then Iordan was that ran down from the Patriarchs was more and fully opened to some of them which â—â—ough it seemed to run under ground in the midst of the Ceremonial observations of the Law yet it frequently brake forth and opened its self in the midst of them and by degrees in the Prophetical Age did make its self a larger Channel till in the time of the Messias by its force and violence it overthrew those banks which stood in the way of it and overspread the face of the whole earth It is evident by the whole series of the Scripture of the Old Testament that Gods ultimate intention was not to confine the saving knowledge of his will only to the Iews for the great promise to Abraham was That in his seed all the nations of the earth should be blessed And as Abraham rejoyced to see that day afar off so good Iacob when he leaned on his Iacobs staff took the height of that day-star from on high which though like some of the fixed stars he might not for some time be visible to the inferiour world yet he foretold the time when he should descend into a lower orb and become conspicuous in our Horizon And consequently to his appearance in the world would be the drawing not so much the eyes as the hearts of the world to him for no sooner is it mentioned that Shiluh comes when the Scepter departs from Iudah but it immediatly follows and to him shall the gathering of the people be Thus we see before ever the Law of Moses came to inclose the people of the Iews as Gods peculiar people there was a design on foot for inlarging the bounds of Gods inheritance and making the uttermost parts of the earth his Sons possession Can we then think that the Law which came afterwards could disanull the Covenant made 430. years before as the Apostle excellently reasons Can we believe the Mosaical dispensation was the utmost of what God did intend when God had before promised that the blessing of Abraham should come upon us Gentiles also to which purpose it is very observable that Abraham was justified not in circumcision but in uncircumcision for he received the sign of circumcision a seal of the righteousness of faith being uncircumcised that he might be the Father of all them that believe though they be not circumcised that righteousness might be imputed unto them also Whereby it is evident that the great blessinâ—s promised to Abraham did not respect him meerly as Progenitor of the Israelites but in a higher capacity as Father of the faithfull and that the ground of his acceptance with God did not depend on any Ceremonial Rite such as circumcision was God imputing his faith for righteousness before his being circumcised But because the time was not yet come wherein that grand mysterie of mans salvation by the death of the Son of God was to be revealed therefore when God called the Nation of the Iews from their bondage he made choice of a more obscure way of representing this mysterie to them through all the umbrages of the Law And withall inforced his precepts with such terrible sanctions of curses to all that continued not in all that was written in that Law to do it to make them the more apprehensive that the ground of their acceptance with God could not be the performance of the precepts of that Law but they ought to breath after that higher dispensation wherein the way and method of mans salvation should be fully revealed when the fulness of time was come Now therefore God left them under the Tutorage and Paedagogy of the Law which spake so severely to them that they might not think this was all God intended in order to the happiness of men but that he did reserve some greater thing in store to be enjoyed by his people when they were come to age So that though the ceremonies of the Law had not a mouth to speak out Christ yet tbey had a hand to point to him for they were the shadow or dark representation of that which was to be drawn afterwards to the greatest life And this was understood by all those whose hearts were carried beyond the outward sapless Letter of the Law to the more inward and spiritual meaning of it there being an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Law as well as Philosophy and these mysteries were not so vailed and hidden but all that were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 fully initiated might fully understand them which made up that true spiritual Cabala which was constantly preserved among the true Israelites which was more largely commented on by the Prophets of succeeding Ages whose care it was to unlock this Cabala and to raise up the hearts of the people in a higher expectation of the great things which were to come Thence we not only read of the solemn prayer of the Church of the Iews that the knowledge of God might be dispersed over all the Nations of the earth but we have many prophecies that when the mountain of the Lords house should be exalted all nations should flow unto it that from the rising of the Sun to the going down thereof Gods name shall be great among the Gentiles and in every â—lace incense should be offered to his name and a pure offering for his name shall be great among the Heathen That the Inscription on the High Priests forehead Holiness to the Lord should
by reason of the large diffusion of a Spirit of Holiness in the days of the Gospel be set upon the bells of Horses and that the pots in the Lords house should be as bowls before the altar i. e. that when the Levitical service should be laid aside and that Holiness which was that appropriated to the Priests and Instruments of the Temple should be discerned in those things which seemed most remote from it That a Priesthood after another order then that of Aaron should be established viz. after the order of Melchisedek and that he that was the Priest after this order should judge among the Heathen and wound the heads over many Countries that in the day of his power the people should not be frighted to obedience with thunderclaps and earthquakes as at Mount Sinai but should come and yield themselves as a free-will offering unto him and yet their number be as great as the drops of the dew which distill in the morning That God out of other nations would take unto himself for Priests and for Levites that the desire of all Nations should speedily come that the Messenger of the Covenant should come into his Temple nay that seventy weeks are determined upon thy people and upon thy holy City that then the vision and prophecie should be sealed up that the Sacrifice and oblation should be caused to cease that the City and the sanctuary should be destroyed and the end thereof shall be with a flood and unto the end of the War desolations are determined that after three score and two weeks Messias should be cut off but not for himself that by him transgression should be finished and reconciliation for iniquity should be made and everlasting righteousness should be brought in And least all these things should be apprehended to be only a higher advancing of the Levitical worship and the way of external Ceremonies God expresly saith that he would make a New Covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah not according to the Covenant that I made with their Fathers in the day I took them by the hand to bring them out of the Land of Egypt which my Covenant they brake although I was an husband to them saith the Lord But this shall be the Covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days saith the Lord I will put my Law in their inward parts and write it in their hearts and will be their God and they shall be my people Can any one that now considers seriously the state of things thus described as it should come to pass ever imagine that the Levitical service was ever calculated for this State Was Gods Worship to be confined to his Temple at Ierusalem when all the Nations of the earth should come to serve him Was the High Priest to make an attonement there when an order of Priesthood different from the Aaronical should be set up Must the Tribe of Levi only attend at the Temple when God would take Priests and Levites out of all Nations that serve him What would become of the Magnificence and glory of the Temple when both City and Sanctuary shall be destroyed and that must be within few prophetical weeks after the Messias is cut off And must the Covenant God made with the Israelites continue for ever when God expresly saith he would make a New one and that not according to the Covenant which he made with them then It is so evident then as nothing can well be more that under the Old Testament such a state of Religion was described and promised with which the Levitical worship would be inconsistent and so that the Ceremonial Law was not at first established upon an immutable reason which was the thing to be proved CHAP. VIII General Hypotheses concerning the Truth of the Doctrine of Christ. The great prejudice against our Saviour among Iews and Heathens was the means of his appearance The difference of the miracles at the delivery of the Law and Gospel Some general Hypotheses to clear the subserviency of miracles to the Doctrine of Christ. 1. That where the truth of a doctrine depends not on evidence but authority the only way to prove the truth of the Doctrine is to prove the Testimony of the revealer to be infallible Things may be true which depend not on evidence of the things What that is and on what it depends The uncertainty of natural knowledge The existence of God the foundation of all certainty The certainty of matters of faith proved from the same principle Our knowladge of any thing supposeth something incomprehensible The certainty of faith as great as that of knowledge the grounds of it stronger The consistency of rational evidence with faith Yet objects of faith exceed reason the absurdities following the contrary opinion The uncertainty of that which is called reason Philosophical dictates no standard of reason Of transubstantiation and ubiquity c. why rejected as contrary to reason The foundation of faith in matters above reason Which is infallible Testimony that there are ways to know which is infallible proved 2. Hypoth A Divine Testimony the most infallible The resolution of faith into Gods veracity as its formal object 3. Hypoth A Divine Testimony may be known though God speak not immediatly Of Inspiration among the Iews and Divination among the Heathens 4. Hyp. The evidences of a Divine Testimony must be clear and certain Of the common motives of faith and the obligation to faith arising from them The original of Infidelity HAving now cleared that the Law of Moses was capable of a repeal I come to the second enquiry whether the miracles of our Saviour did give a sufficient evidence of his power and authority to repeal it I shall not to prevent too large an excursion insist on any other evidences of our Saviours being the promised Mâ—ssias but keep close to the matter of our present debate concerning the evidence which ariseth from such a power of Miracles as our Saviour had in order to his establishing that doctrine which he came to publish to the world The great stumbling-block in reference to our blessed Saviour among both the Iews and learned Heathens was the meanness of his appearance in the world not coming attended with that state and magnificence which they thought to be inseparable from so great a person The Iews had their senses so possâ—ssed with the thundrings and lightnings on mount Sinai that they could not imagine the structure of their Ceremonial worship could be taken down with less noise and terror then it was erâ—cted with And withall collecting all those passages of the Old Testament which seemed to foretell such glorious things of the dayes of the Messias which â—ither refer to his second coming or must be understood in a spiritual sense they having their minds oppressed with the sense of their present calamities applyed them wholly to an external greatness whereby
reason enough to reject the Laws of Moses and Christ because Celsus calls them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Galen Christianity 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that they were such doctrines which require faith and obedience without giving mens reason an account of the things commanded As though the authority of a Legislator sufficiently manifested were not enough to enforce a Law unless a sufficient account were given of the thing required to the purblind reason of every individual person acted by passions and private interests as to the justice and equity of it And so the primary obligation on mans part to faith and obedience must arise not from the evidence of Divine authority but of the thing it self which is revealed to the most partial judgement of every one to whom it is proposed Which those who know how short the stock of reason is at the best in men and how easily that which is is fashioned and moulded according to prâ—judices and interests already entertained will look upon only as a design to comply with the carnal desires of men in that thereby none shall be bound to go any further then this blind and corrupted guide shall lead them Now these being the terms on which the Gospel of Christ must have expected entertainment in the Gentile world how impossible lâ—ad it been ever to have sound any success among men had there not been sufficient evidence given by a power of miracles that however strange and incredible the doctrine might seem yet it was to be believed because there was sufficient means to convince men that it was of Divine revelation Neither were the matters of saith only contrary to the inclinations of the world but so were the precepts of life or those things in Christianity which concerned practice There are two things which are the main scope and design of Christianity in reference to mens lives to take them off from their sins and from the world and of all things these are they which mens hearts are so bewitched with Now the precepts of the Gospel are such which require the greatest purity of heart and life which call upon men to deny themselves and all ungodliness and worldly lusts and to live soberly and righteously and godly in this present world that all that name the name of Christ must depart from iniquity that all true Christians must be cleansed from all filthiness of flesh and spirit and must perfect holiness in the fear of God And the Gospel enforceth these precepts of holiness with the most terrible denunciations of the wrath of God on those who disobey them that the Lord Iesus Christ shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty Angels in flaming fire taking vengeance on them that know not God and that obey not the Gospel of Iesus Christ. That the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who hold the truth in unrighteousness That no persons who live in the habitual practice of any known sin shall inherit the Kingdom of God That no man should deceive them with vain words for because of these things comes the wrath of God upon the children of disobedience that men do but vainly flatter themselves when they seek to reconcile unholy lives with the hopes of future happiness for without holiness no man shall see the Lord. And then in reference to the things of this present life which men busie themselves so much about the Gospel declares that they who love this world the love of the Father is not in them that the friendship of this world is enmity with God and whosoever will be a friend of the world is an enemy to God That Christians must not set their affections on earth but on things in heaven That the conversation of true Christians is in heaven That we ought not to lay up our treasure on earth but in heaven That we must not look at the things which are seen but at the things which are not seen for the things which are seen are temporal but the things which are not seen are eternal Now the whole design of the doctrine of Christ being to perswade men to lead a holy and heavenly life while they are in this world and thereby to be made meet to be partakers of the inheritance with the Saints in light can we think so many men whose hearts were wedded to sin and the world could so suddenly be brought off from both without a divine power accompanying that doctrine which was preached to them And therefore the Apostle saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ i. e. though the Gospel of Christ be the only true mysterie yet I do not by it as the Heathens are wont to do with their famous Eleusinian mysteries which were kept so secret by all the mystae and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but saith he I know no reason I have to be ashamed of any thing in the Gospel that I should labour its concealment to advance its veneration but the more publike the Gospel is the more it manifests its power for through it God is pleased mightily to work in order to the salvation both of Iew and Gentile And of all the success of the Gospel that upon the hearts and lives of men deserves the greatest consideration The great efficacy and power of the Gospel was abundantly seen in that great alteration which it wrought in all those who were the hearty imbracers of it The Philosophers did very frequently and deservedly complain of the great inefficacy of all their moral precepts upon the minds of men and that by all their instructions politiora non meliora ingenia fiunt men improved more in knowledge then goodness but now Christianity not only enforced duties on men with greater power and authority For the Scriptures do as Saint Austin speaks Non tanquam ex Philosophorum concertationibus strepere sed tanquam ex oraculis Dei nubibus intonare not make some obstreperous clamours like those tinkling Cymbals the Philosophers but awe the souls of men with the majesty of that God from whom they came Neither was it only a great and empty sound which was heard in the preaching of the Gospel but when God thundred therein he broke down the stately Cedars and shook the Wilderness and made the Hinds to Calve as it is said of Thunder called the voice of the Lord in Scripture he humbled the pride of men unsettled the Gentile world from its former foundations and wrought great alterations on all those who hearkened to it The whose design of the Gospel is couched in those words which Saint Paul tells us were spoken to him by Christ himself when he appointed him to be an Apostle to open mens eyes and to turn them from darkness to light and from the power of Satan unto God that they may receive forgiveness of sins and inheritance among
them which were sanctified by faith in Christ. And the efficacy of this doctrine in order to these great â—nds was abundantly seen in the preaching of that Apostle who was so instrumental in converting the world to piety and sobriety as well as to the doctrine of Christ. What strange persons were the Corinthians before they became Christians for when the Apostle had enumerated many of the vilest persons of the world he presently adds And such were some of you but ye are washed but ye are sanctified but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Iesus and by the spirit of our God The more dangerous the distemper is the more malignant its nature the more inveterate its continuance the greater the efficacy of the remedy which works a cure of it The power of grace is the more seen in conversion the greater the sins have been before it It is an easie matter in comparison to remove a disease at its first onset of what it is to cure it when it becomes Chronical The power of the Gospel wrought upon all sorts and kinds of persons to manifest to the world there was no distemper of mens souls so great but there was a possibility of a remedy for it and not only so but pregnant and visible instances were given of the power and efficacy of it For they themselves shew of us saith the Apostle what manner of entring in we had among you and how ye turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God and to wait for his son from heaven whom he raised from the dead even Iesus which delivered us from the wrath to come Now that which manifests the exceeding great power and excellency of the Gospel was that it not only turned men from one way of worship to another which is a matter of no great difficulty but that it turned men together with that from their lusts and sensuality to a holy and unblameable life For being more in love with their sins then with their opinions it must needs be a greater power which draws men from the practice of habitual sins then that which only makes them change their opinions or alter the way of worship they were brought up in This is that which Origen throughout his books against Celsus triumphs in as the most signal evidence of a divine power in the doctrine of Christ that it wrought so great an alteration on all that truly embraced it that of vitious debauched and dissolute it made them temperate sober and religious 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The doctrine of Christ did convert the most wicked persons who imbraced it from all their debaucheries to a life most suitable to nature and reason and to the practise of all vertues Therefore certainly the Gospel could not want that commendation among all ingenuous Moralists that it was the most excellent instrument in the world to reform the lives of men and to promote real goodness in it When they could not but take notice of so many persons continually so brought off from their follies and vain conversations to a life serious sober and unblameable nay and some of the Christians were of so much integrity and goodness that their greatest enemies were forced to say that their only fault was that they were Christians Bonus vir Cajus Sejus tantum quod Christianus A very good man only a Christian. But one would think this should have made them have a higher opinion of Christianity when it did so suddenly make so many good men in the world Especially when this power was so manifest on such persons who were supposed uncapable of being reformed by Philosophy young illiterate and mean-spirited persons therefore it may be justly supposed that it was not by the strength of their own reason that this alteration was wrought within them but by that Divine power which was able to tame the most unruly to instruct the most ignorant to raise up the most sordid persons to such a generous temper as to slight the good things of this life in comparison with those to come And so remarkable was the difference of life then between those who were Christians and those who were not as there is still between true Christians and meer pretenders that Origen dares Celsus to compare them in point of morality with any other Societies in the world 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For the Churches of God which are discipled to Christ being compared with other Societies shine among them like lights in the world For who can but confess that even the worser part of the Christian Churches exceeds the best of the popular Assemblies For as he goes on the Church of God which is at Athens that is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 very quiet and peaceable because it seeks to approve its sels to God but the popular Assemby at Athens that is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 seditious and quarrelsom and in nothing comparable to the Church of God there So it is if we compare the Churches of Corinth and Alexandria with the Assemblies of the people there So that any candid enquirer after truth will exceedingly wonder how such fair Islands should appear nantes in gurgite vasto in the midst of such a Sea of wickedness as was in those Cities how these Churches of God should be planted in such rude and prophane places So the same Author goes on to compare the Churches Senate with that of the Cities the Churches Officers with theirs and appeals to themselves that even those among them who were most luke-warm in their office did yet far exceed all the City Magistrates in all manner of vertues From whence he rationally concludes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If these things be so how can it but be most rational to adore the Divinity of Iesus who was able to accomplish such great things And that not upon one or two but upon such great multitudes as were then converted to the Christian faith We read of one Phoedon and one Polemon brought from their debaucheries by Socrates and Xenocrates but what are these compared with those who were turned from their sins to God by the Gospel of Christ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. The twelve Apostles were but the first fruits of that plentiful harvest of converts which followed afterwards And although Celsus like an Epicurean seems to deny the possibility of any such thing as conversion because customary sins become a second nature that no punishments can reform them Yet saith Origen herein he not only contradicts us Christians but all such as were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 who owned any generous principles of Philosophy and did not despair of recovering vertue as a thing feasible by humane nature and gives instances ad hominem to prove the possibility of the thing from the antient Heroes Hercules and Ulysses from the two Philosophers Socrates and Musonius and the two famous converts to Philosophy Phoedon and Polemon But yet saith he these are not
such an impress of Gods authority on the Scriptures that any who consider them as they ought cannot but discern I still further enquire whether this impress lies in the positive assertions in Scripture that they are from God and that cannot be unless it be made appear to be impossible that any writing should pretend to be from God when it is not or else in the written books of Scripture and then let it be made appear that any one meerly by the evidence of the writings themselves without any further arguments can pronounce the Proverbs to be the Word of God and not the book of Wisdom and Ecclesiastes to be Divinely inspired and not Ecclesiasticus or else the self-evidence must be in the excellency of the matters which are revealed in Scripture but this still falls very short of resolving wholly the question whether the Scripture be the Word of God for the utmost that this can reach to is that the things contained in Scripture are of so high and excellent a nature that we cannot conceive that any other should be the author of them but God himself all which being granted I am as far to seek as ever what grounds I have to believe that those particular writings which we call the Scripture are the Word of God or that God did immediately imploy such and such persons to write such and such books for I may believe the substance of the doctrine to be of God and yet not believe the books wherein it is contained to be a Divine and infallible testimony as is evident in the many excellent devotional books which are in the world But yet further if the only ground on which we are to believe a doctrine Divine be the self-evidencing light and power of it then I suppose there was the same ground of beliâ—ving a Divine testimony when the doctrine was declared without writing by the first Preachers of it So that by this method of proceeding the ground of believing Christ to be sent as the Mâ—ssias sent from God must be wholly and solely resolved into this that there was so much self-evidence in this proposition uttered by Christ I am the light of the world that all the Iews had been bound to have believed him sent from God for light manifests its self although our Saviour had never done any one miracle to make it appear that he came from God And we cannot but charge our Saviour on this account with being at a very unnecessary expence upon the world in doing so many miracles when the bare naked affirmation that he was the Messias had been sufficient to have convinced the whole world But is it conceivable then upon what account our Saviour should lay so much force on the miracles done by himself in order to the proving his testimony to be Divine that he saith himself that he had a greater witness then that of John who yet doubtless had self-evidencing light going along with his doctrine too for the works which the Father hath given me to finish the same works that I do bear witness of me that the Father hath sent me Can any thing be more plain or have greater self-evidence in it then that our Saviour in these words doth lay the evidence of his Divine testimony upon the miracles which he wrought which on that account he so often appeals to on this very reason because they bear witness of him and if they would not believe him on his own testimony yet they ought to believe him for his works sake Doth all this now amount only to a removing of prejudices from the person of Christ which yet according to the tenour of the objection we are considering of it is impossible the power of miracles should do if these miracles may be so far done or counterfeited by false Christs that we can have no certain evidence to distinguish the one from the other Which the objection pretends and was the great thing wherein Celsus the Epicurean triumphed so much that Christ should foretell that others should come and do miracles which they must not hearken to and thence would infer as from Christs own confession that miracles have in them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 nothing divine but what may be done by wicked men 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Is it not a wretched thing saith he that from the same works one should be accounted a God and others deceivers Whereby those who would invalidate the argument from miracles may take notice how finely they fall in with one of the most bitter enemies of Christian religion and make use of the same arguments which he did and therefore Origens reply to him will reach them too For saith he our Saviour in those words of his doth not bid men beware in general of such as did miracles 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but bids them beware of that when men gave themselves out to be the true Christ the Son of God and endeavour to draw Christs Disciples from him by some meer appearances in stead of miracles Therefore Christ being evidently made appear to be the Son of God by the powerful and uncontrouled miracles which he wrought what pretence of reason could there be to hearken to any who gave themselves out to be Christs meerly from some strange wonders which they wrought And from hence as he further observes may be justly inferd contrary to what Celsus imagined that there was certainly an evidence of Divine power in miracles when these false Christs gave themselves out to be Christs meerly from the supposal that they had this power of doing miracles And so it is evident in all the false Christs which have appeared they have made this their great pretence that they did many signs and wonders which God might justly permit them to do to punish the great infidelity of the Iews who would not believe in Christ notwithstanding those frequent and apparent miracles which he did which did infinitely transcend those of any such pretenders Such among the Iews were Ionathas who after the dâ—struction of Jerusalem as Iosephus tells us drew many of the people into the Wilderness of Cyrene 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 promising to shew them many prodigies and strange appearances Not long after in the times of Adrian appeared that famous blazing-star Barchochebas who not only portended but brought so much mischief upon the Iews his pretence was that he vomited flames and so he did such as consumed himself and his followers after him many other Impostors arose in Aegypt Cyprus and Crete who all went upon the same pretence of doing Miracles In latter times the famous impostor was David el-David whose story is thus briefly reported by David Ganz David el-David pretended to be the true Messias and rebelled against the King of Persia and did many signs and prodigies before the Iews and the King of Persia at last his head was cut off and the Iews fined an hundred talents of Gold in the Epistle
there must be an Infinite space and what greater ease to the mind is there in conceiving an Idea of that then of an Infinite Being And if the world be eternal there must have been past an Infinite succession of ages and is not the understanding as easily lost in this as in an eternal Being which created the world For if the course of Generations in the world had no beginning at all which necessarily follows upon the eternity of the world then an infinite number of successions are already past and if past then at an end and so we find an Infinite which hath had an end which is a consequence becoming one who avoids the belief of a Deity because Infinity is an unconceivable thing Besides if the number of Generations hath been Infinite these two consequences will unavoidably follow which the reason of any one but an Atheist would startle at that one Infinite may be greater then another and that the part is equal to the whole For let him fix where he please in the course of Generations I demand whether in the Great-grand-fathers time the succession of Generations was finite or Infinite if finite then it had a beginning and so the world not eternal if infinite then I ask Whether there were not a longer succession of Generations in the time of his great grand-children and so there must be a number greater then that which was infinite for the former succession was infinite and this hath more Generations in it then that had but if it be said that they were equal because both infinite then the succession of Generations to the Grand-father being but a part of that which extends to his grand-children and posterity the part is equal to the whole And is not now the notion of an Infinite Being enough to stumble an Atheists reason when it can so nimbly leap over so apparent contradictions I insist not on this as an evident demonstration to prove a Deity which possibly it may not amount to because it may only demonstrate the impossibility of our understandings comprehending the nature of Infinity But however it doth most evidently demonstrate the folly and unreasonableness of the Atheist who rejects the Being of God on the account of his Infinity when his understanding is more lost in apprehending an infinite succession of Generations which follows from his supposition of the eternity of the world If then it be impossible as it is upon any principles whatsoever to avoid the conception of somewhat infinite and eternal either matter or space or some Being let any one appeal to his own reason whether it be not more agreeable to that to attribute these perfections to such a Being to whose Idea they necessarily belong then to attribute them to this world in whose conception they are not at all implyed but on the contrary they do far more puzzle our understandings then when we conceive them to be in God If somewhat must have a continued duration and be of an unbounded nature how much more rational is it to conceive wisdom power and goodness to be conjoyned with eternity and infinity then to bestow these attributes upon an empty space or upon dull and unactive matter It cannot be reason then but some more base and unworthy principle which makes the Atheist question the Being of God because his perfections are unconceivable when according to his own principles the most puzzling attributes of God return upon him with more force and violence and that in a more inexplieable manner As the Atheist must admit those things himself which he rejects the Being of God for so he admits them upon far weaker grounds then we do attribute them to God If any thing may be made evident to mans natural reason concerning the existence of a Being so infinite as God is we doubt not but to make it appear that we have great assurance of the Being of God but how far must the Atheist go how heartily must he begg before his Hypothesis either of the fortuitous concourse of Atoms or eternity of the world will be granted to him For if we stay till he proves either of these by evident and demonstrative reasons the world may have an end before he proves his Atoms could give it a beginning and we may find it eternal à parte post before he can prove it was so á parte ante For the proof of a Deity we appeal to his own faculties reason and conscience we make use of arguments before his eyes we bring the universal sense of mankind along with us But for his principles we must wholly alter the present stage of the world and crumble the whole Universe into little particles we must grind the Sun to powder and by a new way of interrment turn the earth into dust and ashes before we can so much as imagine how the world could be framed And when we have thus far begged leave to imagine things to be what they never were we must then stand by in some infinite space to behold the friskings and dancings about of these little particles of matter till by their frequent rancounters and justlings one upon another they at last link themselves together and run so long in a round till they make whirl-pools enough for Sun Moon and Stars and all the bodies of the Universe to emerge out of But what was it which at first set these little particles of matter in motion Whence came so great variety in them to produce such wonderful diversities in bodies as there are in the world How came these casual motions to hit so luckily into such admirable contrivances as are in the Universe When once I see a thousand blind men run the point of a sword in at a key-hole without one missing when I find them all frisking together in a spacious field and exactly meeting all at last in the very middle of it when I once find as Tully speaks the Annals of Ennius fairly written in a heap of sand and as Keplers wife told him a room full of herbs moving up and down fall down into the exact order of sallets I may then think the Atomical Hypothesis probable and not before But what evidence of reason or demonstration have we that the great bodies of the world did result from such a motion of these small particles It is possible to be so saith Epicurus what if we grant it possible can no things in the world be which it is possible might have been otherwise What else thinks Epicurus of the Generations of things now they are such certainly as the world now is and yet he believes it was once otherwise Must therefore a bare possibility of the contrary make us deny our reason silence conscience contradict the universal sense of mankind by excluding a Deity out of the world But whence doth it appear possible Did we ever find any thing of the same nature with the world produced in such a manner by such a concourse of
him to work upon So true is that of Balbus in Tully when he comes to discourse of the nature of God in quo nihil est difficilius quam à consuetudine oculorum aciem mentis abducere nothing is more difficult then to abstract our minds from the observations of this visible world when we seâ—k to apprehend the nature of the Deity Thus we see upon what general grounds the Philosophers proceeded and from what they took them and how insufficient any collections from the present order of the Universe are to determine any thing concerning its production by For supposing a production of the world several things must of necessity be supposed in it different from what the present order of the world is and it is an unreasonable thing to argue from a thing when it is in its greatest perfection to what must alwaies have been in the same thing for by this means we must condemn many things for falsities which are apparently true and believe many others to be true which are apparently false For which Maimonides useth an excellent fim litude Suppose saith he one of exquisite natural parts whose mother dies assoon as he is born and his Father brings him up in an Island where he may have no society with mankind till he be grown up to years of understanding and that he never saw any female of either man or beast Suppose now this person to enquire of the first man he speaks with how men are born and how they come into the world The other tells him that every man is bred in the womb of one of the same kind with our selves thus and thus formed and that while we are in the womb we have a very little body and there move and are nourished and we grow up by little and little till we come to such a bigness and then we come forth into the world and yet grow still till we come to such a proportion as we are of Here presently this young man stops him and enquires when we were thus little in the womb and did live move and grow did we not eat and drink and breath at our mouth and nostrils as we do now did we not ease nature as now we do If it be answered him no them he presently is ready to deny it and offers to bring demonstrations that it was utterly impossible it should be so For saith he if either of us cease breathing but for an hour our motion and life is gone how is it then possible for one of us though never so little to live and move in the womb for so many months when it is so close and shut up in the middle of the body If one of us saith he should swallow a little bird it would resently dye as soon as it came into the stomack how much more if it were in the belly If we should be but for few dayes without eating and drinking we could not live how can a childe then continue so many months without it Again if one doth eat and not void the excrements of what he eats he will be kild with it in few dayes how can it possibly be otherwise with a child If it be replyed that there is a passage open in the belly at which the child receives his nourishment he will presently say that it is as impossible as the other for if our bellyes were so open we should be quickly destroyed And again if the child bath all its limbs perfect and sound how comes it not to open its eyes use the feet mouth and hands as we do And so concludes it impossible that man should ever be born after this manner Much after this way saith that excellent Author do Aristotle and others argue against the production of the world for if the world were produced say they it must have been thus and thus and it is impossible that it should have been so why because we see things are otherwise now in the world Which how infirme a way of arguing it appears from the consideration of the former similitude in which the arguments are as strong to prove the impossibility of that which we know to be true as in the case about which we dispute And this now leads us to the second false Hypothesis which the opinion of the worlds eternity was founded on which is that there is no other way of production but by Generation Most of the arguments which are used by Ocellus and Aristotle against the production of the world run upon this supposition that it must be generated as we see things are in the world So Ocellus argues 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Every thing that comes into being and is subject to dissolution hath two observable mutations in it the one is whereby it grows from less to greater and from worse to better and this is called Generation and the height of this mutation perfection the other begins from better to worse and from bigger to less and the conclusion of this is corruption and dissolution But now saith he if the world had a beginning there would be such a mutation in it and it would have grown by degrees greater till it had come to its perfection and from thence it would sensibly decay till it came to dissolution but no body hath ever observed such a mutation in the world neither is there any appearance of it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but the world is semper idem it varyes not nor alters any thing from its self For which he particularly instanceth in the courses Symmetryes figures positions intervals proportions of motion which are in the world which things are all capable of such a mutation yet we see no such thing in the Universe from whence he infers that the Universe was alwayes and will be as it is Upon the same principle doth Aristotle dispute for the eternity of the world from the nature of his materia prima because if the first matter were generated it must be generated of other matter and so in infinitum and so he argues from the nature of the Heavens that they are not capable of generation and corruption as other bodyes are All which arguments signifie no more then this that the world was not generated as Plants or Animals are and who ever right in his wits asserted that it was But do any of these arguments prove it impossible that God having infinite power should produce the Universe after another way then any of those things are produced in which we observe in the world For we assert an infinite and eternal Being which was the efficient cause of the world who by his omnipotcut power produced it out of nothing and continues it in its Being which is well expressed by the author of the refutation of Aristotle in Iustin Martyrs works We assert saith he one God who is eternal himself that hath nothing else coaeval with himself neither by way of subjection or
Atome of a bigger size then in a less and if so there must be some union of those imaginable particles in that bigger Atome and how could such an union be without rest and what rest could there be if motion doth inseparably belong to every particle oâ— matter And so it must be in all those Atoms which are supposed to have angles and hooks in order to their better catching hold of each other for the composition of bodyes how come these hooks and angles to be annexed to this Atom for an Atom may be without them whence comes this union if such a principle of motion be in each particle if it be answered that motion did belong to all these particles but by degrees the lâ—sser particles hitting together made up these angled and hooked particles I soon reply that the difficulty returns more strongly for if these angled and hooked particles be supposed necessary to the contexture and union of bodyes how came those least imaginable particles ever to unite without such hooks and angles And so the question will return in Infinitum If then the solidity and indivisibility of these angled Atoms doth depend on the union and rest of those lesser imaginable particles joyned together then it is evident that motion is no inseparable property of all these particles but some are capable of union in order to the making of such hooks and angles which are necessary for the contexture of bodyes and where there is union and solidity there is rest which is at least accompanied with it if it be not one of the great causes of it And without which the Atomists of all other Philosophers will be least able to give an account of firmness in bodyes when they make bodyes to consist of an aggregation of particles by which it will be very hard finding a sufficient account of the difference between fluid and firm bodyes unless it be from the quicker motion and agitation of the particles of fluid bodyes and the rest of the small and contiguous parts that make up the firm body according to that Catholick Law of nature whereby things continue in the state they are in till some stronger force puts them out of it The only thing which the Epicurean Atomists have left to give any account of the solidity of particles of such different sizes is the want of vacuity for say they the ground of divisibility of bodyes is the interspersion of a disseminated Vacuum now where there is no vacuity though the particles be of different sizâ— yet they may be solid and indivisible But this is taken off by the instance produced against other persons by that ingenious Honourable person M. Boyle in his Physiological Essayes which is to this purpose Suppose two of these presumed indivisible particles both smooth and of a Cubical figure should happen to lye upon one another and a third should châ—nce to be fitly placed upon the upper of the two what should hinder but that this Aggregate may by the violent knock of some other corpuscles be broken in the midst of the whole concretion and consequently in the middlemost body For suppose them as solid as may be yet since corpuscles as hard as they can be made very violently to knock against them why may not those grate or break the middlemost corpuscles or any of the others And if there be a possibility of a breaking off these Cubical particles in the middle then meer want of Vacuity is no sufficient account of their being indivisible By this we see how far the Atomists are from giving any rational account of the Origine of the motion of the Atoms themselves without a Deity 2. Supposing this motion to be granted them yet they cannot give any satisfactory account of the manner of concretion of bodyes by the casual occursions of these Aâ—â—ms moving in an infinite empty space Which appears from those gross and extravagant suppositions of Epicurus in order to the making these Atoms of his so hit together that they make up any bodyes by their contexture 1. He supposeth as it were two regions a superior and inferior in an infinite empty space which hath no center at all in it nor any body from which to measure those respects of above and below as appears by his Epistle to Herodotus wherein he saith these terms of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or upwards and downwards must be conceived without any bounds or limits at all So that though we conceive something superior we must imagine nothing supreme and so on the contrary Whereby it is evident as Gassâ—ndus confesseth that Epicurus thought the surface of the earth to be a plain and this plain to be continued up in a level superficies to the heavens and so to all that immense space of the Universe So that all those heavy bodyes which should fall downwards in any parts of the widest distance on the earth as in Europe Asia and Africa would never meet if they continued their motion in the center of the earth but would continue their motion still in a parallel line and so he imagined that which is said to be above as to us was really the upper part of the world and so the descent of his Atoms must necessarily be downwards towards the earth according to the weight of them And was not this a worthy Mathematical supposition for one who would undertake to give an account of the Origine of the Universe without a Deity This motion of descent by reason of the gravity of Atoms would not serve his turn for if the Atoms moved downwards thus in a parallel line how was it possible for them ever to meet for the contexture of bodyes Now for this purpose he invented a motion of declination for finding the motion ad lineam or ad perpendiculum as some call it could not possibly produce those varieties of bodyes which are in the Universe he supposed therefore the descent not to be in a perpendicular right line but to decline a little that so seveâ—al particles in their descent mâ—ght make some occursions one upon another And this Epicurus added to Democritus but therein as Tully observes was very unhappy that where he adds to Democritus ea quae corrigâ—re vult mihi quidem depravare videatur that he mar'd what Democritus had said by mending of it The reason of which motion of declination is thus given by Lucretius Quod nisi declinare solerent omnia deorsum Imbris uti guttae caderent per Inane profundum Nec foret offensus natus neque plaga creata Principiis it a nil unquam natura creasset It was obvious to object that according to the principles of Epicurus there could have been no concourse at all of Atoms in an infinite space on the two grounds he went on which were the natural descent of Atoms and the aequi-velocity of the motion of all Atoms of what size so ever which
Chaos formation of man among the Phaenicians Of Adam among the Germans Aegyptians Cilicians Adam under Saturn Cain among the Phaenicians Tubalcain and Jubal under Vulcan and Apollo Naamah under Minerva Noah under Saturn Janus Prometheus and Bacchus Noahs three sons under Jupiter Neptune and Pluto Canaan under Mercury Nimrod under Bacchus Magog under Prometheus Of Abraham and Isaac among the Phaenicians Jacobs service under Apollo's The 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a from Bethel Joseph under Apis Moses under Bacchus Joshua under Hercules Balaam under the olâ— Siolenus THE main particulars contained in the Scriptures concerning the history of Ancient Times being thus far cleared there remains only that evidence which there is of the truth of the historical part of those eldest times in those footsteps of it which are contained in the Heathen Mythology For we cannot conceive that since we have manifested that all mankind did come from the posterity of Noah that all those passages which concerned the history of the world should be presently obliterated and extinguished among them but some kind of tradition would be still preserved although by degrees it would be so much altered for want of certain records to preserve it in that it would be a hard matter to discover its original without an exact comparing it with the true history its self from whence it was first taken For it fared with this Tradition of the first ages of the world as with a person who hath a long time travelled in forraign parts who by the variety of Climes and Countries may be so far altered from what he was that his own relations may not know him upon his return but only by some certain marks which he hath in his body by which they are assured that however his complexion and visage may be altered yet the person is the same still Thus it was in this original tradition of the world through its continual passing from one age to another and the various humours tempers and designs of men it received strange disguises and alterations as to its outward favour and complextion but yet there are some such certain marks remaining on it by which we find out its true original Two things then will be the main subject of our enquiry here 1. By what means the original tradition came to be altered and corrupted 2. By what marks we may discern its true original or what evidences we have of the remainders of Scripture history in the Heathen Mythology 1. Concerning the means whereby the Tradition by degrees came to be corrupted There may be some more general and others more particular The general causes of it were 1. The gradual decay of knowledge and increase of Barbarism in the world occasioned by the want of certain records to preserve the ancient history of the world in Which we at large discoursed of in our entrance on this subject Now in the decay of knowledge there must needs follow a sudden and strange alteration of the memory of former times which hath then nothing to preserve it but the most uncertain report of fame which alters and disguiseth things according to the humours and inclinations and judgements of those whose hands it passeth through 2. The gradual increase of Idolatry in the world which began soon after the dispersion of Nations and in whose age we cannot at so great a distance and in so great obscurity precisely determine but assoon as Idolatry came in all the ancient tradition was made subservient in order to that end and those persons whose memories were preserved in several Nations by degrees came to be worshipped under diversities of names and such things were annexed to the former traditions as would tend most to advance the greatest superstition in the world 3. The Confusion of Languages at Babel was one great reason of corrupting the ancient tradition of the world For in so great variety as suddenly happened of languages in the world it cannot be conceived but such things which might be preserved in some uniform manner had all Nations used the same language would through the diversity of Idiomes and properties of several tongues be strangely altered and disguised as will appear afterwards This alteratisn of languages in the world upon the confusion of tongues at Babel brought as great a confusion into the original tradition as it did among those who were the designers of that work And because this subject of the Original and cause of this diversity of languages among men doth both tend to explain the present subject and to clear the truth of Scripture history I shall a little further enquire into it Chiefly on this account because it is pretended that such a confusion is needless which is delivered in Scripture for the producing such diversities of languages which would arise through meer length of time the varieties of Climes and customs in the world But if we only speak concerning the sense of Moses about it the enquiry is of greater difficulty then at first view it seems to be For it is pretended that Moses nowhere speaks of a diversity of languages as we understand it but only of a confusion of their speech who were at Babel which might well be although they all used the same language that is there might be a confusion raised in their minds that they could not understand one another their notions of things being disturbed so that though they heard one word they had different apprehensions of it some thinking it signified one thing and some another as Iulius Sâ—aliger tells us that the Iews he had conversed with did not understand by it a multiplication of tongues but only by that confusion their former notions of things by the same words were altered As if one called for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a stone one by that word understands lime another water another sand c. this must needs produce a strange confusion among them and enough to make them desist from their work But supposing no such division of languages there yet after their dispersion which might be caused by the former confusion by the different Laws rites and customs commerce and trading and tract of time there would have risen a division of their several tongues But if there were such a division of tongues miraculously caused there that as it is commonly said all those who were of the same language went together in their several companies whence comes it to pass that in their dispersisn we read of several families dispersed which used the same language after their dispersion as all the sons of Canaan mentioned Gen. 10. 15 16 17 18. used the Canaanitish tongue in Greece Iavan and Elisa had the same language In Aegypt Misraim and Pathrusim in Arabia the sons of Ioctan and Chus in Chaldaea Aram and Uz the inhabitants of Syria Mash of Mesopotamia Nimrod of Babylon Assur of Assyria whence comes it to pass if their several tongues were the cause of
the Indians were in darkness while the Bacchae enjoyed light which circumstances considered will make every one that hath judgement say as Bochartus doth ex mirabili illâ— concentu vel coecis apparebit priscos fabularum architectos e scriptoribus sacris multa â—sse mutuatos From this wonderful agreement of Heathen Mythology with the Scriptures it cannot but appear that one is a corruption of the other That the memory of Iâ—shua and Sampson was preserved under Hercules Tyrius is made likewise very probable from several circumstances of the stories Others have deduced the many rites of Heathen worship from those used in the Tabernacle among the Iews Several others might be insisted on as the Parallel between Og and Typho and between the old Silenus and Balaam both noted for their skill in divination both taken by the water Num. 22. 5. both noted for riding on an ass 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Lucian of the old Silenus and that which makes it yet more probable is that of Pausanias 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which some learned men have been much puzled to find out the truth of and this conjecture which I here propound may pass at least for a probable account of it but I shall no longer insist on these things having I suppose done what is sufficient to our purpose which is to make it appear what footsteps there are of the truth of Scripture-history amidst all the corruptions of Heathen Mythology CHAP. VI. Of the Excellency of the Scriptures Concerning matters of pure divine revelation in Scripture the terms of Salvation only contained therein The ground of the disesteem of the Scriptures is tacite unbelief The Excellency of the Scriptures manifested as to the matters which God hath revealed therein The excellency of the discoveryes of Gods nature which are in Scripture Of the goodness and love of God in Christ. The suitableness of those discoveries of God to our natural notions of a Deity The necessity of Gods making known himself to us in order to the regulating our conceptions of him The Scriptures give the fullest account of the state of mens souls and the corruptions which are in them The only way of pleasing God discovered in Scriptures The Scriptures contain matters of greatest mysteriousness and mest universal satisfaction to mens minds The excellency of the manner wherein things are revealed in Scriptures in regard of clearness authority purity uniformity and perswasiveness The excellency of the Scriptures as a rule of life The nature of the duties of Religion and the reasonableness of them The greatness of the encouragements to Religion contained in the Scriptures The great excellency of the Scriptures as containing in them the Coveâ—ant of Grace in order to mans Salvation HAving thus largely proved the Truth of all those passages of sacred Scripture which concern the history of the first ages of the world by all those arguments which a subject of that nature is capable of the only thing leâ—t in order to our full proving the Divinity of the Scriptures is the consideration of â—hose matters contained in it which are in an especâ—al maâ—neâ— said to be of Divine Revelation For those historical pâ—ssages though we believe them as contained in the Scripture to have been Divinely inspired as well as others yet they are such things as supposing no Divine Revelatiâ—n might have been known sufficiently to the world had not men bâ—en wanting to themselves as to the care and means of preserving them but those matters which I now come to discourse of are of a more sublime and transcendent nature such as it had been impâ—ssible for the minds of men to reach had they not been immediately discovered by God himself And those are the terms and conditions on which the soul of man may upon good grounds expect an eternal happiness which we assert the book of Scriptures to be the only authentick and infallible records of Men might by the improvements of reason and the sagacity of their minds discover much not only of the lapsed condition of their souls and the necessity of a purgation of them in order to their felicity but might in the general know what things are pleasing and acceptable to the Divine nature from those differences of good and evil which are unalterably fixed in the things themselves but which way to obtain any certainty of the remission of sins to recover the Grace and Favour of God to enjoy perfect tranquillity and peace of conscience to be able to please God in things agreeable to his will and by these to be assured of eternal bliss had been impossible for men to have ever found had not God himself been graciously pleased to reveal them to us Men might still have bewildred themselvs in following the ignes fatui of their own imaginations and hunting up and down the world for a path which leads to heaven but could have found none unless God himself taking pitty of the wandrings of men had been pleased to hang out a light from heaven to direct them in their way thither and by this Pharos of Divine Revelation to direct them so to stear their course as to escape splitting themselves on the rocks of open impieties or being swallowed up in the quicksands of terrene delights Neither doth he shew them only what shâ—lves and rocks they must escape but what particular course they must steâ—re what star they must have in their eye what compass they must observe what winds and gales they must expect and pray for if they would at last arrive at eternal bliss Eternal bliss What more could a God of infinite goodness promise or the soul of man ever wish â—or A Reward to such who are so â—ar from deserving that they are still provâ—king Glory to such who are more apt to be ashamed of their duties then of their offences but that it should not only be a glorious reward but eternal too is that which though it infinitely transcend the deserts of the receivers yet it highly discovers the infinite goodness of the Giver But when we not only know that there is so rich a mine of inestimable treasures but if the owner of it undertakes to shew us the way to it and gives us certain and infallible directions how to come to the full pâ—ssession of it how much are we in love with misery and do we court our own ruine if we neglect to hearken to his directions and observe his commands This is that we are now undertaking to make good concerning the Scriptures that these alone contain those sacred discoveries by which the souls of men may come at last to enjoy a compleat and eternal happiness One would think there could be nothing more needless in the world then to bid men regard their own welfare and to seek to be happy yet whoever casts his eye into the world will find no counsel so little hearkned to as this nor any thing which is more generally looked on