among them might as easily and surely have been traced to the Country or Province from whence it was derived to them and the Manner and Occasion of the Conveyance as certainly remembred as the continued Tradition of the same State of things could have been and then the enquiry may be made in those Churches and Provinces which did not derive their Religion from any other within the time before set of 150 Years and so far the Argument from Tradition will most undoubtedly hold according to the former Supposition laid down But however this be whether we suppose that all the Countrys and Provinces from whence the Nicene Bishops came had profess'd the Christian Religion for 150 Years before this Council met or that some of them had received it later the Tradition concerning the continued Vniformity of the Scriptures and Religious Customs which I have before given an account of is equally to be relied on for that whole space of Time for the Tradition of any thing being preserved by a Succession of Men and not a constancy of Place There was no Person at this Council but was capable of informing himself with great certainty that the Christian Religion had been in the World and the same Scriptures and Religious Customs they then had in the Church he belonged to had been in like manner constantly own'd and receiv'd by those that profess'd the Christian Religion for 150 Years before that time either in the Country he himself was then of or in some other from whence that Religion and those Scriptures and Customs were derived to them The Succession of the Persons conveying such a Tradition is so very short that no change of Place is sufficient to disturb or interrupt the Conveyance and therefore no Person that gave himself the trouble of a faithful Enquiry could be mistaken in it and it must be allowed to have been the concern of all to enquire and since 't is plain that all the Bishops did acknowledge these things to be of greater Antiquity and of uninterrupted continuance as all pretences to the Christian Religion do necessarily inferr it must also be supposed that several of them had taken particular care to satisfie themselves of the truth of these Matters and that none of them had met with any contrary accounts that shock'd their Faith Thus does it manifestly appear from the certainty of bare Tradition only without the assistance of any concurrent Monuments of a more fix'd and lasting signification to strengthen it that for 150 Years before the Council of Nice the Christian Religion was in the main Foundation and Substance and in the principal Institutions of it the same it was then wheresoever it was profess'd at either of these times And by accounts written about this latter Period by Persons that were present at the Council then Assembled who could be sure of the Tradition themselves in some Countrys and could receive the like Information from the other Bishops Assembled with them as to the Places they came from it is likewise certain that in most if not all the Provinces and Cities any of the Nicene Bishops belong'd to the Christian Religion had been established 150 Years before the Meeting of that Council and in the same manner profess'd during that whole Term. Taking it therefore for granted that the Christian Religion was by large numbers of Men profess'd in the greatest part of the Roman Empire 150 Years before the Council of Nice in the same manner it was at the Meeting of that Council this Agreement of so many several distinct Countries in the same Religion necessarily proves that that Religion must have been derived to them all from some common Original and since as has before been observed the Chief Governor of all these Provinces and Countries was always till the Person that then Reigned of a Religion opposite to that which was then profess'd by so many of his Subjects and consequently cannot be supposed by any Decree or Law of his to have introduced this into all his Dominions at once it evidently follows from hence that this Religion must have been published and entertain'd in some one Countrey or Province first before it was heard of in any of the other and in some particular Town or City of that Province except we suppose a great many first Inventors concerting a Scheme and agreeing to publish it all at the same time in several Countries or several parts of the same Country which is a very unlikely Supposition will hardly be objected here and if it was would do the Objectors little service as might easily be proved if there was occasion Whatever Country then we suppose the Christian Religion first published in we must allow some time for its spreading through that Country and being afterwards propagated and fix'd in so many other Nations of different Manners Tempers and Languages as the several Provinces of the Roman Empire were in which the Christian Religion was 150 Years before the Council of Nice established and flourished notwithstanding all the opposition a New Religion unsupported by Civil Power must meet with Now if we allow about Threescore Years for all this and according to the natural progress of Things 't is incredible the Christian Religion should from any one City or Province of the Roman Empire in so short a time be diffused so far be embraced by so many and be established so sare under all the disavantages that such a Religion must be attended with yet allowing but Threescore Years or thereabouts for so wonderful an Event this added to the 150 before accounted for brings us to the time of Trajan We are sure therefore that the Christian Religion could not have a later Original than under the Reign of Trajan Pliny But 't is plain from an Eminent Minister of his Court that there were then vast numbers of Christians in the Roman Empire and in Provinces very remote from Rome as well as within the district of Rome it self and the account he gives of that Religion manifestly shews that it was so far the same with what was found in the Scriptures and profess'd by all Christians at the time of the Council of Nice Since therefore as has before been proved the Christian Religion was the same 150 Years before the Council of Nice as it was then since in some of those very Provinces and Cities of the Roman Empire where the same Christian Religion was profess'd 150 Years before the Council of Nice we find that the Christian Religion was likewise profess'd and there were great numbers of Christians about Threescore Years before that time under the Reign of Trajan and the account we have of these Christians and their Religion by Heathen Authors agrees exactly with the Character of the Christian Religion which not long afterwards we find generally maintain'd then it follows from hence that in those particular Places the Religion was the same in the time of Trajan it was Threescore Years afterwards and consequently
Tradition Another Set of Testimonies which Eusebius furnishes us with in behalf of the Christian Tradition are Relicks Buildings and other such like Monuments several of which were remaining in his Time and seen by him himself such were Christian Burying-Places and Sepulchres with the Names of Christians upon them particularly those of Peter and Paul Statues and Pictures particularly the Statue of the Woman cured by Christ of the Bloody Flux Pictures of Christ Peter and Paul in colours These were all seen by Eusebius himself as was likewise the Episcopal Chair of James at Jerusalem several Christian Libraries and several Christian Temples before they were pull'd down and destroyed by the Order of Dieclesian These and many other such like Monuments remaining in Eusebius's Time whether all the Particular Traditional Reports concerning them were true or false might easily be perceived upon view or divers other ways be known to be Ancient and whatever Age they were of they must be good proofs of the Belief of the Men of those Times and consequently of the truth of Christianity so far as we are now concern'd to prove it But the Tradition of Christianity from its first Original down to the Council of Nice with all the principal Matters of Fact upon which it is built is further and more especially secured to us and the truth of all the foregoing Testimonies confirm'd by Books and written Records vast Numbers of which of different Kinds and different Ages written by several Men of different Countries Characters Designs and Religious Persuasions were extant in Eusebius's Time a great many of which were generally known multitudes of Copies of them being dispersed throughout the World and several of these Writings were carefully preserved in particular places and either never communicated further by any Transcripts or Copies to remaining there to be seen in their Primitive State after Transcription Now all these Writings of what kind soever they are whose Authority is made use of for the establishing the Christian Faith I shall rank under certain distinct Heads in order to shew what sense and weight they have in the proof of what they are brought to maintain The several Books and Writings then to be considered are Copies of the Holy Scriptures viz. of the Books of the Old and New Testament Publick Acts and Records belonging properly to Societies and not to particular Authors Genuine Writings of profess'd Christians who by reason of their common Agreement in some certain Doctrines of Christianity are Styl'd Orthodox Books writ by Hereticks who were Men of particular Opinions different from those commonly received by other Christians Jewish and Pagan Books containing such Things as have Relation to Christianity Forged and Supposititious Writings of uncertain Authors which do some way or other concern the Christian Religion As to Copies of the Scriptures found in the hands of Christians in Eusebius's Time I have these Things to observe that they were then multiplyed to so great a Variety that hardly a Christian Family was without some of the Books That they were Translated into several different Languages That in those Countries where the Translations were of common use a great many Copies in the Original Language were preserv'd That in most of the great Cities and Episcopal Churches there was a Copy in the Original Language more ancient than the rest from whence the other Copies were taken and Translations made That such Copies as these might not only by Tradition but by several intrinsick Marks be known to be ancient and their Age pretty nearly determined That upon comparison there was a very great Agreement betwixt these ancient Copies preserved in several very distant and remote Churches That such care had been taken in Transcribing and Translating from them that the differences found between any Copies either of the Originals or Translations were very inconsiderable That all Christians thought themselves concern'd to preserve the Jewish Canon of Scripture as well as the New Testament and therefore Copies of the Old Testament in the Original Tongue and Translations of it into several Vulgar Languages were multiplied carefully Transcribed and kept together with those of the New That upon a diligent search into the Matter it was found that besides those Copies of the greatest part of the Books of the New Testament which were alike to be met with in all Christian Churches there were others received in some Churches and by a constant Tradition then vouch'd to be as early and of as great Authority as the rest From all which I think I may safely inferr That the Writings of the New Testament were as early as they are pretended to be and that the Christian Religion had its Original in Judea at the time assigned it which being less than 300 Years before Eusebius and the Books of the New Testament which give an account of the Christian Religion and plainly suppose an antecedent Propagation and Establishment of it in a great part of the World being writ some time after the first Publication Eusebius or any other Person of his Age who throughly examined the Matter concerning the Copies of the Scriptures then received must needs be satisfied from this Consideration only that the Books of the New Testament had as early a Publication in the World as is now ascribed to them and consequently that the Christian Faith was somewhat earlier and the same then as it is in these Books represented to have been This will further be made out from the next sort of Writings to be considered viz. Publick Acts and Records belonging properly to Societies and not to particular Authors such were Catalogues of Bishops Decrees of Synods Letters from Churches and Societies of Men general Records of remarkable Matters particular Acts and Monuments of Martyrs Psalms Hymns Creeds and Forms of Prayer The most famous Churches especially those constituted by Apostles kept the Succession of their Bishops with great care laid up in their Archives recording their Names and days of their Death in a pair of writing Tables This Eusebius tells us was the Custom of the Primitive Christians and these Tables he assures us he diligently examined and he was very exact in the Account he took of them as particularly appears from what he says concerning the Church of Jerusalem viz. That he found from Old Records fifteen Bishops with their Names who had succeeded in that Church from the Apostles to the Siege of the Jews in Adrian 's Time but could not find preserved in Writing the space of Time each Bishop spent in his Presidency over that See The like diligence and exactness are observable in the Account he gives of the Succession of Bishops in several other Churches most of their Names being set down and the times of their several Succession Presidency and Death punctually determined and Reasons given why he could not speak with the same certainty of the rest omitted There were likewise extant in his Time a great many Canons and Decrees made by several Councils and
Synods convened at several times in different Countries and upon different occasions as also several Letters writ from Churches and Societies of Men such as were the Epistles of the Churches of Vienna and Lyons to the Churches of Asia and Phrygia concerning their Martyrs Epistle of the Church of Smyrna concerning the Martyrdom of Polycarp Epistle of the Martyrs of Lyons to Eleutherus Bishop of Rome Epistles of the Bishops and other Members of Synods inforcing the Observation of the Canons they made c. All which were according to the Nature and Designs of them either dispersed far abroad and to be found in several Countries or else carefully preserved in some particular places whither they were directed and so remain'd there to be seen by such as were pleased to consult them Besides such occasional Writings as these which according to some particular Exigencies of the Church were sent abroad and communicated from one Society of Christians to others there were in several Places Publick Histories of all remarkable Affairs that happened in each Place continued down for a considerable space of Time several of which Publick Histories or Records Eusebius consulted as he himself assures us particularly when he gives us that wonderful Relation of Agbarus King of Edessa he says he took it out of the Publick Records kept at Edessa wherein the Antiquities of the City and the Acts of Agbarus are contained And a great many other Memorable Facts he came by the same way In this manner were more especially preserved the Acts and Monuments of such as had suffered Martyrdom upon the account of the Christian Religion The Names of abundance of Martyrs the Times when they Suffered the various sorts and kinds of Sufferings they endured with all the other Circumstances relating to their Persecution were largely set forth in Writing and the Records of them carefully kept in many Countries where the Cruelty and Violence of the several long Persecutions which had raged at several distant Periods of Time were most remarkable Other Publick Writings extant in Eusebius's Time were Hymns and Psalms Creeds and Forms of Prayer Several of which that were constantly used in the Publick Assemblies of Christians were known to be of great Antiquity And some of these ancient Forms of Worship were the same in many Churches and several of them more or less different from one another Now 't is plain to any one that examines any of these Publick Writings belonging to Societies of Christians that whensoever they were writ and whether in all respects true or false they are certain proofs of an antecedent Establishment and Belief of the Christian Religion such as it was in Eusebius's Time and such as it was and is now found in the New Testament and all the Accounts we have of the Age and other Circumstances of them do concurr to strengthen the Evidence already given of the Christian Tradition But the Truth of all those Matters of Fact related in the New Testament which I have at present engaged my self to prove will be more abundantly made out by a continued Succession of a vast number of Writings belonging to particular Persons distinguish'd by the Titles of Orthodox Christians Hereticks Jews and Heathens A great many of these Writings are mention'd by Eusebius and had been with incredible industry read and examined by him Several he gives the Titles of only others he gives some Character and Account of and Transcribes large Passages out of them a great many Orthodox Books he omits the mention of for want of their Authors Names being prefix'd to them others for want of being able to distinguish when their Authors lived and a great many he rejects the Authority of though they made for the Cause of the Christian Religion which he maintained because they had not sufficient Marks upon them to prove they belong'd to the Persons and Times they pretended to Some of the Writings he quotes were lost in his Time and only Fragments of them to be found in others that were entirely extant several that were then extant and mention'd by him were seen by a great many later Authors and all his Quotations out of them are confirm'd to us by their Writings but the Originals of them are now lost and a great many remain entire still and are plainly the same he represented them to be and so are the Fragments of more ancient Authors contained in them All which are certain Arguments of the Diligence and Sincerity of this Historian and the Antiquity of those Books whose Authority we are now to make use of In the next place then let us take a more particular view of these Writings and consider the Age Character and other Circumstances of the Authors the Subjects they treat about and the Form and Manner in which they are writ As to the Age of those Christian Authors we call Orthodox some small Treatises and Fragments we have of such as lived together with the Apostles and were immediate Witnesses of the Doctrines delivered and the mighty Works done by them and several of these ancient Pieces are allowed to be Genuine by those whose Skill and Enquiry into the Matter have rendred them capable Judges The Authors of the next Age who declare they lived with those who convers'd with the Apostles are more their Writings much larger and of more unquestionable Authority than the other being confirmed by more numerous Testimonies of following Writers who in very near Periods of Time continually succeeded them The Character of all these Writers was in some respects very like and in others very different Some of them were Jews and Heathens converted to Christianity others were born of Christian Parents many of them were Greeks and writ in that Language and many were of Roman Colonies and writ in Latin but though all the Authors we have writ in one of these Languages they were most of them of very different and very remote Countries from one another Several of the first Writers were Plain Simple Men without the advantage of a Learned Honourable or Publick Education others of them were Philosophers and Men very well vers'd in all the Heathen Learning some were of Honourable Families and Publick Employments many of them were Bishops of the Christian Church and lived in the most considerable Cities of the Roman Empire and by that means had great opportunities of being acquainted with the true State of Things in the World In this they all agree that they were hearty Believers and zealous Assertors of the Christian Religion that they bottom'd their Faith upon the Books of the New Testament that they made it the chief Business of their Lives and Writings to promote the Christian Faith and that they were ready to bear Testimony to the Truth of what they profess'd by resigning their Lives the sincerity of which disposition of theirs is confirm'd to us by the actual Martyrdom of several of them who lived in such Times and Places as gave them opportunities of manifesting
have been able to make is become so fixt an Opinion with me that I dare venture to affirm not only that there never was any Imposture in the World which had so many plain Marks and Characters of Truth upon it as the Christian Religion is attended with but that there never was any true History of Things whatsoever so well attested That 't is impossible for the united Wisdom of Men to contrive any Scheme of Events that shall be delivered down to Posterity with so many certain Signs and Monuments of its Truth and that there cannot be any Supposition invented that will be fuller fraught with Absurdities than that of the Christian Religion's being an Imposture These are Assertions I have endeavoured to make good in the following Discourse and I hope I have in some measure performed what I undertook but if I have not said enough to communicate the same Conviction to others which I feel my self the Fault must lie wholly in the Management not the Proof For in the Pursuit of this Argument I found my self on every side surrounded with so much Light that I am sure there 's Proof enough to be made of what I have here advanced though the Evidence I have brought for this Purpose should appear to have been chosen ill or applied wrong But after all there 's no need of proving so much as this to Vnbelievers 'T is a sufficient Answer to them if it can be shewn that the Christian Religion has as just a Pretence to be believed as any other Matters of Fact not questioned by them and that nothing they have to urge in behalf of Infidelity can lessen the Credit of this Revelation which is so easie a Task that whoever engages in the defence of the Gospel will find it much more difficult to meet with Objections than to answer them For my part I must profess that in all the search I have had occasion to make into Natural and Revealed Religion I never could meet with any one Objection to either of them that would bear the Form of an Argument Several new Plans and Models of Philosophy have been framed and a great many new Hypotheses raised in all Parts of Learning and every one of them has been ransacked to furnish Matter for Infidelity but all to no purpose There are no such grounds of Knowledge laid by any Man but Religion may be proved from them And I don't know of any Propositions whatsoever advanced by any Philosopher Ancient or Modern which if they are not such as plainly imply a Denial of Religion can prove any thing against it Some have openly declared for Irreligion and have made a Philosophy on purpose to maintain their Cause others have covertly under false Pretences thrown out several Opinions and Doctrines with a Design to weaken some or other of the main Principles of our Faith but in vain are all these Fiery Darts of the Wicked and the Arrows of those that shoot in secret no Philosophy or Humane Wisdom can prevail against the Almighty In the open Attempts of impious Authors the Force they make use of is unsupported and often recoils upon themselves And as to those dishonourable Writers who endeavour to wound Religion by Hints and Insinuations nothing expressed in their Books is sufficient to make good what they mean Epicurus and Lucretius may affirm that there is no Providence and no Future State but no other Propositions in their Philosophy will prove there are none Hobbs and Spinoza may intend to undermine the Common Faith of Christians but there 's nothing directly advanced by either of them that if it were allowed to be true could infer any thing to the prejudice of the first general Principles and Proofs either of Natural or Revealed Religion For a through Confirmation of which Truth I have in treating of both these Subjects endeavoured to form my Proof upon such common unquestionable Principles as every body of what Sect 〈…〉 Philosophy must needs grant 'T is true indeed most of the Notions imployed in the Cause of Infidelity are false as well as unconcluding and upon both these Accounts deserve a particular Answer in order to prevent the Mischief they might probably do among the Vnwary and Vnstable But I looked upon that as the surest and most effectual Way of defending Religion which would cut off all Objections at once and put the Cause upon a general Issue this is the way I have taken in both Discourses and I am sure the Method cannot fail if the Performance be but Answerable If we are such Beings as I have described and every body by consulting himself may find and if there are such Appearances in the World as every Man that will look abroad may perceive then are all the Principles of Natural and Christian Religion certainly true And if we are not such Creatures that have such Powers and Capacities and act for such Ends and Motives as we feel in our selves and if we are not sure that the Frame of the World and the Publick State of Humane Affairs do appear to us in such a manner as we imagine they do then do we know nothing at all and if the Inferences truly drawn from these Appearances don't hold none do And if we have no Knowledge we are like the Beasts that Perish and have no Pretensions to Happiness neither Religion Knowledge and Happiness are all upon the same Foot and are so closely united together that there 's no separating one from the other without destroying them all But if Religion be built so strong what support can Irreligion have What Principles can the Atheist Deist and Libertine Reason or Act upon What new ways of Knowledge have they found out Can he that denies a God or Providence shew us how the World was Made or has been Governed without Or can he that disowns a Future State inform Mankind what and why they were or resolve them that Question Whether it were not better they had never been How can he that denies the Christian Religion prove that we were not of Yesterday and know nothing but what we have seen our selves or our immediate Forefathers have told us And how can he that thinks both Natural and Revealed Religion to be Imposture perswade himself to believe any thing else The most reasonable thing that such Men as reject all Notions of Religion can do is to believe nothing But Scepticism and Suspence are so very difficult and disagreeable to the Mind of Man that every body must have something continually to believe and we do all of us give up our assent in abundance of Instances without staying for the utmost conviction we are capable of But none have been more remarkably distinguished from the rest of the World for their Credulity than the Irreligious it being commonly and truly observed of them that they believe as unreasonably and absurdly as they deny and that is what no body else does What can be more extravagantly ridiculous than
to see an Atheist telling Fortunes a Deist in quest of the Philosophers Stone and a Libertine venturing all his present Pleasures and Injoyments in a Rebellion for the good of his Posterity And yet such is generally the Conduct of the Irreligious and 't is a just Judgment from God upon them that they should be given up to believe Lyes and to act against their own Interest to throw off the Principles of Truth and not make the best of their Errours Vpon which account I think if the Enemies of God and his Christ are so far resolved upon the ways of Vnrighteousness that they will not consider the Proofs of their Duty in order to be reformed they would do well to betake themselves for Refuge to Ignorance and Amusement rather than Learning and Reasoning For all the Improvements of Knowledge do only furnish new Light and Strength to Religion and administer fresh occasions of Shame and Confusion to Unbelievers and therefore 't would be more advisable for them to keep up their Infidelity to themselves than to let it loose to the disturbance of others They had much better Intrench than Attack For besides that all attempts upon Virtue and Piety annoy the rest of the World without any Advantage to their Cause that make them 't would be more for their Ease to lie quiet For arguing and objecting against Religion and making Proselytes to Infidelity are not only certain Signs of present uneasiness but will very probably create them a great deal more If they will be continually disputing and pressing their Objections they will be sure to meet with something or other to puzzle and startle them and this may awaken their Fears and raise new Disquiets in their Mind which may at last end in a just Despair when they will be able to repent of nothing but this that they were not content to injoy the Fruits of Irreligion without offering to defend it I heartily wish such Advice as this to Vnbelivers were needless and that they were seriously disposed to imbrace a more reasonable and lasting Satisfaction by entering upon an humble and impartial Examination of the Proofs of the Christian Religion But this being to be lookt upon as an Effect of Extraordinary Grace all that can be expected from the Endeavours of those that undertake to set these Proofs in the best light they can is to stop the Mouths of Gainsayers and to prevent the mischief of Infidelity from spreading further than it has done And 't is my sincere Prayer to God that the following Discourse may have a share with many other upon the same Subject in contributing to so good an Effect All that I have to warn my Readers of is that if any of them should be inclined to judge that the Abstract I have given of the New Testament and the Proof of the Common Matters of Fact there Related either unnecessary or too long they would pass over these parts and leave them to be read by those for whom this Discourse was principally designed Most of which I believe will know more of the Christian Religion from that Abstract of it I have drawn up than they did before And I durst not presume so far upon them as to take the Common Matters of Fact for granted because if they are true I look upon all the other as demonstrable from them and therefore I was willing to lay the Foundation as firm and as broad as I could that it might bear the weight of what I was to build upon it and I perswade my self I have all along taken sufficient care not to overload it I have not been precise as to Time and some other Circumstances relating to the History of Christianity because what I was to prove is as fully made good within the Latitude allowed as if it had been more punctually determined ERRATA In the Book PAge 31. line 10. know read knows p. 39. l. 14 measure r. measures p 41. l. 27. him r. him p. 44. l. 5. Discourses r. Discoveries p. 53. l. 19. as r. a. p. 59. l. 10. too true r. to be true p. 62. l. 24. happen'd d. p. 67. l. 26. of r. as p. 76. l. 12. Year r. Years p. 79. l. 9. r. countrey p. 99. l. 13. r. must be p. 106. instanced in d. p. 107. l. 6. Words r. Records p. 109. l. 14. r. Diocletian p. 110. l. 24. sence r. force p. 112. l. last then r. there p. 115. l. 23. designs r. design p. 140. l. 22. r. according to p. 160. l. 22. Relation r. Relators p. 163. l. 26. r. Perceptions p. 174. l. 12. r. truth of p. 192. l. 2. execute r. excite p. 211. l. 14. r. some such p. 228. l. 3. ever r. never p. 240. l. 6. then r. than p. 287. l. 10. r. p. 293 l. last r. p. 298 l. 19. at r. of p. 304. l. 23. to be d. be p. 316. l. 10. Scheme r. Scene p. 337. l. 11. Motives r. Monuments p. 339. l. 5. were r. are p. 353. l. 2. r. frame of The Certainty of the Christian Revelation AND THE NECESSITY Of BELIEVING It. HAving in a former Discourse proved that there is a God That this God has appointed us a certain Rule and Order of Life That he has obliged us to Conform to his Will and Appointments by annexing Happiness to our Obedience and Misery to our Disobedience That the Rule he has given us to go by is whatever we can upon our own Enquiry or the Information of others discover to be agreeable to our purest and most unprejudiced Reason all which is comprehended under the Name of Religion Having likewise shewn that a general and exact Observance of all the Duties of such Religion would advance the Happiness of Mankind to the highest degree they are in this their Mortal Condition capable of and from these Principles together with the present Irregularity of things in the World having made it appear that there must be a Future State of Rewards and Punishments proportion'd to the different behaviour of Men in this I have now farther undertaken to prove that besides those Tokens and Indications God has given of himself his Will and Designs in the Nature and Constitution of things which are discoverable by right well-exercised Reason he has in a more extraordinary manner viz. by Immediate Revelation from himself made known his Mind to us by which means he has given us a clear and intire view of the forementioned rational Truths render'd our knowledge of them more certain plain and particular discovered a great many new Truths which the unassisted force of Human Faculties could not have found out and established new Rules and Measures of Duty over and above those our Reason was before by its utmost efforts able to inform us of All which extraordinary Discoveries I affirm to be contained in the Books which go under the Name of the Old and New Testament from whence I inferr that all the Doctrines Precepts and Directions
delivered in the Old and New Testament are obligatory to us so far as they are there declared to be so that is they are to be believed and observed in the Way and Manner and upon the Reasons and Motives there proposed and consequently that at present the true and adequate Rule of Human Life is what we call the Christian Religion But because as 't is plain from the nature of all Revelation the truth of what is pretended to be revealed must depend upon the proof of Matters of Fact I shall take this Method of establishing the Certainty of the Christian Revelation 1. Having premised some things concerning those particular Facts I design to insist upon I shall give a short Abstract or Summary of the Christian Scheme as we find it delivered in the New Testament 2. I shall prove by such direct Arguments as Matters of Fact are proveable by that all the principal Matters of Fact related in the New Testament are true 3. I shall endeavour to make good the same Proposition indirectly by shewing the Absurdity of a contrary Supposition and the weakness of all the Difficulties and Objections raised against the truth of those Facts or of Revelation in general 4. I shall shew the sufficiency of such a proof as shall be given under the former Heads to induce us to believe the Christian Religion and to render us inexcusable if we do not As to what concerns those particular Facts I design to insist upon for the proof of the Christian Religion there are these three things necessary to be observed First I take all this for granted viz. That there are such Books as those I call the Old and New Testament that they are in the hands of a great number of People of different Countries in the World and are with a very little variation the same every where That the greatest part of those in whose hands they are who are called Christians profess to believe that the Matters of Fact there Recorded are true and that the Doctrines came from God and are appointed by him as the Rule and Measure of their Actions but more especially those delivered in the New Testament which they look upon to contain a full Scheme of their Duty That a large Sect of Men called Jews profess to believe the same of the Old Testament as the Christians do but reject the New and make the former only the Rule and Measure of their Duty and that a great many of these both Jews and Christians do really and sincerely believe what they profess and endeavour to order their Lives accordingly All which Matters of Fact are such as I have no manner of reason to suspect any body will deny me Secondly I insist wholly upon the proof of those Matters of Fact which are recorded in the New Testament not only because the Christian Religion the Certainty of which I have undertaken to establish is fully confirmed by the truth of those Facts But because the Old Testament is supposed and every where appealed to in the New as true and authentick upon which account a thorough effectual proof of the latter will be of it self a sufficient establishment of the former Besides many of the same Arguments that I shall make use of to support the Christian Revelation are in like manner applicable to the Jewish And therefore I shall only consider the Old Testament as a Book that was extant long before the Christian Religion appeared in the World and which was then and had been long before esteemed by the whole People of the Jews as a Book that contained the Revelations of God and I shall concern my self no farther in the proof of these ancient Writings than to defend them from the little Cavils and Objections raised against them by Modern Unbelievers with a design to weaken the Certainty of Divine Revelation in general and consequently to invalidate the proofs of the Christian Religion Thirdly I distinguish all the Matters of Fact observable by us in the New Testament into Common and Extraordinary such as are conformable to those Facts we have often taken notice of before or to those Notions we have of the Natures and Powers of the Agents which appear to be the immediate Authors of them and such as exceed all our Knowledge and Observation of what we call Nature and natural Powers which Extraordinary Facts mentioned in the New Testament I distinguish further into two kinds such as were immediately perceivable by some of the Senses of those before whom they were done and such as were knowable only by reasoning from the Natures of Things and other concurrent or consequent Facts Of the first kind are Prophesies and Miracles of the second are Divine Assistance and Revelation And thus I shall endeavour to establish the Certainty of the Christian Religion by proving the truth of all the principal Matters of Fact contained in the New Testament according to the Order and Distinction of them before mentioned viz. Common Historical Facts Prophecies and Miracles Divine Assistance and Revelation I. But for a better and clearer prosecution of my Design I shall in the first place before I enter upon this proof give a short Abstract or Summary of the Christian Scheme as we find it delivered in the Books of the New Testament Wherein I shall consider the Matter and Subject of these Books and the Manner in which they are writ with all the important Circumstances belonging to them that offer themselves upon a careful and impartial reading Which general view of of all the Christian Facts the truth of which I have undertaken to maintain will not only prevent a great many inconvenient Repetitions and shew the force of the subsequent Proofs in a stronger light but give us such an Idea of the Christian Religion as if carefully weighed and attended to would render any further attempts to prove it unnecessary It is plain to any one that reads over the New Testament that it contains in short a History of the Publication and Propagation of certain Doctrines and Rules of living proposed to the Belief and Practice of Mankind together with an Account of the several Discourses Actions Writings Sufferings and other remarkable Circumstances in the Lives of the first Publishers and some of the principal Propagators of those Doctrines and Principles which make up the New Scheme of Religion here delivered But to take a more particular Survey of the New Testament according to the several Parts or Volumes into which it is divided In the first Four Books of it call'd the Gospels we find a very large and particular Account of the Birth of Jesus Christ the first Author as is there affirm'd of that Religion which is now term'd Christian and his Birth is related to have been after an extraordinary manner in all the Circumstances of it viz. That he was conceiv'd by the Spirit of God and the over-shadowing of his Power That he was born of a Virgin That his Conception was foretold
to him and Expounding the Scriptures of the Old Testament in such a manner that all that heard him were astonished at his Vnderstanding his Doctrine and Answers His usual way of Teaching the People that believed on him and reproving the Scribes and Pharisees and others that were unbelievers and sought occasion to find fault with what he said was by Parables which were such familiar Resemblances of or Allusions to the common and most observ'd accidents of Life as were more easily apprehended by ordinary Capacities better attended to and remembred and not so liable to Censure and Misinterpretation as plain and proper expressions of the same Truths that were delivered this way would have been But sometimes he both taught and reproved openly without any disguise or reserve and some of his Parables were such as were not understood even by his Disciples till he was pleased in private to shew them the meaning of them and acquaint them with the reason of this part of his Conduct His Answers to those that accused him of any crime as of eating with Sinners breaking of the Sabbath Blasphemy and the like or that sought to entrap him in his Discourse and to find matter of Accusation against him were very surprizing and unexpected and such as always silenced and disappointed his Enemies His Exposition of some parts of the Scriptures of the Old Testament and the Inferences he draws from them seem'd wholly new to all the Jewish Teachers and Expositors that heard him and yet we do not read that they confuted or so much as opposed either his Comments or his Arguments And in fine his whole Behavior and Conversation were so carefully and wisely ordered that though he was constantly watch'd and observ'd by cunning and malicious Men of different Opinions Designs and Interests yet no Man was ever able to convince him either of Sin or Ignorance as is manifest from the Answers he gave to those who Censured or Despised him or thought to puzzle him by difficult Questions and from the whole Process against him when he was condemn'd to die Thus lived Jesus Christ a perfect Pattern and Example of the Religion he established in all Holiness and unblameableness of Conversation shewing in all the Actions of his Life recorded of him an entire Submission and Resignation to the Will of God and exceeding great Charity and Compassion towards Men. And the same reason for which he came into the World and was obedient to the Law of Moses for which he published his Gospel and upon that account endured the Contradiction and Persecution of Sinners was that also which made him lay down his Life and submit to all the Indignities and Torments that accompanied it the only Cause Motive and End of all these Actions and Sufferings of Christ was the love of Mankind As he came into the World to save Sinners so he gave his Life a ransom for many To free Men from Eternal Misery render them capable of Eternal Happiness and to direct and assist them in the way of Salvation was his sole Work and Design These are the largest and most remarkable lines in the Character of Jesus Christ the first Author of that Religion we profess and defend In the next place I shall endeavour to give a short draught or representation of his Doctrine or Gospel or as we now call it The Christian Religion so far as it is plainly delivered in the Writings of the New Testament But all Religion as every one know consisting of Faith and Practice things to be believed and things to be done in consequence of such Belief I shall first consider the Christian Faith and afterwards what concerns the Practice of a Christian The sum of the Christian Faith is to believe in One God such as he is in the New Testament set forth to us and in Jesus Christ his only begotten Son our Lord according to the History and Character before given or whatever else the Scriptures say of him and by Faith in him accompany'd with a Sincere Vniversal and Persevering endeavour of Obedience to the Rules and Laws prescribed by him and a hearty Repentance for the Sins and Frailties we do at any time fall into to expect eternal inexpressible Happiness or in case of Infidelity or Disobedience attended with Impenitency to be assured of suffering Eternal inexpressible Misery in another Life The particular Doctrines which give us an account of these things more at large may be considered under these three Heads God Christ and Man The God proposed in the New Testament to be believed in is represented as a Spirit Invisible Incorruptible Eternal that is that was and is to come Almighty that knoweth all things and yet whose Judgments are unsearchable and his ways past finding out Creator of the World and all things therein who upholdeth all things by his Power in whom we live and move and have our being of whom and through whom and to whom are all things Most Holy Just Righteous and Perfect who is to be worshiped in Spirit and in Truth and with purity of Heart no respecter of Persons of great goodness and forbearance and yet who will render to every Man according to his deeds to them who by patient continuance in well-doing seek for Glory and Immortality Eternal Life but to them that do not obey the Truth but obey unrighteousness indignation and wrath of whom it is further said That he is the Father the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ and our Father a Title he is frequently and peculiarly distinguished by all over the New Testament That he sent his Son into the World to die for us and by him reconciled us to himself That the Sins of Ignorance he winked at but that now at the appointed time when Christ came into the World he calleth all Men every where to repent That at sundry times and in divers manners he spake in times past by the Prophets but in these last days hath spoken unto us by his Son whom he hath appointed Heir of all things by whom also he hath made the World that he foreknew predestinated and Elected some in Christ and adopted them for Sons to be Heirs of Salvation and to obtain a Heavenly Inheritance all which are said to be Sanctified by the Spirit of God who is often called the Holy Ghost or Spirit and the Spirit of Christ and of the Son in several places of Scripture is joined together with the Father and the Son and frequently talk'd of as a Person acting after such and such a manner as God is in other places represented to do and many of the same Titles Characters and Attributes are ascribed to him as are ascribed to the One Only Supreme God The principal things that are taught us in the writings of the New Testament concerning Christ besides what we have already mentioned in his History and Character are That he came into the World took upon him the nature of Man was obedient to the Law
themselves in Christ their whole lives are taken up in Travelling and Preaching and labouring with their hands to maintain themselves their whole Business and Design is to persuade People to embrace the Gospel of Christ many are their Troubles and Sufferings upon this account all which they undergo very chearfully and never shew the least sign of fear or regret for any thing that happens to them they never decline an opportunity of Preaching the Gospel or converting People to the Belief of it upon any prospect of danger whatsoever and no Power or Authority of Rulers and Governors no severity of Persecutors can discourage them in their Work The other Persons concern'd in the Ministry and Propagation of the Gospel of Christ by whatever Names and Offices distinguished whether Apostles Disciples Deacons Pastors Teachers Prophets Evangelists and Presbyters Bishops or Rulers so far as we know any thing of them by the Scriptures were all of them very near of the same Character with the Twelve for meanness of Birth and Education simplicity of Manners Steadiness of Faith and adherence to the Doctrines they taught Piety and Devotion Self-denial and Disinterestedness Constancy and Resolution under continual Sufferings and a chearful preference of a future expectation in another Life to all considerations whatsoever which this World could afford But one of them named Paul is represented to us under some particular Circumstances which make his Character very different from that of the rest He was Educated in all the Learning of the Jews at the feet of one of their greatest Doctors and by some passages we find in the Epistles ascribed to him we collect that he was acquainted with the Heathen Greek Authors he was at first a zealous Enemy of the Christian Doctrine and a fierce Persecutor of all that called upon the Name of Christ but being in an extraordinary manner call'd by God and by several wonderful Signs and Appearances converted to the Faith of Christ he became a zealous Preacher of the Gospel had a larger and fuller Commission of Apostleship granted to him than any of the Twelve was exercised with a greater variety of Afflictions for the sake of the Gospel laboured more abundantly in the establishment of the Christian Religion in the World and writ more for the Confirmation of those in the Faith whom he had converted The generality of the first Common Believers who were not call'd to the Ministry were of the lowest sort of the People and several of them scandalous and notorious Sinners before their Conversion but some there were of the better and richer sort and some Rulers and Priests that believed in Christ though but a very few that we read of The Character of which Believers after the Ascension of Christ and first Sermons of the Apostles was this That the Multitude of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul neither said any of them that ought of the things which he possessed was his own but they had all things common neither was there any among them that lack'd for as many as were Possessors of Lands or Houses sold them and brought the prices of the things that were sold and laid them at the Apostles feet and distribution was made to every Man according as he had need In other places it is said of them that believed That before they were Servants of Sin but after they had obeyed from the heart that Form of Doctrine that was delivered them they were made free from sin and became the Servants of Righteousness that in times past they walked according to the course of this World fulfilling the desires of the flesh and mind but now being created in Christ Jesus unto good Works did walk in them that some of them who were before Fornicators Idolators Adulterers Abusers of themselves with Mankind Thieves Covetous Drunkards Revilers and Extortioners were washed and sanctified by the Name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of God many of them that believed came and confess'd and shewed their Deeds many also of them which used curious Arts brought their Books together and burnt them before all Men. But in process of time when the number of Believers encreased tho' the greatest part of them manifested their Faith by their Works turn'd from the Vanity of Idols to the Living God renounced all the hidden Works of Sin and Darkness and were ashamed of those things in which before they took pleasure yet Offences and Heresies did spring up among Christians notwithstanding all the care of those that first planted the Churches and those that afterwards presided over them and some there were that walked disorderly that Preached Christ out of Envy that taught other Doctrines than what they had received that turn'd after Satan that loved this present World that put away Faith and made Shipwrack of a good Conscience but these bore no proportion to the numbers of the Faithful whose Faith and good Works were spoken of throughout the World Such were the first Publishers and Believers of the Gospel of Christ And the Persons who endeavoured to discourage the Belief and oppose the Establishment of it by all the means they could but especially by Contemning Disgracing Reviling and Persecuting those who were any ways concern'd in maintaining or propagating this new Religion were among the Jews their Kings Governors Chief Priests Elders and Chief of the Jews as also the Scribes Pharisees and Saducees who were the Men of greatest Learning and Authority in the Jewish Nation some of which are represented as very wicked Men and notorious Hypocrites and others as disbelievers of a Future State And among the Gentiles the Magistrates Rulers and Chief of the Cities Philosophers Sorcerers Craftsmen for Idolatrous Shrines and certain lewd Fellows of the baser sort most of which were stirred up and moved to what they did by the Jews that lived among them This is the shortest and plainest account I could give of the Subject of the New Testament or the Matters contained in that Book which are such as every Body that reads it will find there and consequently must subscribe to the truth of the Representation however he may doubt of the reality of the Original The next thing to be considered in the New Testament is the Way and Manner in which the several Matters before mention'd are there related with such other circumstances as referr to the Form or Composition of the whole Book and the several parts of which it consists Now 't is plain to any Man that reads over the New Testament with the same care attention and impartiality as he does another Book that it was not all writ by the same Person at one continued time but by several Persons at different times and upon different occasions and that in general 't is writ with great plainness and simplicity of Stile without Art or Affection and with many extraordinary Marks of Sincerity and Truth But to be more particular the four first Books called Gospels
Doctrine and Miracles all which being told as happening in the life-time of Christ most of the things concerning him must be supposed by those who pretend to have written presently after his Death as 't is plain all the Evangelists do to be generally known and freshly remembred at the time of their Writing which Supposition further appears from the short and disorderly Relation of several Matters of Fact in each Gospel which in such cases where we are not assisted with a fuller Account from the other Gospels or following Books of the New Testament seem very obscure to us now who are not acquainted with the rest of the Circumstances omitted This is what I thought fit to remark concerning the Subject and Form of that Book which we call the New Testament And now that this Book does really contain such things as are before mention'd and is writ in such a way and manner as I have here represented I think may be taken for granted since whatever has been observed under this head must necessarily appear too true to any one that will read over the New Testament and is capable of making any Judgment of a Book II. Supposing then that I have given a just Account and Character of the New Testament and the several Books or Volumes it consists of I shall from hence advance to the main Design proposed which was to prove That all the principal Matters of Fact related in the New Testament are really true that is did really happen out at the Times and Places and in the Manner they are there recorded to have happen'd This I shall endeavour in the second place to make good by a direct Proof according to the distinction of the several Facts to be enquired into before laid down viz. common Historical Facts Prophesies and Miracles Divine Assistance and Revelation I. The first Step then I am to make in the proof of what I have before asserted is to shew that the common Historical Facts mention'd in the New Testament are true The principal of which are these following viz. That there was such a Person as Jesus Christ of such a Character who taught such Doctrines pretended to such mighty Works and was executed in such a manner as is represented in the New Testament That there were likewise certain Persons who were Followers and Adherents of Christ who after his Death profess'd to believe the Miracles we find now recorded of him and to do as great themselves who taught the same Doctrines he did in his life-time and many other things which they pretended to have received from him while he was alive and from the Spirit of God afterwards and who made is their business to propagate the Belief and Practice of what they taught throughout the World whose Characters and Sufferings were such as are before described That the Doctrine or Religion of Christ was accordingly propagated through all Judea and most Parts of the Roman Empire so that great Numbers of People every where own'd and profess'd it And that all this happen'd within that compass of Time included between the Death of Julius Caesar and the Destruction of Jerusalem Now these are such remarkable notorious Facts have been so well proved by multiplicity of Evidence and so little contested by the several Enemies of Christianity That I shall content my self by giving a summary Proof of them without entring upon that great Variety of particular Arguments every general Branch of Evidence contains in it Which Proof I shall cast into this Method First I shall take an Account of the Original of Christianity and shew That this Religion must have came first into the World at the time assign'd for this Event in the New Testament Afterwards I shall consider the state of Christianity at another Period of Time when it will certainly be allowed that all the principal Matters of Fact that stand now recorded in the New Testament were generally believed And then I shall prove That the same Matters of Fact were likewise believed at and immediately after the Times in which they are said to happen and so continually down to that particular Period fixed upon Which last Proposition I shall endeavour to make out From the constant Tradition of such a Belief together with many sensible infallible Effects of it And from many other extrinsick Signs and Monuments remaining at that Time From which constant and universal Belief among Christians of all the principal Facts in the New Testament both common and extraordinary continued down to such a Period from the very first Times in which they severally happen'd I conconclude That at least the common Matters of Fact such as I have just before instanced in must be true First then as to the Original of Christianity it is to be observ'd That there is no Age of the World no Portion of Time since the beginning of Things at any great Distance from us that we have a clearer fuller and more particular Account of than we have of that which past under the Twelve first Cesars or Emperors of Rome both Learning and Empire being then at the highest Pitch and furnishing abundance of Matter for the Pens of that and the succeeding Ages And as the History of that time is the truest and best known of any so no Matter of Fact could happen within that Time which was more remarkable or could more easily and certainly be conveyed down to Posterity than the first Rise and Propagation of the Christian Religion There 's nothing so easy to be known of any Countrey where we have the least Remains of History left us as what Religion was profess'd there and what considerable Alterations were made in it All the Laws Customs and Policy of a Nation are intermixt with their Religion most of the Actions Opinions and Characters of particular Men bear the Marks of it and if we examin Things more narrowly and trace them up to their Original we shall find that Religion puts a greater Distinction betwixt one Nation and another than any difference of Climate can do But not to pursue that Speculation any further 't is very plain from all History what the Religion of the Jews was and what Religion they had at Rome and in other Parts of the Roman Empire under the Reign of Augustus There were no such Persons then to he heard of as bore the Name of Christians no such Religion any where professed as that which is now call'd Christian the Plan and Model of which we find in the Books of the New Testament But in the Time of Nero we find a great many Persons at Rome Tacitus call'd Christians put to Death and several other ways persecuted and tormented for being so by that Emperor which Denomination and whatever they thought themselves obliged to believe or do upon that Account was then generally acknowledged by themselves and others to be derived to them from one Christ who was sometime before crucified at Jerusalem Now the Time when this
Christ the first Author of this Sect of Men call'd Christians began to publish his Doctrine to the World is very particularly and circumstantially set down by St. Luke in the Third Chapter of his Gospel to be the Fifteenth Year of the Reign of Tiberius Cesar Pontius Pilate being Governor of Judea and Herod being Tetrarch of Galilee and his Brother Philip Tetrarch of Iturea and of the Region of Trachonitis and Lysanias the Tetrarch of Abilene Annas and Caiaphas being the High Priests of the Jews And in the Book call'd the Acts of the Apostles said to be writ by the same St. Luke it is affirm'd That the Disciples by which Word is there meant all those that believed in Christ and embraced the Doctrines taught by him were called Christians first at Antioch Which Matter of Fact is by the Consent of all Christian Historians recorded to have happen'd at the latter end of the Reign of Caligula who was the next that succeeded Tiberius in the Empire of Rome And that this is the lowest Point of Time it can be fix'd at appears from the same Place of St. Luke where immediately after the Words before cited it follows And in these Days came Prophets from Jerusalem unto Antioch and there stood up one of them named Agabus and signified by the Spirit that there should be great Dearth throughout all the World which came to pass in the Days of Claudius Cesar From whence I infer That this Relation of Agabus concurring in Time with that other Account of the Disciples being first call'd Christians and it being plain from what is said concerning the Completion of Agabus's Prophecy in the Days of Claudius Cesar That he first utter'd his Prophecy some time before the Days of Claudius Cesar the Time when the Disciples were first called Christians must likewise be sooner or later before the Reign of Claudius which Claudius being the immediate Successor of Caligula in the Empire the Matter of Fact in question must happen in the latter end of the Reign of Caligula or at some time before Now from the Fifteenth Year of Tiberius when Christ first published his Doctrine at Jerusalem to the last of Caligula when his Disciples were first call'd Christians at Antioch is about Twelve Years from whence to the Tenth Year of Nero when the Christians were first persecuted at Rome is a little above Twenty Years within Five Years after which Jerusalem was destroyed and an End was put to the Jewish Government and Policy So that from the Fifteenth of Tiberius when it is pretended that Christ first published his Gospel at Jerusalem to the first of Vespatian when Jerusalem was destroy'd is about Forty Years and no more If therefore these Matters of Fact concerning the Neronian Persecution and the Destruction of Jerusalem are true as is constantly attested by Heathen and Jewish as well as Christian Writers 't is more than probable that those mention'd by St. Luke are so too For before the Fifteenth of Tiberius no Signs or Footsteps of Christianity are to be found in the World neither is it pretended by any of the Adversaries of this Religion that it was earlier and the Destruction of Jerusalem falling in the First Year of Vespatian the Propagation of the Christian Religion from thence to other Parts of the World must needs have had as early a Date of that And therefore if we find great Numbers of Christians at Rome in Nero's Time both the Propagation as well as Original of the Christian Religion must have happen'd not only before the Destruction of Jerusalem but some time between the Fifteenth Year of Tiberius and the Tenth of Nero and consequently the Account before given by St. Luke of these great Events cannot well be imagin'd to be false but 't is certain the Mistake in Time if there should be any supposed cannot be considerable From all which I think I have reason to conclude That the Christian Religion was profess'd at Rome in the Time of Nero and was derived from one Christ who was the first Author of it and suffered Death at Jerusalem upon that Account toward the latter end of Tiberius's Reign as I find it recorded by St. Luke and the other Writers of the New Testament The next view I shall take of the Christian Religion shall be under Constantine another Emperor of Rome who upon some occasion or other was disposed to embrace this Religion about 300 Years after the first Publication of it by Christ at which time it is very notorious that Christianity was the prevailing Religion in all the parts of the Roman Empire the extent of which was then very great This manifestly appears from all the accounts we have of the History of this famous Emperor and the State of the World under his Reign in the Twentieth Year of which was held a General Council which was a Meeting or Assembly of a great number of Bishops who came from all the different Provinces and Cities both of the Eastern and Western Empire and were Persons that in their several Districts govern'd and directed in Religions Affairs the chief design of that Meeting was by Constantine who called them together declared to be for the decision of a Controversie that had happen'd between certain Christian Professors concerning a particular Article or Doctrine of their Religion which some affirm'd ought to be believed in one Sense and some in another These Bishops did meet accordingly to the number of about 300 decided the Matter they were called about by appointing a Form of Words for all Christians to express their Belief of that and several other particulars in which was unanimously approved and subscribed by all but two Besides which Form of Faith they made several Canons or Rules with Relation to Discipline which concern'd the Qualifications of such Persons as were to perform Religious Offices or to partake of the Effects of them their manner of Acting upon such occasions and their Behaviour to one another upon the account of any Religious distinction But in order to take a more particular survey of the State of the Christian Religion under Constantine from the account that is given us of this Council by Eusebius and Athanasius who were present at it and other credible Writers who lived at or near the same time I shall draw these following Observations and Reflections I. Constantine was the first Roman Emperor that profest the Christian Religion There was no King Consul Dictator Emperor or any other the chief Governour of the Roman State before him that ever departed from the ancient Institution made upon the first Settlement of that Commonwealth or publickly embraced a new Religion of a different Character from that established by the Laws of Numa 2. There never was before this Council any such General Meeting of Eminent and Learned Persons who were Assembled together from so many different quarters of the World purely to settle some Controversies in Religion Which two surprising Circumstances must make this
Council of Nice one of the most remarkable Events that ever happen'd in the World 3. The calling of this Council does plainly inferr that Constantine look'd upon the whole Roman Empire to have been at that time generally Christian The Persons summon'd the Places from whence they came the occasion of their Meeting do all prove this For the Persons of which the Council was compos'd were most of them Governors and Teachers of large Churches and Congregations they came out of all the greater and lesser Provinces and from the most Populous and Considerable Towns under the Roman Government and the reason of their coming was to give their Opinion concerning a particular Doctrine which did suppose an antecedent Belief of the whole Christian Scheme 4. The whole behaviour of this Council of Bishops while they sat together and the business they did there is a certain proof not only that they were Christians and that the Christian Religion was publickly and generally profest in the Places from whence they came but that they all agreed in some common Faith and that the Christian Religion profess'd in the several Places from whence they came was every where the same without any other variation than what was grounded upon the different Conception of some Articles by particular Persons which were allowed by all alike in some general Terms or different application of some general Rules about such Matters as Christians were by the whole tenour of their Religion left at liberty so to apply 5. The reason of this general Agreement of all Christians separated so far from one another in place and never before this time united under one common Head or Governor was as we find by what pass'd in this Council a firm and constant Belief that such and such Books which they all had amongst them were written by the immediate Followers and Disciples of Christ and contained a true Account of his Life and Doctrine and a full Scheme of their Religion What ever was in any of these Books they lookt upon as Obligatory and such they esteemed the Authority of these Writings That they were not upon any Account in the least Passage of them to receive any Addition Diminution or Alteration whatsoever In the Decision of the present Controversy before them these were appeal'd to on both Sides and the Authority of them allowed by all and the particular Canons they made were founded upon the general Rules and Orders of Discipline laid down in these Scriptures 6. As we find by what was done in this Council concerning the Matter of Faith they came to settle That all the Bishops there assembled were acquainted with several of the same Books of Scripture which we now have under the Name of the New Testament and that they were perswaded they were delivered down to them from the Apostles as a Rule of their Faith So by several of the Canons they made we are assur'd That in all the several Places from whence they were assembled the Customs of Baptism and the Communion were universally and constantly used That the First Day of the Week was observed as a Day set a-part for Religious Services which were chiefly Prayers and Reading the Scriptures That there were a great many Men in a particular Way and Manner appointed for the Performance of Religious Offices in the Name and Presence of the People And that some of these did in a more eminent Degree preside over all other both Religious Officers and common Christians in such a District under the Title and Style of Bishops Now the Truth of this Relation concerning the Council of Nice and the State of the Christian Religion at that Time being supposed in the next Place I shall undertake to prove That the Christians we find in Nero's Time were of the same Faith and Religion with those that lived under the Reign of Constantine and consequently That all the principal Matters of Fact now recorded in the New Testament were generally believed at and immediately after the Times in which they are said to happen and so continually down to the Council of Nice This I shall endeavour to make out First From the constant Tradition of such a Belief together with many sensible and infallible Effects of it From the Neronian Persecution to the Council of Nice is about 260 Years which is so short a Period That 't is hardly possible to imagine the Tradition of so important a Fact as the general Profession of the Christian Religion in any considerable Country or Nation should in the main Branches and Substance of it be defective or corrupted within that Time though there were no other remaining Monuments of it but what were obvious to every Man 's own Observation at the Meeting of this Famous Council And therefore since the Christians of this latter Period did look upon it as a certain Truth delivered down to them That the Christians who lived in Nero's Time professed the same Faith they did as 't is plain from the Account before given of their Religion they must we may very well conclude That the Matter of Fact was really so without further Proof But to remove all Doubts and Objections so general a Conclusion as this may be apt to create the Truth and Credibility of the Tradition shall be more clearly made out in the following Manner Several of those who were present at the Council of Nice might of their own certain knowledge be fully satisfied That for Fifty Year backward the Christian Religion had been the same it was then in the Countries from whence they came That all this Time they had had the same Scriptures among them That these Scriptures had constantly been read both in publick and private and as far as fell within humane Cognizance as constantly and in the same manner believed and esteemed as they appeared then to be That the Ceremonies of Baptizing and Communicating had been always universally used at such Times and upon such and such Occasions That these and several other Religious Performances as Reading the Scriptures Prayers Exhortations c. had been constantly practised in publick when Christians were assembled together That Meetings or Assemblies for these Purposes were very frequent That besides other occasional Times they always observed the First Day of the Week as a Portion of Time which they thought themselves obliged to set a-part for the Performance of Religious Duties and especially in Publick That there were a constant Succession of Men by certain Ceremonies peculiarly appropriated to the Discharge of some Religious Offices which they did not think it Lawful for others not so distinguished to be concern'd in That it was the particular Business of these Men to teach and instruct the rest in the Knowledge of the Christian Religion and exhort them to a steady and exact Submission to the Rules of it That there were some of these styled Bishops who were by some different Marks of Distinction known from the rest of their Brethren and presided
Teachers and multitudes of their Disciples and the Christians that lived in Nero's Time must have believed most of this to have happen'd in half that space Thus by the help of meer Tradition only does it plainly appear that the Christian Religion was the same at the Time of the Council of Nice as it was when it was first Publish'd and Preach'd to the World and consequently that all the principal Matters of Fact in the New Testament such as I have before given an account of were all along believed by those who Styled themselves Christians and therefore all those common Historical Facts the certainty of which 't was my present business to shew must be true All the Authority I have made use of to strengthen this Tradition is the Testimony of some Heathen Authors of unquestionable Credit for the proof of this one point only that there were a great many Persons Styled Christians who were persecuted for what they believed and did as such at Rome by Nero and in other remote Provinces of the Roman Empire by Trajan Which two Matters of Fact happening at such particular distances from the supposed Original of the Christian Religion I chose to mention rather for the better Illustration of the Matter I was to prove than for any distinct proof of it For taking it for granted that the Matters of Fact concerning the Council of Nice and the State of the Christian Religion at that time were such as I have represented and allowing further what I think I have proved that the Christian Religion was professed in most if not all the same Places from whence the Nicene Bishops came and in the same manner as to the Belief of the Scriptures and use of those Religious Customs and Institutions I have before instanced in 150 Years before as it was then it follows from hence that without the help of any particular Testimony of Heathen or other Writers or any other Ancient Monuments of History that all those common Matters of Fact which I have mention'd at the beginning of this Head must needs be true For according to this Supposition the greatest part of the Roman Empire believing the Books of the New Testament 150 Years before the Council of Nice must consequently believe that in less than 150 Years before that Time the Christian Religion was first published to the World at Jerusalem there being no such Thing as a Christian before and that within that space of Time down from the first Publication of the Gospel to their present Belief of it it must have been Preached and Propagated through the greatest part of the known World in the Way and Manner recorded in the Books of the New Testament and that the same Persons who Preach'd it were the Authors of those Books Copies of which had been dispers'd so far and multiplied to so great great a variety that most of the People that profess'd the Christian Religion in every Country had them in their Hands which Matters of Fact and other Particulars depending upon them if they had not been true could never have been so generally believed at a Time so near that in which they were supposed to happen that the first and remotest of all was not 150 Years past and the others must fall out much later But further besides this proof that I have brought from Tradition there are a great many other concurrent Authorities which do not only confirm the Certainty of the Tradition but are of themselves a distinct and sufficient Evidence of the same Truths which we have already proved that way For at the same Period of Time wherein we have chosen to consider the State of the Christian Religion and from whence we have traced it up to its first Original and shewed the Constancy and Integrity of the Conveyance viz. At the Meeting of the first General Council of Nice we find a great many fixt and standing Monuments of several Ages and different Places that every body might have recourse to and examin when they pleased all which did very exactly and fully prove the Antiquity and uninterrupted continuance of the Christian Faith as to all the principal Matters of Fact related in the New Testament Eusebius one of the Bishops of the Nicene Council before mention'd has writ a History of the Christian Religion from its first appearance in the World down to his own Time and the Book is now extant warranted to be his by the Testimony of abundance of succeeding Writers and question'd by none Now in this History he gives us a very large and particular account of the State and Condition of Christianity in all the several Places of the World wherever he could learn it had been entertain'd which Account consists of a vast variety of Matters of Fact beside those already instanced in as preserved by Tradition the Memory of most of which was not only preserved the same way but was further secured by lasting Monuments and Records The most remarkable Matters in him which I think sufficient to my present purpose to mention for the further Confirmation of those Truths I have already proved may be referred to these three Heads Customs and Vsages Relicks Buildings and other such like Monuments Books and written Words And first it is to be observed that at the time of the Council of Nice besides those Religious Customs and Institutions before instanced in which were general and constant in all Ages and Countries since the first Original of Christianity there were several other Customs and Vsages then Practised some of which obtained as generally as the former did and others were confined to some particular Places such were the Annual Feasts of Christmas Easter and Pentecost stated times of the Year and Week for Fasting Anniversary Commemoration of the Sufferings of Martyrs and often Meeting at the Places where they Suffered using the Sign of the Cross upon several occasions calling Children by the Names of the first Apostles and Saints c. These and many other such like Customs as these are plainly founded upon and suppose an antecedent Belief of Christianity and particularly those principal Facts Recorded in the New Testament upon which the whole Christian Religion turns These therefore are both fresh proofs of the Truth of those Facts we have undertaken to prove and do also strengthen and confirm the Tradition of those other Customs and Institutions we have before instanced in especially if we consider what the same History that gives us this account informs us of viz. that the Christian Customs now mention'd were not look'd upon as such necessary parts of that Religion nor of so early an Original as the other and that both these and the former were in several Places and Ages practised after several Manners with different additional Rites and Ceremonies which general Reception of some Customs and general distinctions betwixt Necessary and Vnnecessary Substance and Manner in all that were received are certain Arguments of a sincere and well-examin'd
account in a great measure may be given of the Heathens whose Writings do any ways concern Christianity For neither those of them that were Instrumental in the Persecution of Christians nor those who endeavour to overthrow the truth of their Religion by Arguments do deny any of those matters of Fact related in the New Testament which we have distinguished by the Title of Common Historical Facts and a great many of them are confirm'd by other Heathen Writers who treat of their own affairs only or mention Christian Matters occasionally as they happen'd to be intermixt with those Things they designedly writ about Nay some of those that writ expresly against the Christian Religion do not only allow that Christ pretended to Miracles and that he did those Things Recorded of him in appearance as was the Opinion of several of them but that he did really work those very Miracles he pretended to But then they endeavour to lessen the Credit of them and destroy the Doctrines built upon them either by ascribing them as many of the Jews likewise did to Magick and Evil Spirits or shewing that several of their own Religion had done as extraordinary Things as any that were attributed to Christ and his Apostles A great many of these Heathen Writings are quoted some of them particularly Answer'd and Confuted and several large Pieces of them inserted in the Books of Christian Authors There we find besides a great many Passages out of Private Authors and Common Traditions several Rescripts Edicts and Letters of Roman Emperors either mentioned or transcribed and several Publick Acts and Records compiled by the Authority of Heathens and in their keeping appeal'd to with the greatest Confidence and Assurance imaginable as extant in the Writers Time that Cites them and generally known Particularly we meet with divers of these Heathen Monuments in the Christian Apologies which were at several times by different Writers Dedicated to Roman Emperors the Senate of Rome and Governors of Provinces Many such Proofs and Evidences as these of the Christian Faith and History are still to be found in the Christian Books which were writ before Eusebius and are now extant But there were also extant in his Time several of the same Heathen Books out of which those Testimonies were taken and others which gave the same Account of Christian Affairs which was look'd upon by Eusebius to be so notorious a Truth that when he talks of the State of Christianity under Domitian he confirms what he says by the Authority of Heathen Writers without thinking it necessary to name any particular Author Eus E. H. l. 3. c. 18. So mightily says he did the Doctrine of our Faith flourish in those forementioned Times that even those Writers who are wholly estranged from our Religion by which he plainly means Heathens have not thought it troublesome to set forth in their Histories both this Persecution and also the Martyrdoms suffered therein and they have also accurately shewn the very Time relating that in the Fifteenth Year of Domitian Flavia Domitilla Daughter of the Sister of Fabius Clemens at that time one of the Consuls of Rome was together with many others banished into the Island of Pontia for the Testimony of Christ There are likewise several Heathen Authors still separately extant out of which may be Collected a great many Passages which give a concurrent Evidence of the Truth of the Christian History as Tacitus and Pliny before quoted and divers others and there is nothing to be found in any of them that does in the least contradict any of the principal Matters Fact now to be proved But besides these Writings which are acknowledged to be Genuine and the true and proper Works of those Persons whose Names they bear whether Orthodox Christians Hereticks Jews or Heathens there were a great many other in the Primitive Times of Christianity written by uncertain Authors and either purposely Published under false Names and Titles with a design to promote the Belief of the Christian Religion in general or to advance and defend some particular Notions and Practices which the Authors of them approved and had a mind to recommend to the World or else by some mistake ascribed to those Persons to whom they did not really belong Such were a great many false Gospels Acts Epistles and Revelations and several other Historical and Doctrinal Discourses Published under the Names of Christ the Virgin Mary the Apostles and Eminent Christians of the succeeding Ages such were also several Letters said to be Writ by Pilate Seneca and Lentulus the Oracles of the Sybils and several other Writings attributed to some considerable Heathens a Passage in Josephus relating to Christ c. All which supposing them all Forged or only some of them so some accidentally mistaken and others doubtful whoever were the Authors of them so long as it plainly appears they were of such and such Antiquity they are certain proofs of the general Faith of Christians at the respective Times when any of them were Published and consequently of the Truth of those Facts in question forasmuch as they all evidently suppose an antecedent Belief of the Christian Religion founded upon those Facts as is visible by all the Remains we have left of them and therefore are as good Arguments of the Truth of what I am proving as the most Genuine unquestionable Writings of any other Author whatsoever viz. That the common Historical Facts related in the New Testament are true Which Point I think is proved by such a multitude and variety of Evidence that I may take it for granted That Jesus Christ who lived and was Crucified at Jerusalem in the Reign of Tiberius Cesar was the first Author of the Christian Religion That the Characters Sufferings and Pretences of Christ and his Apostles and the Doctrines taught by them were the same we find represented in the Books of the New Testament and that the Christian Religion there delivered was propagated through the World and those Books writ according to the Time Manner and Circumstances there mentioned between the middle of Tiberius and the beginning of Trajan's Reign and consequently that the Christian Faith as to the principal Facts and Doctrines contain'd in the New Testament was always the same from the Time of Tiberius to the Council of Nice and from thence to the present Age the greatest part of the Scriptures having been always acknowledged to be the Genuine Works of those whose Names they bore and to contain the unalterable grounds of the Christian Religion and the Sum of what Christians were obliged to believe 2. In the next place then I am to prove that those extraordinary Facts Recorded in the New Testament which we call Miracles and Prophecies were really true according the Relation there given of them That they were constantly believed to be true by all Christians ever since the Time in which they are first said to happen has already been proved but whether their Faith was well
to Resvery and Enthusiasm which must be the Case if that Persuasion was ill grounded is much more unintelligible since as has been proved before these Effects are such as exceed the most improved Force and most accomplish'd Wisdom of Man 'T is certain then from all that has been said that the Miracles Prophecies and Doctrines contained in the New Testament could not be the Work and Contrivance of meer Man In the next place therefore I am to prove that God was the Author of them all That God might if he pleased Reveal such Things to Men by secret Impression upon their Minds as they did not know before and could not have found out of themselves has been proved already and therefore all the Prophecies mentioned in the New Testament all the Doctrines which peculiarly concern Christianity the consciousness that Christ and his Apostles had that they could do such Miracles as are Recorded of them or a firm Persuasion that they would be done upon their use of such external Signs and several of the Miracles themselves such as telling the private Thoughts and Actions of Men speaking strange Languages and the like may all be accounted for this way And whoever believes a God must likewise grant that 't was possible for him to effect all the other Miracles either by an original Designation of such a chain and connexion of Events or by an immediate interposition of his Power That it was not only possible but very likely and probable that God should reveal himself to Mankind in this manner appears from the common Opinion of Men in all Ages that he had revealed something to the World and their common Expectation that he would manifest his Will to them in further Discoveries In all the Accounts of past Things we have left us we find that every where what was Great or Good was always ascribed to some Divine Power Not to mention the Jews whose Opinions in this respect are sufficiently known and allowed if any thing useful or beneficial to Mankind was invented among the Heathens the Gods had the Praise and Honour of the Discovery if by Dreams or waking Suggestions Men were put in mind of procuring themselves some Advantage or avoiding some Evil the Gods were thank'd for it many also were the absurd and the superstitious Opinions of the People concerning the way and manner of the Gods discovering Things to them by the means of external Signs but this they were all most constantly and unanimously satisfied of That their Religion came immediately from Heaven and what we call Prophecies and Miracles were always esteemed proper Marks and Characters of Divine Power especially if they any ways contributed to the happiness and welfare of Mankind This has been the constant Faith of the World at all Times and so far as it concerns Divine Revelation in general and the ways of conveying and confirming it by inward impressions upon the Mind and by Prophecies and Miracles I think is very well grounded For first That there has been such a Thing as Revelation in the World and that there have been true Prophecies uttered and true Miracles wrought to confirm it seems to me very plain For not to insist upon that common but very true Observation that all Pretences of this nature must be founded upon Realities and that therefore it cannot be conceived how Revelations Prophecies or Miracles should ever have been pretended to or believed if there never had been any true ones of each kind omitting I say this Reflection it appears very unaccountable to me upon a supposition that there never was any Revelation how there could be any such Thing as Religion Civil Government or Learning in the World Learning certainly depends upon Government When Men are not united together in Society and live securely under good Laws and Defences no Improvements of Knowledge are to be expected and I do not see how such a Union should be made without a good share of Religious Notions nor how a loose divided Herd of Men such as we must now suppose living in a State of Want and Ignorance who are wholly imployed in providing themselves Necessaries and securing what they have from others and consequently who have but few Ideas and no leisure or curiosity to get more how I say such Men as these should be furnished with any Notions of Religion or how they should be able to form a Regular Government and Constitution without I cannot possibly imagine The present State of the Americans is an instance which confirms me in the Opinion I have laid down for I cannot help believing that if this People should always continue divided from the rest of the World and have no Commerce with other Men nor any Revelation from God they would constantly as long as the World should indure remain in the same stupid ignorant Condition we now find them in or if possible worse without any further improvement in Religion Policy or Learning This seems to me much more probable than that any Polite Learned and well-govern'd Nation which once lived under the Advantages of Wise Laws and a Rational Religion should in some few Ages become as Rude Barbarous and Ignorant as the present Americans and yet this has been almost the Fate of many a Countrey and would have been quite if they had been deprived of the Assistance of better and more inlightened Neighbours as the poor Americans were And in general from many Observations 't is evident That Men are naturally so apt to degenerate and fall into a State of Ignorance Confusion and Wildness even till they become like the Beasts that perish that all remains of natural Religion seem purely owing to Tradition and not to Study and Search and if so that Tradition must have had its Original from Revelation the former set of Men being as unlikely to find out and cultivate Religion of themselves as the present So much is visibly owing to Revelation That had it not been for the Jewish and Christian Pretences there had hardly been now any such Thing as Religion in the World if we may judge what would have been in other Places by what we find actually is in those Countries where the Jewish and Christian Revelation were ever heard of or are now forgot Nay those obscure Notices of Religion we find among the Ancient and Modern Pagans are most of them plainly derived from something contained in the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament And as from these Observations concerning the general Opinion of Mankind about Revelation and the different State and Condition of Humane Affairs where Revelation is supposed and where none is pretended to it appears very probable that there has been such a thing in the World so likewise does it seem very agreeable to the best and purest Notions our most improved Reason is now able to form concerning God and our selves and the Obligations we owe to him that God should reveal himself to us We cannot but think however we
Souls are able to frame of God and therefore since it could not proceed from Man as has already been shewn we must ascribe it to God But moreover besides the nature of the Things revealed the Ways and Methods made use of to Communicate them to the World and to Establish and Propagate the Belief of them among Men are Infallible Marks that the Revelation came from God His Power and Wisdom are as Legible in this whole Dispensation as in the Frame and Structure of the Universe as will easily appear from a short view of the Progress and Conduct of this great Work of the Salvation of Man For except the Hand of the Lord was in it how came the Jews to have better and juster Notions of God the Original of the World and the Nature of Man than any other Nation under Heaven when they had no manner of Learning among them no gradual Improvements in Knowledge as we find other Countries had How came the whole People to have these Notions as well as the chief and most knowing among them In all the Periods of Learning among the Egyptians Chaldeans Greeks and Romans the People were generally Idolaters and the Priests and Philosophers durst not propagate better Notions of God when they had found them out tho' even their best had a ridiculous mixture of Fable and Superstition in them How then came the People of the Jews to remain intirely free from Idolatry for so many Years ever since they became a Nation Or if we believe their own Story and they were as inclinable to Worship Idols and imbrace absurd Opinions of God and Religion as any other Nation How came they to recover themselves again and preserve the true Worship of God among them And how at last when they were so wedded to the external form and manner of Worshipping the true God as to place all their Religion in it to the neglect of Moral Duties at a time when there was no other sort of Learning among them how I say came a perfecter Scheme of Morality and Religion to proceed from thence than from any other Quarter of the World and such a Scheme as no body that professed it durst think of altering adding to or diminishing when no such respect was paid to any Philosophers Scheme by his own Sect or Party To whom can we ascribe such a wonderful Preservation of true Religion but to God who was able to bring Strength out of Weakness and even of Stones to raise up Children unto Abraham If afterwards we consider by what particular Hands this perfecter Scheme of Religion was delivered to Mankind and in what manner it was first Published and Preached to the World here the Finger of God will plainly appear also For all the Instruments and Ministers of this great Work were Persons of a low Rank and mean Occupations Ignorant and Unlearned and of no Reputation in the World and their Preaching was plain and simple without the enticing Words of Man's Eloquence and yet where-ever they came the Gospel prevailed many were daily added to the Church and in a little time they drew the whole World after them this they did notwithstanding all the Opposition that was made to them by the Reasonings and Disputings of the Learned and by the Force and Authority of Magistrates and Men in Power notwithstanding the Doctrine they Preached was everywhere spoken against and the Preachers and Believers of it were everywhere Persecuted and Afflicted with all the variety of Sufferings their Enemies could invent And when we perceive it so ordered that the Foolish things of the World should Confound the Wise that the Weak and Base things of the World and things which are despised should Confound the things which are Mighty and in great Esteem we cannot but acknowledge that God hath chosen them and what is thus wonderful in our Eyes is the Lord 's doing Thus it became God Almighty to humble Men and shew his Power in a way directly contrary to all the measures they would have imagined proper Was it not likewise every way worthy of God and agreeable both to the Wisdom and Goodness of his Designs in giving Mankind a more perfect Model of Religion than they were hitherto acquainted with that he should convince them of the Beauty and Reasonableness and incourage them to the Practice of it by exemplifying the whole Scheme in the Lives of the first Publishers and Preachers of this Religion And where were such perfect Characters of Men ever heard of before as those of Christ and his Apostles and most of the first Christian Believers What could more demonstrate the Force and Influence of the Christian Religion and recommend it more Effectually to the World than this As therefore the Knowledge of a true and reasonable Service of God must be referred to him so must likewise the power to will and to do according to all those Rules and Measures he has been pleased to prescribe us But further when such Doctrines as those of the Gospel which were Preached Believed and Propagated in such a manner and recommended by Persons of such Characters as is before specified are confirm'd by so many Prophecies and Miracles and those of such kinds as we find mentioned in the New Testament it must be likewise allowed that God was the Author of all these Signs and Wonders For if it be possible and sometimes expedient for God to reveal something to Mankind as has been already shewn more infallible Tokens and Indications of himself he cannot give us than such Prophecies and such Miracles as those Recorded in the New Testament no greater Instances of Knowledge and Power besides what appear in the Making and Governing the World are conceivable by us and what better deserved such an extraordinary and immediate Manifestation of these Attributes of God then the Gospel To what nobler Ends could God imploy his Power than for the confirming and promoting the belief of such a just reasonable and beneficial Scheme of things as the Christian Religion But besides these Prophecies and Miracles were not only certain Indications of Divine Revelation and Assistance in themselves and more undoubtedly so to us for being made use of to confirm a Doctrine which deserved such Attestation but they were also the properest and most suitable means that could be chosen for Establishing the belief of the Gospel to which they were designed and consequently must be imployed by God to that End For what was more becoming the Divine Wisdom and what could be more effectual to convince Men of the truth of such future things as are Promised and Threatened in the Christian Religion than by the Completion of Prophecies spoken of at several distant Periods of time before the Events happen'd to give them a sensible proof that all things were manifest and open to the Eyes of God and that a Thousand Years was to him but as One Day And that the strangeness of the Christian Events relating to a Future State
upon the prospect of which the whole Religion is founded might not shock the Faith of Mankind what wiser and more convincing Method could be taken than by various Instances of things actually done in their Presence of as strange and surprizing a Nature as those foretold and some of them of the very same kind as the Resurrection of the Dead Ascension into Heaven c. How I say could Men be better satisfied than by such present Experience of the Divine Power that nothing was impossible to God and that there might be such things in a Future State which Eye had not yet seen nor Ear heard nor had entered into the Heart of Man to conceive Thus have I proved in short that the Prophecies Miracles and Doctrines contained in the New Testament and consequently the whole Christian Religion which were before shewn to exceed all Humane Reach and Capacity did certainly proceed from God After which proof the third thing proposed will be very easily made out viz. that 't is very improper and absurd to ascribe these things to Evil Spirits All that we know of Good or Evil Spirits without Revelation is that there have been some Men unaccountably assisted by some invisible Power to say and do certain things which they knew they could not have said or done without such Assistance that if what was said or done this way was serious and concerning and seem'd to contribute any thing to the Good of Men it was reckoned to proceed from a Good Spirit appointed by the Supreme God for that End if the things said or done were Trifling or Hurtful they were thought to come from Evil Spirits permitted by the Supreme God to Amuse or Punish Men and that Sacrifices and other Religious Rites were performed by the Persons particularly concern'd to express their Thanks to the One or to appease the Other these Good and Evil Spirits being esteemed as Gods of a Lower Order who had different Offices assign'd them by the Supreme In the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament we have a more particular account of Good and Evil Spirits the first occasion of their Distinction and their different Offices and Imployments as such and there we find that what was said or done by Angels or Good Spirits was by the express Order and Command of God and is Attributed to him in the same manner as if it had proceeded immediately from himself and what was said or done by Devils or Evil Spirits was by the Permission of God for the Trial or Punishment of Men. The Power God suffered Evil Spirits to Exercise and the Signs and Wonders he permitted them to do in order to tempt Men from the Belief or Practice of those things he had injoined and commanded them were so easily distinguishable from the positive express Manifestations of Divine Power that any Man was justly to be Condemn'd for being deceived by them For besides that Miracles done by the help of Evil Spirits were Pascal as a Judicious Author well observes always foretold or outdone or both and consequently could never be of force enough to invalidate a Divine Revelation Besides this I say the Works of the Devil and the Doctrines of Devils are so contrary to the Reason and truest Interests of Mankind and so easily known to be so especially when compared with the Doctrine of God and the Fruits of it that no Miracles or Signs whatsoever can be sufficient to establish their Credit And therefore 't is very absurd and contrary to all that the Scriptures inform us of concerning Devils or Evil Spirits to suppose that they should imploy all their Power and Cunning to promote a pure and holy Service of One God and to destroy all the Pretences of Superstition and Idolatry 'T is contrary to all the Policy of the Kingdom of Darkness as our Saviour argues that it should be divided against it self and that some Evil Spirits should disturb and oppose the rest when they are all carrying on the same Work But neither Jews Christians or Heathens ever entertained any such Notions of Devils or Evil Spirits as to make them the Authors of any thing that recommended and establish'd what they call'd Vertue in the World or contributed to the Peace Welfare or Happiness of Mankind 'T is manifest then that such a Scheme as we have seen the Christian Religion is could not be Contrived and Propagated through the World in such a manner by Evil Spirits neither was it possible that the first Preachers and Professors of this Religion should derive their extraordinary Characters from the Possession and Influence of Devils These are such Notorious Truths that there is no need of further Inlargments upon this Head Thus have I finished what I undertook under my Second General and by a full and direct Proof made it very Evident that all the principal Matters of Fact related in the New Testament are true III. I shall strengthen and confirm the same Truth by shewing the improbability and absurdity of a contrary Supposition and the weakness of all the Difficulties and Objections rais'd against the Scriptures and the Matters contained in them which is the third thing I proposed to make good in order to my main Design which is to establish a firm Belief of the Christian Religion and all the Obligations of it It has been sufficiently proved already that if all the common Matters of Fact related in the New Testament or only the principal of them such as have been before mentioned are true in the Manner and Circumstances there set down it necessarily follows from hence that the Miracles and Prophecies there Recorded must be true also and if the Miracles and Prophecies are true they must certainly be the Effects of Divine Assistance and Revelation and consequently the Doctrines delivered by Persons so assisted must come from God This I say has been fully made out beyond all possibility of a a reasonable Contradiction and every thing that could be supposed all the different Accounts that could be given of these Matters in order to invalidate the strength of the Inferences drawn from them have been shewn to be false and groundless The next Pretence which the Enemies of Revealed Religion make use of in the behalf of Infidelity is that the whole Body of the Scriptures of the New Testament are Forged and Suppositious that all the principal Matters of Fact there Recorded with all the Strange and New Doctrines built upon them were purely the Inventions of Men and that the Books were given out by the Contrivers of them as containing the Revelations of God in order to Establish their Credit and Authority in the World This is the worst that the utmost Malice of Scoffers and Unbelievers can suggest but the Folly and unpresidented Absurdity of this Plea will easily appear upon a slight Examination of it For first 'T is very manifest from what has been said already that it has been a constant and universal Tradition in this part
of the World that most of the Books of the New Testament were written by those very Persons whom we that are now called Christians pretend they were Written by and that all of them were writ about the same time we now believe and affirm they were and therefore there is the same reason to believe these Books to be true and genuine as any other of the same Standing and Antiquity and if we consider the importance of the Books much greater In the next place 't is certain that in all the Accounts we have left us of the History of Christianity it no where appears that any of the Ancient Adversaries of this Religion either Jews or Heathens Prophane or Revolting Christians ever Objected to the true Christian Believers that the Books in which they pretended their Religion was contained were Forg'd and Supposititious and consequently that their Faith was Vain and Ill-grounded And if those who lived at and near the first rise of Christianity never made use of this Objection against it then what strength can it have now when urged by those who cannot well be more industrious Enemies of the Christian Religion than their Unbelieving Predecessors were and cannot possibly at this distance make out such a discovery as they pretend to could we suppose the thing true and never detected before by such as sought all occasions to lessen the Credit and stop the growth of Christianity in every Age which to me seems utterly inconceivable I am likewise perswaded that no meer Man by the strength of his own unassisted Capacities could have framed and contrived such a Book as the New Testament is I cannot possibly prevail upon my self to believe that such Facts as are there Recorded such a Contexture of History such a Scheme of Doctrines such Characters of Men and such a manner of Writing as we find throughout that Book could be altogether the Issue and Result of Humane Sagacity alone But supposing it to be possible that all these things might have enter'd into a Man's Mind supposing likewise that notwithstanding the present appearance of Vniversal uncontradicted Tradition to the contrary a Book now believed to be true might some time or other have been invented without any ground for such a Work in the reality of things allowing I say the possibility of these things 't is still upon many other Accounts manifestly absurd to imagine that the Writings of the New Testament were the Work and Contrivance of Men without a sufficient Foundation of true real Facts to support them This will more paticularly appear from these two Considerations 1. That there is no End or Design imaginable sufficient to have determined the supposed Author of the New Testament to undertake such a Work 2. That if the Principal Matters of Fact contained in the New Testament both Common and Extraordinary had not been true 't would have been utterly impossible that the Christian Religion should ever have been believed and propagated in the World in the manner we find it is at present First then I am to prove that there is no End or Design imaginable sufficient to have determined the supposed Author of the New Testament to undertake such a Work All the Ends we can imagine the Author of this Extraordinary Performance acted upon must be either the Good of Mankind his own particular Interest or Reputation in the World or purely the pleasure of deceiving but none of these could have Influence enough to produce such a Work and therefore we must account for its Original some other way For first it cannot be supposed that some Vertuous Good Man who endeavoured as far as he was able to live up to those Rules we find delivered in the New Testament should out of pure Zeal for the Welfare and Interest of Mankind Publish such a Scheme of Living as is there laid down under the grossest form of Imposture imaginable it could never enter into the thoughts of such a Man as this to recommend Simplicity Truth and Integrity by the most solemn variety of Lyes and Falshoods that ever were invented He that was concern'd to establish a Form of sound Words who represents all manner of Lying Deceit and Dissimulation as utterly inconsistent with that Model of Religion he was setting up and who strictly forbids all Men to do Evil that Good might come of it a Person I say of this Character who was in earnest and throughly perswaded of the truth of the Principles he recommended cannot be imagined to have acted directly contrary to them himself in order to have them Believed and Observed by others 'T is true indeed Fables and Parables have been often made use of as very proper and easie means of conveying good Instructions to Mankind but the History of the New Testament is too Particular and Circumstantial to be reckoned an Allegory and therefore there is no occasion to prove it none so that if the Principal Matters of Fact Recorded in the New Testament are not true according to the first obvious literal meaning of them the whole Relation must be a downright Forgery and consequently could not be the Work of an Honest Man invented by him merely for the good of Mankind The possibility of which Supposition can no ways be accounted for by the many Forged and Supposititious Writings Published by some of the first Christians in favour of that Religion for considering only those which made for the Christian Religion in General and may seem to have been contrived purely for the Propagation of it among such whose Condition was lookt upon as very Miserable by reason of their Ignorance or Disbelief of Christianity whatever of this Nature was Forged by any Christians was not really done upon any good Motive but proceeded from too passionate a Concern for the Party they were of and the Opinions they had undertook to defend When the Enemies of their Religion stood out against all the true rational Proofs urged for it an eager desire of convincing those they Disputed with and doing Honour to their own Cause and Management of it put them upon inventing such things as by the Temper or Concessions of their Adversaries were likelier to prevail with them This I take to be the true Spring and Cause of most of those False and Spurious Writings which were designed for the advantage of the Christian Cause in General the Forgeries that were contrived for the defence of some Particular Doctrine proceeding most commonly from a worse Original But 't is very evident that the first Invention and Publication of the whole Christian Scheme could not be owing to the Influence of any such Principle or Motive as is before mentioned and if it had the Inventer and Publisher could not have been a Good Man that was so Influenced nor such a good Man as we suppose acted upon a pure disinterested Principle of Love to Mankind And if it should be further Objected that 't is very probable some honest well-meaning Christians were guilty
of the like indirect Practices as well as others and that Purely out of Love and Compassion to Mankind for no other End and Design but to bring over as many as they could to the belief of that Religion which they were perswaded would make them happy the Answer to this is very ready and obvious viz. That these were very plain simple Men as manifestly appears by those Circumstances whereby their Forgeries were discovered their great Zeal for the Salvation of their Brethren was without Knowledge and they were ignorant of the Nature and Power of that Religion they sought to Propagate as imagining such well-intended Frauds allowable But the Author of the New Testament if the Work was wholly Humane was certainly a wise knowing Man his Forgery if it was one was so well laid and contrived that no body has been yet able to find it out and he cannot be thought to have been so ignorant of the Religion he made himself as to believe that to be lawful which he had expressly forbid and therefore we may certainly conclude that if the Scriptures of the New Testament were Forged the Author of them was an Ill Man who acted upon some Private Motive and not out of a true generous Concern for the good of Mankind But what Principle or Motive can we imagine strong enough to have disposed an ill Man to frame such a Work Not any Profit Interest or Advantage that could accrue to him from it He could not but foresee that to impose a New Religion upon the World to change the Ancient Laws and Customs of Nations to Condemn and Expose to Contempt what the Wisest and most Powerful part of Mankind had in Veneration to disturb Men in the Possession of Advantageous Errors and Prejudices and to put a Restraint upon their most agreeable Passions and Inclinations This I say he must needs foresee would be an attempt too difficult to be manag'd without the most violent Opposition imaginable and too great to be effected in his Days 'T was hardly possible I think for a Man of Common Sense to perswade himself such a design as this should succeed at all but much more inconceivable that he should imagine Things should be carried on so smoothly and easily that he should live to enjoy the Fruits of his Labour and a future Reward in another Life could have no antecedent Influence upon him who is supposed to Invent the Notion or at least to inforce it upon others without having any good Reason to believe it himself And as it must be acknowledged 't was very easie to foresee the many Troubles and Difficulties that would attend the Establishment of Christianity so 't is plain that the Author of the New Testament whoever he was understood very well what the Natural Consequences of such an Attempt were as appears by the large Representation he makes of the manifold Sufferings and Afflictions which befel all the first Publishers and Preachers of the Christian Religion and those who embrac'd the Doctrines they taught It must be likewise confessed That if any of those mentioned in the New Testament as concern'd in Publishing or Preaching what is there call'd the Gospel did really Suffer such things as are there Written of them for endeavouring to persuade people to believe such Wonderful Facts and Doctrines as we now find Recorded in that Book which some of them had before invented and afterwards caused to be written together with the Account of their own Sufferings If this I say be supposed then it must be granted That the Event was every way answerable to the Prospect which we have seen the Author of the Christian Scheme must have had before him when he was upon that Design and which soever of these Persons we ascribe the Work to we must be convinced that he did by no means consult his own Interest in it But if some unknown Person was the Author of the New Testament and the whole History of it is pure Fiction as must be allowed in the Supposition we are at present concerned to disprove then is it utterly impossible to find out what Advantage he could propose to himself by a Performance of this Nature I cannot conceive for the Reasons before given that he should design any Interest of his own at all in it and his being unknown is no small Argument that the Advantages gained whatever they were were too inconsiderable a Recompence for such a noble well-invented Scheme as he has given us in the Scriptures of the New Testament 'T was not then for any Private Interest or Advantage assignable by us That any Person who thought fit to conceal himself could frame and contrive the New Testament and much less can it be supposed that a desire of Reputation put him upon such a Work since he has taken such effectual care to suppress his own Name and attribute the Glory of his Invention to another Nothing therefore remains but that we say 't was purely the pleasure of deceiving which occasioned the writing that Book But this is as unlikely and insufficient a Cause of such an Effect as any of the other before mentioned For the secret Pleasure of deceiving without the Reputation which is wont to attend an artful Deceiver could never work so strongly as to produce any thing of that excellent Skill and Contrivance in the making and of such mighty tendency in the Consequences of it as the Christian Religion is Besides when a Man acts for no other End but to deceive his Designs can never be such as serve for the procuring and promoting the benefit of Mankind The pleasure that an ill Man takes in deceiving is always a malicious pleasure which is raised and heightned by the prospect either of the Folly or Misery of the deceived Had such an Impostor as this contrived the Christian Religion he would never have taken the pains to oblige the World with such a Rational Scheme of Life as was never before exhibited and could never since be mended he would rather have chose to triumph over the Ignorance and Credulity of Mankind by giving them false and pernicious Rules of Action as well as monstrous and improbable Articles of Belief but those who considering the Christian Facts and Doctrines as meer Imposture talk of them under that Style are forced to allow that the Christian Morality whether it be of Humane Invention or Divine Revelation is certainly the most perfect accomplish'd Piece that was ever declared to Mankind There is no other Motive imaginable the Author of the New Testament if it be all a Forgery could have acted upon and the insufficiency of those alledged has been already shewn and might be further made to appear if there were occasion for such an inlargement But the absurdity and impossibility of the supposed Forgery appearing more plainly from the following Head I shall add but one Argument more for the Confirmation of what I have said very briefly upon this Now the Argument I shall
insist upon is this That 't is utterly inconceivable that the supposed Author and Contriver of that Book could have imagined that such a Scheme of Things as we there find delivered should ever come to be believed and established in the World and without such a Thought and Perswasion of this in the Author we can never account for either the first Contrivance or Publication of it Whatever it was that determined him to frame the Christian Scheme whatever End he proposed to himself from his Labour and Skill in making it he must certainly design that the whole Fiction should be believed by those it was communicated to otherwise it was impossible for him to compass the End he aimed at If therefore 't is certain That the first Author and Publisher of the Christian Religion did design and intend to have it believed and if he was a Wise Understanding Man of great Reach and Sagacity as the Enemies of his Religion allow and is very evident from that Rational Draught of Morality the World is obliged to him for then does it plainly follow That Christianity is no Imposture and that the Books of the New Testament are not Forged and Invented For how was 't possible for a Wise Man to think that such a Multitude of strange unheard of Facts as are Recorded in the New Testament and made the Foundation of the Christian Religion should be believed without any manner of Proof or Evidence of the Truth of them But if he did not distrust the credibility of the Facts themselves what could induce him to give such a particular circumstantial Relation of them as submitted them to every Bodies Enquiry and Examination and made the discovery of their Falshood easie and obvious How could he perswade himself that such New and Difficult Doctrines should be entertained which no former Notions of Learning or Religion prepared Men to receive and which no Discovery or Revelation could make them fully comprehend And how was it possible for him to imagine That such Doctrines and Facts as these should set off and recommend his Morality to the World which considered by it self is granted to be unexceptionable Had the principal Aim and Design of this supposed Impostor been to establish the Christian Morality he would rather have Published it alone in the Name of some admired Prince or Philosopher or have pretended by some secret way of conveyance to have received it from Heaven This any Man of common Sense would have judged a likelier Method of getting it believed than the mixing and blending so many strange Facts and Doctrines amongst it and laying the whole Work upon such a Foundation as he knew had no manner of Support from Reality And on the other side had it been his chief Intention to abuse the Credulity of Mankind by making them believe so many strange and unaccountable Lyes as are contained in the History and peculiar Doctrines of Christianity if they are all False he would have taken care to have made his Morality more easie and palatable and more suited to the common Prejudices and Inclinations of the generality of Mankind that so the other parts of the Scheme might have been taken down readily and without Examination for the sake of this But taking the Christian Religion altogether as we now find it 't is not to be imagined that a Wise Man should believe he was able to bring People over to imbrace it supposing it purely an Invention of his own which he knew had no Foundation in true Facts And therefore there could be no End or Motive sufficient to Influence him to contrive what he could not believe would ever be received so far as to answer any End proposed But supposing it possible that there should have been some Man who was Wise enough to invent the whole Christian Scheme as we now find it in the Scriptures of the New Testament and who was at the same time so absurdly foolish as to think it would be believed so far as to recompence him for the pains of making and the hazard of Publishing it Supposing I say all this which to me is perfectly unconceivable yet the Books of the New Testament could not be forged Because 2. If the Principal Matters of Fact contained in the New Testament both Common and Extraordinary had not been true 't would have been utterly impossible that the Christian Religion should ever have been believed and propagated in the World in the manner we find it is at present which I shall endeavour to prove in the following Method That the Christian Religion such as we find delivered in the Books of the New Testament is at present own'd and profess'd in a great part of the World and that where-ever this Religion is profess'd those Books are appeal'd to as the Rule and Standard of it as to every thing therein contained are Truths I shall take for granted It is likewise as evident that there was a Time when there were no such Books or Religion known or heard of The inquiry then will be when and how the Christian Religion came to be Establish'd in the World In answer to which it must be allowed that either the Books of the New Testament were written first and the Christian Religion Propagated from them or the Doctrines therein contained were spread first by Preaching and Conversation and afterwards committed to Writing But which soever of these Suppositions we take the Publication of the Christian History and the Doctrines built upon it cannot possibly be placed above the Times mentioned in the New Testament because there are abundance of Names and other Circumstances allowed to be true which could not be known before without a Spirit of Prophecy which Imposture has nothing to do with In the Account the New Testament gives of this Matter the first Scene of the Imposture if the Christian Religion be accounted such is laid at Jerusalem in the time of Tiberius Cesar and consequently the Period fix'd upon for first acquainting the World with what is pretended to have happen'd then at Jerusalem must be at or near that time or at some distance since Let us consider this great Event in all these different Periods and see what the Success will be In the first place then let us suppose the Christian Religion Invented and Published at Jerusalem in the Reign of Tiberius Cesar 'T is plain the way of Propagating the belief of it must have been by Writing or Preaching if the Work was begun by Writing it must be by some of the Gospels none of the other Books of the New Testament can be pretended to be then Written without Prophecy But whether it were by one or more of the Gospels or by Preaching the things contained in them 't was absolutely impossible such a Scheme of Falshood should be believed by those who by an Infallible Consciousness must know it to be so or be spread propagated and defended by those who did not believe it themselves in places
believe the Christian Religion and render us inexcusable if we do not Now the Matters of Fact I have undertook to prove lying out of the reach of our own present Perceptions and Memories and being not Communicated to us by Immediate Revelation from God we can be informed and assured of the truth of them no other way than by Humane Testimony the Connexion of present Appearances with former and from the Nature of things either in General or the Particular Facts in Question If therefore it can be shewn that those Matters of Fact which make up the Christian History and upon which the Christian Religion is Founded are as well attested as any other distant Facts whatsoever that there is as necessary a Connexion betwixt them and the present state of things in the World as betwixt the present and any former Appearances and that we have as much assurance both from the Nature of things in General and these in Particular that they are true as we can have that any thing else is so at a distance from us If I say it can be shewn that the Proof before given answers all these Characters then does it evidently follow that there is as much reason to believe the Christian Religion as there can possibly be to be believe any Matters of Fact out of the Notice and Observation of the Living and that there are some such Matters of Fact as these which deserve our assent to them as well as any Truths concerning the real Nature of things cannot be questioned 1. First Then as to Humane Testimony What true Matters of Fact are there now believed in the World which are better attested than the Christian are There is no History of former Times now extant confirm'd by such a Cloud of Witnesses and there never were any Witnesses of such unquestionable Characters We have a great many Authors now extant who had themselves a Principal Concern in the Transactions they write of They were all Persons of great Probity and Integrity of a disinteressed undesigning Simplicity of Manners Men without Guile and without Deceit They were bred up in a different Religion from that they Recommended in their Writings They were very much Prejudiced against the Pretences of their Master who came to instruct them in it They were slow to believe the Account he gave of Himself and the Gospel he Preached and the Meanness and Poverty of his Condition while he Lived the Scandal of his Death and the many Afflictions and Dangers his Disciples and Followers were exposed to after his Death were very great Discouragements from imbracing his Doctrine The History these Persons acquaint us with consists of such a multiplicity of Publick Notorious Facts so easie to be known so curious to be enquired into and of such vast Consequence and Importance for all Persons to be rightly imform'd in that every body might have disproved them if they had been False and every body that did not believe them would have thought himself concern'd to have done it if he could After these first Christian Writers we have a large Succession of other Authors who Lived at different Times during the space of Three Hundred Years and in several distant Countries and Nations throughout the Roman Empire who do unanimously acquaint us that Copies of those first Writers were carefully preserved in every Place and who confirm their Characters and the Truth of their Relation which they assure us were every where believed so firmly and heartily that vast Multitudes of People in all Places forsook the Religion they had been bred up in laid aside the old Laws and Customs they had lived by restrained the Inclinations and denied the Appetites they had indulged and conquered inveterate Prejudices and Aversions in order to comply with the Doctrine and Institution of Christ according as it was delivered in the Scriptures of the New Testament And in the same manner we are informed that during these Three Hundred Years all sorts of Christians were exposed to great Troubles Losses and Sufferings upon account of their Profession and that abundance of them indured various Tortures and suffered Death and Reproach for not renouncing their Faith of which number were most of the Writers of those Times of whose Sincerity Piety and Diligent Enquiry into the Truth of the Christian History and Revelation we have ample Testimonies remaining Several of them were likewise very Learned Men of great Fame and Reputation for Philosophy and who would not yeild to the Simplicity of the Gospel till over-ruled and bore down by the Irresistible Authority of Matters of Fact well proved and attested All of them writ at such Times and in such Places when and where every body that read what they had writ was as capable of imforming himself of the Truth and Integrity of the Christian Tradition as the Authors themselves were there being a great many other Writers cited by them and divers other Monuments and Records appealed to which were then extant and publickly known It is moreover very remarkable That during this forementioned Term of 300 Years while Christianity was new and under Persecution neither the Jews nor Heathens those industrious Enemies and Opposers of the Gospel who were every where mixt with the Christians and were continually Disputing with them This I say is a further confirmation of the Truth of the Christian Religion that not one of all its Ancient Enemies either Jew or Heathen should ever deny or call in question the great and wonderful Facts 't was built upon but that several of them should corroborate the Christian Accounts by many Circumstances mention'd in their own Writings as 't is manifest they have done Thus stands the first and earliest Proof of the Christian Religion from Humane Testimony which is further confirmed by an innumerable and continually increasing Company of Writers and the Constancy and Vniversality of Belief ever since which by reason of some Opposition or other has been in every Age almost examined over again and stood the Test of the most Malicious Examination 2. In the next place then without considering these Humane Authorities in particular let us examine what Connexion there is betwixt the present State of Christianity in the World and the Ancient History of it That the Christian Religion is now own'd and professed in a great many Countries that where-ever the Christian Religion is believed there the Scriptures of the New Testament are acknowledged also as the Rule and Standard of it and that all the wonderful Facts therein Recorded are believed by Christians to have really happen'd at the Times and Places there mentioned are Matters of Fact which every Body may by his own Observation find to be true and I shall here take for granted This therefore being the present State of Things in the World it necessarily follows from hence That the Christian Religion had a Beginning There was a Time when the Christian Religion was no where practised nor any of those Facts Recorded
in the New Testament believed How then came it to pass That any Body should Contrive and Publish such a Scheme as this And how came any Body to believe it when Published if it had not been true 'T is plain that the first Contrivers Publishers and Believers of the Christian Religion whoever they were must have been either Persons of no Religion at all before or of a different one from the Christian they must have been either Good Men or Ill Men such as lived up to the Rules and Principles of the Christian Religion or contrary to them But whichsoever of these Characters we suppose belong'd to the first Christians I cannot possibly account for the Present State of Christianity if the Principal Facts related in the New Testament were not true I cannot conceive that an Atheist or a Wicked Man that was bred up in different Notions of Religion and whose Practice was contrary to the Christian Rules of Life could invent such a Scheme as contradicted and condemned all his former Opinions and Practices or would have been at the pains to do it if he could And I can as little imagine that there was any Person before the appearance of Christianity in the World who could by the strength of his own Capacities without any Divine Assistance find out such a noble Plan and Model of Humane Life as that contained in the New Testament and by the extraordinary force and goodness of his own Disposition live up to it himself before he recommended it to others and as impossible is it to suppose that such a good Man as this should throw off those contrary Sentiments and Impressions of Religion he had been brought up in for being False and Ineffectual for the promoting a good Life and at the same time forge a Set of the most unaccountable Lyes that were ever known and make use of this Imposture to inforce the Belief and Practice of his new Principles which are plainly and directly inconsistent with such Methods But could we suppose any Person capable of framing such a Scheme as the 〈…〉 without the help of Revelation for the Doctrines of it or true History for the Facts 't is built upon What End or Motive could be imagined sufficient to determine him to do it He could not propose any Profit or Advantage to himself from a Work which he knew would render all the Promoters of it liable to Reproaches Troubles and Afflictions and every thing that was hard and grievous in Life For this whoever Published the Christian Religion first assures us was to be the Lot and Portion of those that imbraced it This is one of the Principal Doctrines of the Gospel where we are commanded to quit all we Possess to renounce all the Pleasures and Enjoyments of the World to expect Tribulation and Anguish Ignominy and Death and to suffer all manner of Persecution gladly for the sake of the Christian Profession How could a Man that made this a part of his Religion and had foresight enough to know he should have occasion to practice it himself think of advancing his Interest in the World by such an Invention And how can we imagine any uncertain doubtful Prospect of Future Reputation after Death should be strong enough to bear him up against all the sure and sensible Discouragements he was to meet with while he Lived As this cannot well be imagined so neither is it probable to believe that the meer pleasure of deceiving should put a Man upon the contrivance of such a Scheme as was very unlikely to take very hazardous to the Impostor and very beneficial to all that were deceived It is moreover very unconceivable how any Man should think of advancing the present Interest and Welfare of Mankind by perswading them to believe all the Wonderful Facts and Extraordinary Doctrines of the Christian Religion which have no manner of relation to it and how he should come to be so mightily for their Happiness in a Future State which he had no certainty of from Revelation Neither is there any reason to be given why he should imagine the belief of those Facts and Doctrines necessary to their Happiness in a Future State if he had been sure there was one nor why he should pitch upon the grossest Forgeries imaginable in order to promote the practice of such Vertues among Men as are directly opposite to the means he used for this end We cannot therefore account for the contrivance of the Christian Religion from any End or Motive that was likely to put a Man upon such a Work because it is very manifest from the whole Tenour of this Religion that the Author of it if it had been an Imposture could not have promised himself any kind of advantage from his Undertaking And upon further Enquiry and Examination it will appear That if any Man had been wise enough to invent such a Religion and foolish enough to have had some certain aim and prospect in effecting it his Success could never have been answerable to his Expectation For how could such a Religion as the Christian have ever obtained so general a Credit in the World as we find it now has if it had been purely Humane Invention The Morality of it is so Pure and Holy so contrary to all the prevailing Inclinations and Interests of Mankind in this Life that we find it the hardest thing in the World by continual Care and Instruction to bring Men to submit to it who have been accustomed by Education to believe it Revealed by God and Established upon the Conditions of Eternal Happiness and Misery in another World who are confirm'd in that belief by the concurrent Faith of all they know and converse with and who are left without a possibility of disproving the Truth of the pretended Revetion if it had been at first an Imposture How then can we imagine that the Christian Laws and Rules of Life should have been so easily received at their first Publication so widely Propagated afterwards and so absolutely and intirely submitted to that they should become the standing unalterable Laws of so many different Countries and Nations as do now profess the Christian Faith How I say could this have ever happen'd if the first Set of Persons that imbraced this Morality had not been fully convinced that it had been expresly revealed by God and injoyned Mankind under the Sanction of Eternal Rewards and Punishments And how could any Man be perswaded of this without believing those wonderful Facts upon the Credit of which the Truth of the whole Revelation is Founded But if we suppose the first Christians that ever were believed all those Matters of Fact how can this be supposed of them except they were true How can we possibly imagine that the Principal Matters of Fact related in the New Testament which are now a necessary part of the Faith of all Christians should be believed by those in whose times the Scheme is laid in contradiction to all their
the Objects that affect them and the difference of the Imaginations of those that are affected the Influence may be stronger upon some than others If we consider the Power and Force of Truth in general the natural Ease and Pleasure that accompanies Sincerity and the Difficulty and Reluctance with which Men practise known Deceit and Falshood we cannot but infer from hence that it very rarely happens that any Men come to find a pleasure in Lying purely for deceiving sake without any further End or Prospect and all Observations upon the History of Mankind confirm this Conclusion and therefore we judge it contrary to the Nature of Man to suppose there was a whole Age of such Deceivers as these who pretended to believe a great number of unprofitable Lyes which were to bring them in no other Pleasure or Satisfaction than what every one found in deceiving others But 't is plain that if Christianty was an Imposture this must be supposed For none of the first Christians ever pretended to any other Pleasures or Advantages of Life They made it part of their Religion to renounce them all and the World was not so kind as to force them to accept what they had voluntarily abandoned And if it be contrary to Humane Nature in General to imagine that a vast Multitude of People of different Tempers and Inclinations should all conspire together to pretend a Belief of what they knew to be false without any further prospect of Pleasure and Advantage than what immediately resulted from such Pretences much more repugnant is it when we consider the Characters of these Pretenders the greatest part of which were Persons of such steady integrity before that Lying must have offered the greatest violence imaginable to their Consciences But further supposing the first Christians had some Motives sufficient to determine them all to agree in the same false Pretences notwithstanding that great contrariety of Interests such a Multitude is commonly govern'd by whatever Advantages they proposed to themselves they found such mighty disappointments every where in their Hopes and indured such unspeakable Troubles and Afflictions for the sake of their Profession that they had stronger Motives for their discovering and relinquishing the Cheat they had maintained than they could have at first to begin it and therefore if none of them were induced to confess their Pretences false in such occasions where other Men have been often tempted or forced to disown the Truth we must infer from hence that they did really believe all they pretended to or they were not like other Men but of a strange Nature different from whatever we have known or heard of This must be likewise said too of all the other People of that Age when Christianity was first Published who refused to believe the Christian Pretences For how otherwise can we account for their not contradicting and disproving them when they had all those Motives and Reasons for discovering the Imposture which were manifestly wanting for the Invention and Propagation of it From all which I think we may with confidence conclude that the first Authors Publishers and Professors of Christianity did really believe all they declared and asserted From whence it immediately and necessarily follows that all the Common Matters of Fact which they believed to be true were actually true they having the same Evidence of Sense for them as we have now or any other Generation of Men ever had for whatever fell under the Cognizance of their Senses so that if they were deceived we must call in question all our own Sensations which are the Foundations of all our other Knowledge And the same Evidence that they had for these Common Matters of Fact they had also for all the Extraordinary Facts mention'd in the Christian History so far as concerns the Things done and the Pretences of the Authors and as to the Power by which they were done I am as sure they exceed all Humane Strength and Skill as I am sure any thing else does And then according to the best and truest Notions we are able to frame of the Divine Nature we cannot but judge they were very proper Marks and Indications of his Power manifest Tokens of his Goodness to Men and so suited and adapted to their Capacities that we cannot frame or imagine a way whereby God could have more effectually revealed himself to us if he ever designed to reveal himself to us at all and it appears very agreeable both to his Wisdom and Goodness that he should make such a Revelation as the Christian Religion is to us as has been shown more at large before If therefore there was an Age when the several Persons mention'd in the New Testament did pretend to do what is there Recorded of them and all the principal Matters of Fact which make up the Christian History were believed far and wide according to the Relation there given 't is inconsistent with all the Principles of Humane Nature and repugnant to the Nature of God that they should be false as far as we are able by all the Knowledge we have of the Nature of God and Man to judge That there was such an Age as this we have the constant universal and uninterrupted Testimony of all the succeeding Ages and when a great many different Countries and Nations do all Unanimously agree to assert that their Immediate Forefathers did receive such a Religion consisting of a great variety of Facts and Doctrines and all these being contained in certain Books and Copies of those Books being dispersed throughout these several Countries the Faith is every where the same In such a case as this it is not to be doubted but so far as the succeeding Generation of Men agree in their Testimony concerning the Faith of their immediate Predecessors so far they were of the same Faith with them If this be not allowed 't is impossible to know any thing beyond our own Time and no Humane Testimony is to be admitted upon any occasion a greater and more unsuspected Testimony then this being utterly inconceivable But if such Evidence as this be certain and unquestionable as indeed it is then is the present universal belief of the Scriptures of the New Testament an undeniable Argument that there was a time when the Principal Matters of Fact there Recorded were pretended to be done and were believed by vast Multitudes of those who lived at that time to be really done in the way and manner in which they are now related to have happen'd and if they were then believed they must be true for the Reasons before given Thus far the Sufficiency of the positive and direct part of the proof of the Christian Religion is manifested from the Nature of Things And in the same manner it will appear that what has been before offered to shew the absurdity of supposing the Christian Religion an Imposture is sufficient to determine any Man to believe it For if we throughly and impartially consider the
whole Christian Scheme as delivered in the Writings of the New Testament which we have before laid together in a short Draught and Representation of the Principal Parts and Characters of it and if at the same time we take a just view of Humane Nature we shall find it utterly impossible that such a Scheme as this should ever have been contrived or believed without any Extraordinary Interposition of Divine Providence All the Notions we have of the Powers and Capacities of the Soul of Man will not enable us to conceive how such a Set of Thoughts as compose the Christian Scheme could be brought together by the meer unassisted Force and Agitation of the Soul whatever Internal Springs we imagine that Force derived from But when we consider further that if there had been any Man capable of such an Invention there was no End or Motive sufficient to determine him to undertake it and Conduct and Support him in the Management of the whole Work we must conclude that it was not of Humane Composition And this we are assured of because there are but such and such Ends that Mankind can act upon and none of these could have any influence in the Contrivance of the Christian Religion in the manner we find it delivered to us in the New Testament for it is so Framed and Contrived in all its Parts and Circumstances that 't was impossible for any one that could be the Author of it not to perceive that all the Ways and Methods he took of Establishing his Invention would most certainly and effectually defeat the End he aimed at whatever we suppose that to be and no Man could make use of such means for the obtaining an End which he knew would destroy it But besides the difficulties of the Invention which cannot be accounted for by all the knowledge we have of the Nature of Man the Propagation of the Christian Religion does plainly surmount all Humane Art and Power For supposing the first Christians never so well inclined to believe Christianity when it was proposed to them 't is impossible for Men to belive what they will The Evidence of some things is so great that we cannot resist and on the contrary there are some things of such a Nature that no Byass or Prejudice whatsoever is strong enough to make us believe them without their proper Evidence and such are all the Principal parts of the Christian History as appears from the Reflections before made upon them But if we consider the first Christians as being all strongly disposed to reject the Christian Religion before they imbraced it as 't is certain they were whoever we suppose them to be then was their difficulty of believing much greater From whence it is necessarily inferr'd that if the Principal Matters of Fact contained in the Christian History had not been proved to be true when they were first Published they could never have been believed and if they could not have been truly and really believed 't was full as impossible that great Multitudes of People should pretend to believe them when they did not because all the Reasons and Motives that can be supposed for such Pretences could have no more Influence in the first Profession then they had in the Invention of Christianity and there they had none at all as we have shewn before Thus does it plainly appear from the whole Frame and Texture of the Christian Religion the Nature of the Facts and Doctrines contained in it and the manner in which it is delivered to the World compared with the Nature of Man that the Christian Religion as we now find it contained in the Scriptures of the New Testament was Discovered Published and Propagated in the way and manner there Recorded From whence I shall infer that it certainly came from God for the Reasons given in the former part of this Discourse concerning the Nature of God and Evil Spirits which I shall not repeat here because if the first Point be granted this Inference I believe will not be disputed by any Man Now that the Arguments here taken from the Nature of Man have all the force and weight that is laid upon them I shall further endeavour to make good by shewing that we have as much reason to conclude that these are Just and True as we have that any other Arguments drawn from the Nature of Things are Valid In order to which end I shall take the liberty to go over the chief Proofs of the Christian Religion again and consider them with this particular View Let us then examine what ground we proceed upon in our reasoning upon other Matters and how we arrive at any certainty concerning them How come we to affirm that a Body of such a Density and Bulk is of such a Weight that a Body of such a Weight has such a force in Projection that such a particular Body in such and such Circumstances will certainly produce such Effects that 't is impossible that such a Body should exceed such limits in its Motion and the like Now the only reason we have to conclude such Propositions concerning Bodies to be true upon which all the fine Mathematical Demonstrations in Natural Philosophy and all the useful Inventions in Mechanicks are grounded is this That all the Observations and Experiments that have ever been made upon these things do assure us that they have always been after this manner and the like will hold in our Reasonings from Humane Nature I can no more believe the whole Christian Scheme an Imposture of mere Humane Contrivance than I can believe that all the Materials which composed the City of Rome met together and put themselves into that Form For as I cannot see what should give those Materials a determinate Motion towards the building that City no more can I comprehend what should influence or determine a Man to Frame and Contrive such a History and Religion as the Christian And as 't is impossible to believe that if all the Materials necessary for the Building of Rome had by some extraordinary Motion been carried to that Place they would have fashioned themselves and fell into that exact Form we find that City built in so likewise is it equally impossible to conceive that if there was any End or Motive in Nature sufficient to determine a Man to invent such a Religion as the Christian he should have made and contrived it in all its Parts and Circumstances just such as it is delivered to us in the Scriptures and that so contrived it should have been Entertained Propagated and Fixt in the World upon lasting Foundations Now the reason why I conclude both these things equally impossible is because there never was any thing like either of these Events ever known to have happen'd in the World and because upon the utmost stretch of Thought grounded upon the most intimate Knowledge we can have of the Nature of the Things concern'd and the greatest compass of Observation that can be
made upon the course of things in the World it cannot be conceived or imagined that such Events as these should ever happen That there never was an Instance of any thing like the Christian Scheme which was proved or allowed by any body in the World to be an Imposture I shall take for granted since none of the Enemies of Christianity have ever produced one As for Mahometism which some have had the impudence to compare with Christianity so far as both they and we allow it to be an Imposture it can have no manner of place here as a Parallel Instance For it is on all hands granted that there was such a Man as Mahomet who lived at the Time and Place 't is pretended by his Followers he did 't is granted likewise that he wrote the Alcoran and pretended to the things there Recorded of him and that his Religion prevailed and was Propagated in the way and manner there related and described by him But in the present supposition of the whole Christian Scheme's being an Imposture it must be affirmed that call the Scriptures of the New Testament and the whole History therein contained are meer Forgery and Invention without any Foundation of Truth in the Common Matters of Fact there Recorded which makes the case of Christianity in all the important variety of Circumstances and Events possible unlike that of Mahometism And as no Instance of such an Imposture as is here pretended can be given out of the History of former times so likewise is it utterly impossible to imagine that such an Instance as this could ever happen at all To give our selves a fuller and more sensible Conviction of this let us take as exact and extensive a view as we can of the State of the World just before we affirm that Christianity was discovered or at the latest Period of Time mentioned in the New Testament Let us consider the General Temper Inclinations Opinions and Interests of the Jews at that time together with the highest Improvements in Learning and Religion then amongst them Let us make the same Reflections upon the Roman State and Government and the Principal Nations and Countries within that Empire Then let us carefully weigh and examine the Christian History and Religion contained in the Scriptures of the New Testament let us represent to our selves in one continued Prospect all the Principal Facts there Recorded drawn forth in all their variety of Circumstances the whole System of Doctrines and Rules in their just Dependance and Connexion the Characters of the Persons concerned in the Publishing and Establishing them together with the way and manner in which all these things are Written and when we have done this let us truly and impartially ask our selves whether we can possibly conceive how any Person could at that time Invent and Publish that whole Scheme of Things at Jerusalem Rome or any other part of the Roman Empire without any ground of truth to build upon and supposing it Published how it could be Believed so firmly and Propagated so far and wide that it should be fixt and continue in all this part of the World to this day without any Footsteps or Motives remaining whereby we might be able to detect the Imposture This I say appears to me as hard to conceive as that Rome should build it self and I am verily perswaded would appear so to any one else that had as fully and impartially considered the Matter as I have endeavoured to do If we date the Imposture later the same difficulty will attend the Invention and Propagation of it and we shall be further puzled to account for all the Signs and Monuments of Christianity which will appear to have been before the Period assigned for its Original wheresoever we place it But if we deal as fairly by Christianity as we do by Mahometism and allow the Common Matters of Fact Recorded of it to be true if we grant that there was such a Man as Christ who lived at the Time and Place 't is affirmed by Christians he did that he and his Disciples pretended to what is Recorded in the Scriptures of the New Testament of them that those Books were written by the Persons whose Names they bear and that the Christian Religion spread and prevail'd over the World in the way and manner and by the means of those Pretences we have there an account of Granting I say all these things as by the general acknowledgement of all sorts of Persons and the impossibility of their being false just before proved they must be granted From hence it necessarily follows that all the other Extraordinary Facts are true and consequently that the Christian Religion came from God and lays a necessary Obligation upon Mankind to believe it and conform themselves to it This is certain in the same way of Reasoning we used before because there never was an Instance and it cannot be conceived there ever should be one where such Marks and Indications of Truth as accompany these things should all belong to an Imposture Upon this account therefore it is that we affirm all these things to be impossible viz. That Persons of such Characters as Christ and his Disciples were represented to be should invent and contrive the Christian Doctrine and Institution or perform those things that are Recorded of them meerly by their own Skill and Power That Christ and his Disciples should pretend to have done such Extraordinary Facts as are attributed to them in the New Testament if they were not the true and immediate Instruments by whom they were done That such Multitudes of Persons as we there Read of should believe these Facts and imbrace Christianity upon the Credit of them if they were not true or should pretend to believe them if they were not really perswaded of their truth And if all the Principal Facts both Common and Extraordinary were certainly true as far as the Persons concerned in bearing Testimony to them were capable of perceiving their Truth It is likewise impossible but the whole Christian Religion and all the Conduct and Management in the Discovery and Propagation of it must come from God All these Propositions we are firmly assured of upon this ground viz. because if we suppose the contrary of any thing here alledged no Parallel Instance can be given to prove the truth of what we suppose and if we represent any of these Cases to our selves fairly in all its Circumstances we cannot possibly conceive it should ever happen 'T is true indeed there have been Persons of low Fortunes and mean Imployments in the World who have by the meer force of their Natural Genius spoke Wisely and acted Gallantly upon some Occasions but 't was never known and 't is impossible to conceive that Persons of no Learning or Education who knew nothing beyond the mean Affairs of their own Village and never Converst with any of higher Improvements than themselves it is impossible I say to imagine that such Persons
as these should be able by the meer strength of their Natural Parts to Compose such Poems as Virgil's and such Orations as Tully's and should likewise at the same time exceed all others in the Skill of Explaining hard Authors and in the Knowledge of Physick But 't is much harder to conceive that Christ and his Disciples being Persons of such Education and Character as they are represented to us to be could by their own unasisted Capacities Compose the Christian Religion Interpret Ancient Prophecies Foretel Future Events Cure all manner of Sick and Maimed and perform all those other Mighty Works that are Recorded of them We have heard of several Persons who have pretended to Revelations to Prophecies to Miracles and to all of them falsly without any ground for their pretences but there never were any who pretended to such Revelations such Prophecies and such Miracles as we find in the Scriptures of the New Testament so many and so publick so far exceeding all the conceivable Power of Art and Confederacy so liable to discovery and contradiction if they were false so hazardous to the Undertakers and so beneficial to the World in such a continued Series all of them concurrent to the same End and accompanied with such other Circumstances as these are related to be Whoever will be at the pains to consider all this wonderful Scheme of Things together will find it impossible to contrive such another though he has the Advantage of a Model before him which the Author of this had not and supposing he had succeeded in such a Contrivance he would find it impossible to prevail upon himself to pretend to act it over there being no Motives conceivable which bear any manner of Proportion to the plain and certain discouragements he must foresee supposing he knew all his Pretences to be false as in the present Case must be supposed And the same will hold with respect to the first Professors of Christianity 'T would be equally impossible for them to pretend to believe all these Things if they were not really and fully persuaded of the Truth of them Lying and Deceiving are a pleasure to some Men and the more notorious and gross the Deceit is the greater is the Satisfaction But then 't is certain likewise that there are very few of such a temper as to be pleased with Lying and Forgery without any other design or prospect but that there should be a large Succession and continual increase of such Men in divers Countries and Nations is much more difficult to conceive than that there should be an Age of Crookedness and Deformity when in a considerable part of the World the generality of People of all sorts had of a sudden by some strange unknown Influence some parts of their Bodies distorted and the Calamity was continually propagated all the time by an unusual sort of Infection But if this were allowed if all the first Christians were granted to be pure Deceivers 't would be exceedingly more difficult to imagine that the pleasure of Deceiving was so strong as to be able to support such vast Multitudes of Persons under all the other Losses and Sufferings Humane Nature is capable of 'T is possible indeed for Men to suffer all manner of Affliction and even to die Martyrs for the falsest and most absurd Religion that can be devised and frequent Instances may be given of such as have done so but then 't is certain also that they truly and firmly believed what they Suffered for There never was nor ever can be such an extravagant Army of Martyrs and Confessors as did or will renounce all the Comforts and Satisfactions of Life indure Grief and Pain chearfully and be ready upon all occasions to lay down their Lives for the Profession of such Matters of Fact as they are all infallibly convinced are false and which they are sure all their Persecutors have the same Reason to know are false that they have To affirm or imagine that any Men can act upon such disproportionate Motives as such Men must be supposed to act upon is full as absurd and ridiculous as to suppose that the Sea may be restrained with Bars and that the Hills and Mountains are lighter than the Dust of the Balance But if it be granted as we have shewn it must that all those who pretended to say and do such strange Things as are related of them in the New Testament and those who pretended to be persuaded of the Truth of what was said and done did all really and truly believe what they pretended to then is it impossible to conceive that the Things thus believed to be true should notwithstanding be false There are it is confessed no Opinions so extravagant and absurd but a great many Persons may be throughly persuaded of the Truth of them but there never was an Instance of such Stupidity or Enthusiasm yet where such Facts as those related in the New Testament were by great Multitudes believed to have happen'd within their own immediate Cognizance when no such Things did really and truly happen at all And 't is impossible to conceive there ever should be such an Instance as this in the World without a through change of Humane Nature and all the Powers and Faculties of it And we have no more reason to think it was so in the Case before us than we have to believe that there was a Time when the Earth and all the Bodies belonging to it did exist in the same State of outward appearance we now perceive them without Motion Figure or Extension And if all the Principal Matters of Fact both Common and Extraordinary were really true or did really and certainly happen so far as Humane Perceptions are to be relied on it cannot be doubted but God was the Author of the whole Christian Scheme because we have no Example of any such Scheme as this that was ever made by any other Power but the Divine We cannot by the utmost Knowledge we have of all the Powers that be conceive that any Power less than the Divine could produce such an Effect or that any other besides such as were Commission'd by him would have produced it if they could By what we know of the Nature of God the Work appears very worthy of him and very agreeable to all his Attributes and we cannot possibly imagine what more proper and effectual ways God could have taken to manifest himself to us if he was pleased to vouchsafe us that Favour These are the Reasons upon which we conclude that the Christian Religion came from God supposing all the Facts before-mentioned to be true as I think they have been proved to be which Proof being allowed we have as much Reason to believe that the Christian Religion proceeded from God as that the World was Created by him Thus does it plainly appear from the Nature of Things that the Proofs before given of the Christian Religion severally examined were all very well founded
And now if we take a just view of them and consider them all together we shall be obliged to make the following Conclusions 1. That there never was any Thing discovered or so much as suspected to be an Imposture that had so many Marks and Characters of Truth upon it as the Christian Religion has 2. That there never were any true Matters of Fact so well attested or that were capable of such a Proof as the Christian Facts are There being no Ancient Facts which have so many sensible Monuments and Effects of them left and in the Proof of which Mankind was so nearly and necessarily concern'd 3. That it is impossible to conceive or frame any Notion how or in what manner the Christian Religion might possibly have been an Imposture notwithstanding all the present appearances of its being true And if all these Conclusions are right as I am throughly and irresistibly convinced they are and I think have proved them so to be there can be no room left to disbelieve the Christian Religion without distrusting all our Knowledge and renouncing all pretences to Reasoning But supposing these Conclusions were not any of them fully proved and it could be shewn That something else which had once all the appearance of Truth that the Christian Religion now has had afterwards been detected to be false that some other Ancient Matters of Fact are as well attested and proved to be true as the Christian seem to be and that 't is possible to imagine which way the Christian Religion might come to obtain its present Credit in the World notwithstanding it was at first an Imposture none of which I am sure can be proved Yet even in this Case the Proof that has now been given of the Christian Religion is sufficient to build our Faith upon because the most that can be inferr'd from all these Arguments is only this That there is a bare possibility in the Nature of Things that the Christian Religion may be false But he that from hence should conclude that it was really so without any other Reasons to support his Opinion and in opposition to all that multiplicity of Proof that has been offered for the Truth of it must not pretend Reason but only Resolution for his Infidelity Such therefore is the Sufficiency of the Proof before given whatever be the Nature or Kind of it or however it may be thought to differ from or fall short of the Demonstration used in other Matters that we are utterly inexcusable if we do not believe the Christian Religion upon it and God may justly Condemn us for our disbelief and that upon these two accounts 1. Because we believe other Matters of Fact upon less Evidence and 2. Because we are obliged to believe such Facts as have these appearances of Truth which the Christian Religion has though they should really be false 1. That we believe Matters of Fact upon less Evidence than the Christian Religion is received upon is manifest by what has been before proved that no Matters of Fact have or are capable of so great and therefore to confirm this Point I shall only bring that one Instance of Mahometism Now 't is certain that those who look upon the Christian Religion as an Imposture do at the same time profess to believe all the principal Parts of the History of Mahomet Such as his Pretences to Revelation his Writing the Alcoran and his Propagating the Belief of the things contained in it in the way and manner therein mentioned These I say they do not in the least question notwithstanding that the Mahometan Religion pretends to a Divine Original as well as the Christian and is in like manner addrest to Mankind under the Promises and Threatnings of Future Happiness and Misery though it is withal a very absurd Composition in it self and of very pernicious Consequence to the World to be Believed and Established It is therefore very unreasonable for Men that believe these things to deny the Common History of Christianity such as the Pretences of Christ and his Disciples to Revelations Prophecies and Miracles the Writing of the Scriptures of the New Testament by those whose Names they bear or at least by some of Christ's immediate Disciples and the Propagation of the Christian Religion according to the Times Places Ways and Methods Recorded in those Books 'T is very unreasonable I say for Men who believe the History of Mahometism to question the truth of these things because they are attested by a much greater variety of Books and other Monuments and a greater multiplicity of the Copies of the Scriptures all which Testimonies we are sure by a numerous succession of others were extant nearer the date of the several Facts attested and in an Age of Learning among People of much higher Improvements than the first Mahometans were and moreover because it is certain that the Pretences of Christ were more difficult to be Feigned by himself or Forged by others afterwards that the Promises and Threatnings of the Gospel are of more Concern and Importance to be enquired into and the Establishment of Christianity whether true or false in its Original would so certainly contribute to the Happiness of Mankind that 't is one very good Argument of its being true that it is impossible to make and contrive any other Scheme every way so suitable and agreeable to the truest Interests of Humane Nature From whence I conclude that we cannot question the Truth of the History of Christianity so far as concerns the Common Matters of Fact without distrusting all the Knowledge we have of every Thing that happen'd at any distance from us And if the Common Matters of Fact are true all the other are plainly demonstrable from them as far as we have any certain Knowledge of the Natures of Things as has already been proved We are therefore obliged either to believe the Christian Religion or to renounce our belief of all other Facts whatsoever because whatever of this kind we believe besides we believe upon less Evidence 2. But Secondly Whatever degree of Evidence other Matters of Fact may be supposed to have we are absolutely obliged to believe the Christian Religion upon that Evidence that is brought for it because we are obliged to believe such Facts as have those appearances of Truth the Christian Religion has though they should be really false We are to judge of Things by the Faculties God has given us according to those grounds and measures of Truth he has suited and proportion'd to them and therefore when we have the greatest assurance of a Thing that we are capable of according to the present frame our Nature and the State of Things in the World it would be highly unreasonable in us to deny it whatever it was barely upon a Suspicion it might be false though it should afterwards really prove to be so but if what we had this apparent Proof of was a Matter of concern and importance to us upon the
Belief or Disbelief of which our utmost Happiness or Misery seemed to depend and we should prefer a meer Suspicion to all the appearing Marks and Characters of Truth God might as justly punish us for disbelieving a real Error upon such grounds as for rejecting the Truth It is not whether our Opinions are true or false but whether we have judg'd well or ill that we are accountable for neither in Matters of meer Speculation is it of much concern whether we judge well or ill because it is of no great moment whether we judge at all but it is not indifferent to us whether we will be happy or no Happiness is and must be the end of all our Thoughts and the governing Principle of our Lives upon this Account it is as we have seen in a former Discourse that we are necessarily concerned to know whether there be a God or no whether he requires any thing of us if there is and whether he has appointed any Future State of Life for us And these things our Reason has assured us are true and fit to be believed notwithstanding any Suspicions we may have to the contrary because we venture all our Happiness by disbelieving them And upon the same Score it is that the Christian Religion challenges our Assent to it because if all the fore-mentioned Principles be true we venture our Happiness as much in denying it For if this does not contain the Will of God it is impossible to know what is required of us because we can never give so strong and certain a Proof of what our Particular Duty to God is without Divine Revelation as we can that the Christian Revelation is true We are therefore in as high a manner obliged to believe Christianity as Natural Religion because the Proofs of that are very near if not quite as strong as those that are brought for the other and our Happiness is more certainly ventured here than there for this reason that if the First General Principles of Religion should be false he that denies them will suffer nothing for his denial but if those be true and the Christian Religion should be false he that rejects that runs as great a hazard as if it had been true because God will certainly Judge him according to the Evidence and not according to the Reality of things And therefore he that believes in God is obliged to believe in Christ also since 't is certain that the Christian Religion has a great many Extraordinary Marks and Characters of Truth to recommend it and is pressed upon our Belief under the Considerations of Eternal Happiness and Misery and we have nothing to oppose to all the appearing Evidence it is built upon but barely a Suspicion that notwithstanding what appears to us it may possibly be false The two first of these Assertions are manifest and the Truth of the latter will be very visible to any one that will give himself the trouble of considering all the Objections that have ever been made to the Christian Revelation which taken altogether will not so much as make out the meer possibility of the Christian Schemes being false but amount to no more than this that something else like something contained in the History of Christianity has been proved to be false therefore the Christian Religion is an Imposture For all that has ever been urged against the Truth of the Christian Religion is in short but this that Histories have been false Prophecies and Miracles have been counterfeit there have been false Pretences to Revelation Books have been forged strange Things have been said and done by Men and stranger by Evil Spirits But it can no more be inferr'd from hence that the Christian History and Revelation and all the Christian Prophecies and Miracles are false and the Scriptures of the New Testament are forged than it can be concluded that all Men are mad or asleep because there have been several in these Conditions that have thought themselves awake and in their Senses or that all the Arguments and Proofs made use of in Mathematical Knowledge are false because some pretended Demonstrations have been Undemonstrated and Confuted And yet this is the utmost defence that Infidelity can make for it self as has before been more particularly shewn Wherefore they are utterly inexcusable whoever they are who believe there is a God and that he is a Rewarder of all those that diligently seek him and yet reject so plain and evident a Revelation of himself as the Christian Religion is But there are very few I believe of this Character to be found in the Christian World 'T is more reasonable to think that those among us who will not have the Son of God to Reign over them have as little regard for the Father that sent him and that if they will not hear Moses and the Prophets nor be perswaded by one that rose from the Dead neither will they understand the Eternal Power and Godhead by the things that are made And if this be the Case of our Modern Deists and Vnbelievers if their Minds are Blinded and their foolish Hearts Darkned to such a degree that they cannot perceive God in any of the other ways he has took of Revealing himself to them we must leave them to be convinced by the last Revelation that will be made of the Righteous Judgment of God when they shall be forced to Believe and Tremble FINIS BOOKS Printed for Tho. Bennet Folio THuidides Greek and Latin Collated with five entire Mannscript Copies and all the Editions Extant Also Illustrated with Maps large Annotations and Indexes by J. Hudson M. A. and Fellow of Vniversity Coll. Oxon. To which is added an exact Chronology by the Learned Hen. Dodwell never before Published Printed at the Theater Oxon. Octavo and Twelves Sermons and Discourses upon several Occasions by Dr. Stradling Dean of Chichester Together with an Account of the Author by James Harrington Esq Sermons and Discourses upon several Occasions by Dr. Meggot Dean of Chichester The Meditations of Marcus Aurelius Antonius the Roman Emperor Translated out of Greek into English by Dr. Causabon with Notes To this Edition is added the Life of the Emperor with an Account of Stoick Philosophy as also Remarks on the Meditations All newly written by Monsieur and Madam Dacier The Inspiration of the New Testament Asserted and Explained in Answer to the Six Letters of Inspiration from Holland c. by Mr. L. Moth. THE CERTAINTY and NECESSITY OF Religion in General c. The Contents INtroduction shewing the design of the Discourse and the Method in which it is Prosecuted Page 1. An account of the Nature of Man so far as concerns Religion p. 9. Of the Nature of God p. 16. Of the Relation there is betwixt God and Man p. 18. A direct proof of the Being of God p. 19. Considered as Possible p. 20. Considered as Probable p. 26. Considered as Certain p. 40. The certainty of God's Existence proved
Grounds upon which the first Christians believed them evinced from General Reflections upon the Scripture-account of them p. 161. What is said in the New Testament concerning Divin Assistance and Revelation proved to be true p. 183. The Miracles Prophecies and Doctrines Recorded in the New Testament which are all the Matters to be inquired into under this Head did certainly proceed from God p. 185. The Person themselves who appeared to be the immediate Authors of them might be infallibly satisfied that whatever of this kind they said or did was from God p. 186. Others may be likewise convinced of the same Truth by a certain proof of the following Points viz. p. 194. That the Miracles Prophecies and Doctrines contained in the New Testament could not be the Work and Contrivance of meer Men. p. 195. That God was the Author of them all p. 222. And that 't is absurd to ascribe these things to Evil Spirits p. 242. The Truth of the Christian Revelation delivered in the Books of the New Testament proved indirectly by shewing the absurdity of a contrary Supposition and the Weakness of all the Objections raised against Scripture and Revelation in General p. 245. The Scriptures of the New Testament could not possibly be Forged and Invented p. 250. Because there is no end or design imaginable sufficient to have determined the supposed Author of this Work to have undertaken it And because further if the principal Matters of Fact both Common and Extraordinary had not been true it would have been utterly impossible that the Christian Religion should ever have been Believed and Propagated in the World p. 264. The principal Objections against Revelation and the Scriptures answered viz. p. 272. That the Miracles and Prophecies mentioned in Scripture are no Proofs of a Divine Revelation p. 276. And that there are such Faults observable in the other parts of Scripture as shew the whole to be a pure Humane Composure p. 288. The sufficiency of the proof before given of the Christian Revelation fully and undeniably made out p. 303. From Humane Testimony p. 305. From the Connexion of present Appearances with former p. 309. And from the Nature of Things in General and the particular Facts in Question p 317. The Arguments taken from the Nature of things further made good by shewing that they are as just and concluding in the case of the Christian Religion as any other Arguments drawn from the Nature of things are p. 332. The sufficiency of the Proof before given is such that God may justly condemn us for not believing the Christian Religion upon it p. 349. Because we believe other Matters of Fact upon less Evidence and Ib. Because we are obliged to believe such Facts have those appearances of Truth which the Christian Religion has though they should really be false p. 352. FINIS BOOKS Printed for Tho. Bennet THE Lives of all the Princes of Orange from William the Great Founder of the Common-wealth of the United Provinces to which is added the Life of his present Majesty King William III. from his Birth to his Landing in England By Mr. Tho. Brown Together with all the Princes Heads taken from the Original Draughts by Mr. Robert White A Voyage to the World of Des Certes Translated from the French by T. Taylor M. A. of Magd. Coll. Oxon. Thirty Six Sermons upon several Occasions in Three Vol. by Robert South D. D. The second Edition The Certainty and Necessity of Religion in general or the first Ground and Principles of Humane Duty Establish'd In Eight Sermons Preached at St. Martins in the Fields at the Lectures for the Year 1697. Founded by the Honourable Robert Boyle Esq By F. Gastrel B. D. and Student of Christ Church Coll. Oxon.
THE CERTAINTY OF THE Christian Revelation AND THE NECESSITY OF Believing it Established In Opposition to all the Cavils and Insinuations of such as pretend to allow Natural Religion and reject the Gospel By FRANCIS GASTRELL B. D. and Student of Christ-Church Oxon. Ye believe in God believe also in me John 14. v. 1. LONDON Printed for Thomas Bennet at the Half-Moon in St. Pauls-Church-Yard 1699. To the Right Honourable Sir John Holt Lord Chief Justice of England and one of His Majesties Most Honourable Privy-Council My Lord THE Design of the following Discourse being to prove the Christian Religion in the most unexceptionable manner I could I was resolved to give the Enemies of our Faith as little Advantage against me in my Dedication as in my Proof And 't is for that Reason I have presumed to offer these Papers to your Lordship as being well assured that your Lordship's Name and Character will not only Justifie this Address but Recommend the Cause I am defending For to whom could an Advocate for Christianity better direct his Defence than to a serious Believer and a great Example placed in a high Station whose Profound Knowledge of Law and Government has fully convinced him of the absolute Necessity of Religion in general and the Reasonableness and Wisdom of the Christian Institution and who in a long diligent and impartial Administration of Justice must be very well acquainted with all the Ways and Methods of proving Matters of Fact and nicely understand the Force and Proportion of every Proof I shall not take upon me in this place to set forth all the Extraordinary Qualifications your Lordship is Master of because most of them being imployed in the Service of your Country they have already procured you the just returns of Gratitude and Esteem from the Publick which has received the benefit of them But this I think my self more particularly obliged to mention for the Honour of the Christian Religion that it is to the Influence of that Holy Doctrine your Lordship owes the most advantageous Distinctions in your Character What other Account can be given of that Firmness and Steadiness of Mind which your Lordship has preserved in all the difficult and trying Circumstances that different Turns of State and different Measures of Policy have ingaged you in When new Interests and new Dangers arose and every thing chang'd about you it must be wholly owing to Christian Principles that your Lordship always kept your Ground and your Posture To the same Cause it must be ascribed that your Lordship has never stained your Publick Character with private Immoralities Notions of Honour and Reputation may preserve a Man's Dignity upon the Bench but 't is only a Just and Awful Sence of Religion that can make him Reverence himself at home And in a Corrupt Age where Impiety is grown Fashionable and has Quality and Title to Countenance it t is no small Sign of your Lordships regard for Religion that you judge it for your Honour to have it known that you make the Scriptures the Rule of your own Life and think it the highest Concern of all Humane Laws and Constitutions to support their Authority and Obligation For all these Reasons my Lord it must be very proper for any Person that appears in the Christian Cause to Address his Endeavours to your Lordship especially if it be considered that besides your great Capacity to make a right Judgment of the Proofs alledged for it you have no other Considerations to ingage you in the Interests of Christianity but those of Truth and the Happiness of Mankind It cannot be said of your Lordship that the Credit or Advantages of your Profession are concerned in the Defence of the Gospel you derive none of the Honour and Greatness you possess from the Church and therefore your Lordship's Example is a very good Argument to Unbelievers that those who are peculiarly set apart for the Service of God are not carrying on a separate Interest from the rest of the World but are promoting all they can the Universal Good of Mankind I might among other Inducements to the present Dedication reckon personal Favours But I must own that though I have all the Gratitude imaginable for the Honour of your Lordship's good Opinion and kind Intentions and though I have no greater Obligations to any Man Living than to your Lordship yet nothing of that Nature would have produced such an Address as this if I had not been determined by more publick Considerations to interest your Lordship in the Cause I have undertaken I am My Lord Your Lordship 's most Obliged and most Humble Servant FRANCIS GASTRELL THE PREFACE WHen Christianity first appeared in the World the Light and Influence of it were so strong that it bore down all the Powers of Vice and Falshood and made one of the worst Generations of Men that perhaps ever lived since the Flood a most astonishing Example of the greatest Vertue and Piety that Humane Nature has yet reached but now the Spirit of Wickedness seems to have recovered it self and to threaten Revenge to that Religion which has so often triumphed over it And Deism is employed by the great Enemy of Mankind to do what Atheism Superstition and Idolatry never could effect And indeed it has pleased God to suffer Irreligion to spread so far under this new Title that one would be apt to imagine it had like the Lying Spirit we read of in the Time of Ahab a solemn Permission from the Lord to go forth perswade and prevail For what other Account can be given of the Original and Growth of such a Delusion which has no manner of Foundation either in Reason or Fact to support it 'T is true Deism is look'd upon as a more defensible Post than Atheism and when we observe with what seeming Calmness and Serenity some deny the Christian Religion with what Contempt they treat the Holy Scriptures and with what Boldness they ridicule the History and Doctrine of the Gospel we are tempted to suppose that these Men must certainly have a great deal to say for themselves or otherwise they durst not thus despise what they could not prove to be false nor bear up against if it should be true But whoever has that regard for Truth and Happiness as to consider the Pretences of Christianity and to examine carefully the Proofs it stands upon will be throughly and effectually convinced that those who deny Revelation have as little ground for their Infidelity as those that disclaim all Religion and that the Confidence of the one as well as the other is only the Effect of a desperate not a well-defended Cause For if Matters of Fact are capable of any Proof if we can have any Evidence of Things not seen or heard by us the Christian Religion has as sure an Establishment as any other part of our Knowledge which does not confist in pure abstract Ideas or immediate Sensations This upon the strictest Enquiry I
and his Birth proclaim'd by Angels That his Coming into the World was signified by a Star which brought Wise Men from the East to worship him That mighty Things were immediately before and after his Birth said of him by Angels and Just Persons moved by the Spirit of God From the Birth of Christ 'till he was thirty years of Age very little is mentioned of him besides some Discourse he held with the Doctors in the Temple at Twelve but when he began to be about thirty he was baptized by John who is stil'd his Forerunner that prepared the way for him and at his Baptism the Heavens were opened and the Spirit of God descended upon him like a Dove and a Voice was heard from Heaven saying This is my Beloved Son in whom I am well pleas'd The principal Things that are afterwards recorded of him are his calling of Disciples and Apostles his Sermons and Instructions to the People his Miracles and Prophecies and his Sufferings Death and Burial with some other remarkable Passages that happened after his Death His Disciples and Apostles but more especially Twelve of them were favoured with a nearer and more intimate Conversation than any of the rest he directed his Instructions to These were the constant Companions of his Labours and Witnesses of his most private Behaviour These he instructed in a more plain and open manner than he did others and communicated several things to Them which he kept secret from his common Auditors and Followers To these he gave a Commission to teach and instruct the Jews and to do mighty things among them while he lived and to preach to all Nations after his Death and propagate his Doctrine with Signs and Wonders He himself is represented as preaching and teaching throughout all Judea and several of his Publick Sermons and Discourses as also many things which he said in private to his Disciples are every where throughout the several Gospels repeated sometimes in short and only the Substance of them sometimes more at large in the same Form and Manner in which they were delivered The Miracles or wonderful Things mentioned to be done by Christ exceeding all the Observation and Power of Mankind are these Fasting Forty Days and Forty Nights together turning Water into Wine Stilling Tempests walking upon the Sea telling the secret Thoughts of Men's hearts curing the Blind Lame and Maimed healing all manner of Diseases with a word or touch of his Garment casting out Devils and unclean Spirits and restoring Men possessed with 'em to their former state of health and sense feeding vast multitudes of People with a few small Loaves and Fishes by his bare Word causing a Fig-Tree immediately to wither great numbers of Fish to be taken in a Net and a single Fish to come to the Hook with Money in its mouth to pay his Tribute with transfiguring himself before some of his Disciples so that they saw the fashion of his Face alter'd and his Raiment chang'd raising the Dead and rising himself after his Burial appearing to his Disciples after he was risen and conversing with them Forty Days sometimes being known by them and sometimes not according as he pleased and at last in their Presence ascending up into Heaven The Matters we find in the Gospels foretold by Jesus Christ were his own Passion Death Resurrection Ascension and Mission of the Holy Spirit or Comforter with several particular Circumstances of them the Persecutions and Sufferings of his Disciples the Death of some of them and the manner in which they were to dye as also their future Glory and Office at the end of the World the Rejection of the Jews Vocation of the Gentiles Success and Continuance of the Gospel or Christian Religion the Appearance of False Prophets and Teachers and False Christs the springing up of Heresies and falling away of Professors the Destruction of the Jewish Temple and Constitution and Dispersion of that whole People with many strange and terrible Signs foregoing and lastly the second Appearance of himself in Glory to judge the World which is set forth in a very large and pompous Description of the whole Scene As to his Sufferings Death and Burial and what followed afterwards which are the next things that challenge our Consideration we read that he was betrayed by one of his Disciples denied by another and deserted by all the rest that he was taken and carried first before the High Priest of the Jews and afterwards before Pilate and Herod that he was scourged mocked spit upon reviled and at last upon false and frivolous Accusations condemn'd by Pilate contrary to his Conscience only to please the Jews and then crucified between Two common Malefactors one of which reproached him the other believed in him while he was upon the Cross the Sun was dark'ned the Veil of the Temple was rent in twain and the Earth quaked and the Rocks rent and the Graves were open'd and many Bodies that slept arose and came out of their Graves after his Resurrection and appear'd unto many his Body being taken down from the Cross unbroken was laid in a Sepulchre hewn out of a Rock with a Stone roll'd to the door of it and the Sepulchre was made sure by sealing the Stone and setting a Watch notwithstanding which he rose again the Third day after he was buried and appear'd to his Disciples and many others But the Soldiers that were appointed to watch the Sepulchre being affrighted by the appearance of an Angel who descended from Heaven and roll'd back the Stone from the door came into the City and shew'd the Chief Priests all the things that were done and had Money given them to say his Disciples came by Night and stole him away after this the Disciple that betray'd him repented of the Fact brought back the Money he had received for betraying him and hang'd himself This is the summ of what is contained in the Four Gospels In the next Book call'd The Acts of the Apostles we find the Eleven who are peculiarly stiled Apostles after their return from beholding the Ascension of their Master assembled together at Jerusalem with the rest of those who were more particularly distinguished by the Name of Disciples where they make choice of another Apostle to supply the room of Judas that had hang'd himself After which choice the twelve being all with one accord in one place they were filled with the Holy Ghost and spake with other Tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance which wonderful Gift of divers Languages was conferred upon them with very strange amazing Signs and Appearances viz. a sound from Heaven as of a rushing mighty Wind cloven Tongues like as of Fire c. Having received this extraordinary Assistance we find them wholly employ'd in preaching the things concerning Jesus interpreting the Scriptures of the Old Testament with relation to him baptizing in his Name converting People to the Belief of those Facts recorded in the Gospels and the Doctrines built upon them
exhorting Men to the Practice of the several Duties enjoin'd them by God and delivered to them by the Ministers of the Gospel of Christ and bidding them expect Salvation by Christ only ordaining several Persons under different Characters to assist in the Ministry healing all manner of Diseases raising the Dead and doing many other Signs and Wonders where-ever they come and conveying the same Powers and Gifts to others they had received themselves By which means we read that the Gospel was spread and the number of Believers encreased many Churches or Congregations were every where established and the Members of them kept so united by those that were set over them first in Judea and Samaria then in remoter Parts abroad where the Jews were scattered afterwards in several Cities Islands and Nations of Asia and Europe With the Progress of the Gospel or Christian Religion we have an Account likewise of several Attempts made in many Places to hinder and oppose the Establishment of it together with the Sufferings and Persecutions of the first Apostles and others chosen afterwards to be Assistants to them in carrying on the same Work many of which were beaten imprison'd and many other ways afflicted and distressed and some were put to death But a more particular relation is given of the Conversion Travels and Sufferings of Paul all which appear to be very extraordinary Several Discourses of Paul and other Apostles and Disciples of Christ are set down at large Some Prophecies also are mentioned of Holy Men who are represented as being filled with the Holy Ghost and speaking by the Spirit of God and some remarkable Judgments of God upon wicked Persons are there recorded These are the principal Matters which compose the History of the Acts of the Apostles All the following Tracts or Volumes of the New Testament are written in the form of Letters or Epistles sent from such of the Apostles and Disciples of Christ as we find mention'd in the Gospels and Acts and directed some of them to particular Persons some to large Societies of Men of several different Countries who had embraced the Christian Faith In which Epistles are contained most of the same Rules and Precepts that are laid down in the Gospels and Acts many large and particular Explications of several Doctrines there delivered and several new Doctrines which we do not meet with in those Books the Truth and Obligation of all which are frequently enforced by Arguments Most of the principal Matters of Fact recorded in the Gospels and Acts are reserr'd to in the Epistles and alledged as Proofs of the Truth of the Doctrines there taught and of the Authority of the Teachers Here are likewise several new Matters of Fact incidentally mentioned which we do not find in those former Books and some of the Facts there related are repeated here with new Circumstances All the Epistles do abound throughout with Exhortations to a steady Belief of those wonderful things said and done by Christ and his Apostles and to a constant Practice of the Duties enjoin'd by them In several of them there are some Prophecies too intermixed with these other Matters before taken notice of And the last Epistle directed to the seven Churches in Asia which is by a peculiar Title stiled The Revelation is almost wholly prophetical Some of them also conclude with Salutations to and from several particular Persons therein named These are the most remarkable things that occurr to a Man upon reading the Epistles Thus have I run through all the Variety of Particulars treated of in the New Testament But in order to form a juster and fuller Idea of the Subject of this Book 't is necessary to add some farther Considerations not formally express'd in any one particular Volume or Chapter but fairly and evidently collected from the whole Composure or from several plain Passages here and there dispersed through the several parts of it Such as are the Characters of Jesus Christ and his Doctrine of those that believed in him and that assisted him in the publishing and propagating his Gospel and of those that persecuted him and all that bore Testimony to him and opposed the Establishment of his Religion As to the Character of Jesus Christ so far as it can be collected from the several Writings of the New Testament it is in short this His Birth Life and Death were attended with extraordinary Circumstances of different kinds Those who are called in Scripture his Parents are said to be descended from the Family of David the greatest King that ever reigned over Judah and Israel but their present Condition when this Child was born is set forth as very low and the Employment that maintained them then and afterwards very mean but they were Persons that feared God and lived very conformably to the Law of Moses The first Appearance of Christ in the World was prepared accompanied and followed by Prophecies Visions Signs and Wonders Ministry of Angels Adoration of Wise Men Jealousies and Fears of a Great King together with the Doubts Ignorance Amazement Necessities and Flight of his Father and Mother His Education was fuitable to the meanness of his Birth Thirty years were spent at home in Obscurity and Retirement where he was subject and obedient to his Parents but at the same time he waxed strong in Spirit and encreased in Wisdom and the Grace of God was upon him to the Astonishment of all his Kindred and Countreymen who could not imagine whence he had that Wisdom His whole Life afterwards was taken up in preaching and instructing and confirming his Doctrine and Authority by Signs and mighty Works and by Arguments drawn chiefly from the Prophecies and other Passages of the Old Testament He went about every where teaching and doing Good He taught in the Temple and other publick Places of Jerusalem he passed through all the Cities and Villages of Judah and Samaria and the Neighbouring Coasts preaching and expounding the Scriptures to the People in their Synagogues In the Fields the Desarts and upon the Sea-shore we find him attended with great multitudes who heard him gladly Thus was he constantly employed from the first discovery of himself and his Gospel to the World 'till by Treachery and Malice he was apprehended and put to Death In all which time that he publickly convers'd with Men we have a great many surprizing things related of him which do very much distinguish his Character from that of any other Person He is represented as sensible of Human Passions Appetites and Infirmities and yet free from all Sin and endued with a Power of not feeling and relieving those very wants he suffered He loved grieved and was angry but these Affections were occasion'd in him by a just Concern for the Glory of God and the Success of that great Work he came about the Salvation of Mankind and they never exceeded their due bounds He felt Hunger and Weariness yet fasted Forty days and Forty nights together fed vast multitudes and
over all Christians both Clergy and Laity in such a District governing and directing them all in Religious Affairs and exercising certain Spiritual Powers of an extraordinary future Influence in order to the preserving and inforcing the Belief and Practice of the Christian Religion Such Customs and Actions as these in all which every Bishop must himself have bore a Share must needs be infallibly known to those Bishops assembled at Nice who were of Age enough to remember for so long together as Fifty Years which may easily be supposed of several of them And it may with as much reason be allowed That these very Bishops might have Fifty Years before their Meeting at Nice convers'd with those who could have as distinctly remembred what was done for Fifty Years further backward as they could remember what had happen'd since the Time we supposed they convers'd with them from whom they might have been certainly inform'd That all the foremention'd Matters of Fact had continued the same for Fifty Years before they could have an immediate Knowledge of them themselves And moreover those who gave them this Information could have assured them That they never saw or heard of any Body that lived since their Time who knew it otherwise and this with the same Allowance as in the former Case will carry the Thing Fifty Years higher still And so far I think however uncertain Tradition is justly accounted in the Conveyance of Doctrines and Opinions the Tradition of such notorious Matters of Fact as these so easily observed so constantly present so general and so concerning may be fully relied upon To make this plainer by a like Instance in our Country just about 150 Years ago Edward the Sixth is reported to have been King of England and the same History which tells us so which I will suppose to be but just now written acquaints us That in his Time the Christian Religion was generally professed through all this Nation and much after the same manner it is now But particularly that the same Scriptures were acknowledg'd and the same Religious Customs and Vsages obtained which are before mention'd in the other Case viz. Baptism and Communion Observation of the Lord's Day Ministration of Priests Government of Bishops c. just as they are at this present The Truth of all which we might be very well assured of if there were no History or other Monuments of what was done in the Reign of King Edward the Sixth extant down from his Time to this because by the former Supposition there have been a great many Persons who during the Course of their Lives computed at no uncommon length might have convers'd with those who liv'd in King Edward the Sixth's Time and also with those who are now Living and at such Ages of their several Lives in which they may well be suppos'd capable of remembring and judging of what they saw and heard From which intermediate Persons so many as are now Living and convers'd with them which I believe are a great many may have had sueh certain Information of the state of Religion in this Nation during the Reign of that King that they cannot possibly call in question And if all these agree in their several Reports without concerting with one another the Evidence of the same Matters of Fact they thus agree in will be as strong with respect to us who enquire these Things of them and much stronger than to any of them themselves in particular who have not made the same Observations concerning the Agreement of others before them 'T would be no unreasonable Supposition to imagine That there are some now Living who have immediately convers'd with those who lived in Edward the Sixth's Time but these are so few and of so unusual an Age that I shall not insist upon a Proof that might be made that way But the other Case I have mention'd is easy and common and lies open to every Body without a particular Computation of Time Upon which I shall further observe That those whose Testimony is allow'd sufficient for the Form and Kind of Religion professed in England under Edward the Sixth are so far as that Period reaches as good and capable Witnesses of the Condition of its Being with respect either to its Original then or any considerable Alterations or Intermissions in it at any time since Whether the Christian Religion was first introduced into this Country by Edward the Sixth or any Body else in his Time all the Inhabitants of it having immediately before been Jews Heathens or Mahometans or whether it had been receiv'd and professed here before he came to the Throne must have been equally known and in like manner conveyed down by those from whom we derive the other Matters of Fact with which this is supposed cotemporary And if any considerable Changes in the main Branches or general and publick Vsages of it such as are before instanced in or any Intermissions either of the whole Profession or of some of those publick Customs and Manners of Worship or Discipline should have happen'd at any Time since these being more remarkable Facts than the uninterrupted Continuance of the same state and form of Religion and falling later than the first Date of what we allow to be distinctly known and remembred must be granted to be as easily and surely delivered down to us as those Things which are acknowledg'd to fall earlier and yet came safe to our Hands Now to apply all this to the former Case These Bishops in the Council of Nice who came from such or such a particular Province of the Roman Empire might be as fully assured That the Christian Religion was professed 150 Years before in that Province in the same Manner founded upon the same Scriptures and attended with the same Customs as it was at the Time of their assembling at Nice as we of this Country can be assur'd That our Religion Scriptures and Religious Customs are the same now that they were in the Reign of Edward the Sixth King of England What particular Christian Customs I mean in both Instances has been sufficiently expressed already but what those Scriptures were which I suppose the Nicene Bishops unanimously acknowledg'd for the Word of God and Rule of their Faith and believed to have been written by the First Apostles and Disciples of Christ and consequently to have been the same 150 Years before they met in Council as they were then has not yet been declared and by what was done in the Council does not certainly appear But I think there is no manner of Reason to doubt but they were the very same which now go under the Name of the New Testament For whether the Council of Laodicea which was the first that made any Canon concerning the Books of Scripture was before this Council of Nice as some imagine or about Forty Years after as others more probably conclude we have Arguments and Authorities enough to convince us That all the Books
of the New Testament were acknowledg'd by the greatest part of the Nicene Fathers and most of them by all 'T is plain from all the publick Decisions and Orders of the Council That they are grounded upon some or other of the Books of Scripture now in our Hands if they may be supposed to have been written before that Time And that they were Eusebius one of the Bishops of this Council is a sufficient Witness who in a History he has left us gives us an Account of the Time when they were all writ and the Authors they were writ by which is another very good Argument That most of the Nicene Bishops had the same Bible For Eusebius being not only present amongst and conversing with several of them but having a great Share in the Management of the Controversy they came to decide and being of a doubtful Faith in the main Point determined by them or as some suspect a Favourer of the Side condemned must have had occasion either in publick Debate or private Conversation to have cited most of the Books he acknowledg'd for Scripture and had any doubt arisen concerning the Authority of them such a considerable and important Controversy as would have sprung from thence would have produced a Determination of the Council upon it or to be sure have been as much taken Notice of and as faithfully Recorded as any Thing else that was done there Besides 't is plain from the History we have of this Council by Cotemporaries and others of the Age immediately following That some Scriptures were appeal'd to their Authority acknowledg'd Forms of Expression drawn from thence a Difficulty made of departing from Scripture-Terms till other equivalent Expressions were found necessary to distinguish those who believ'd Scripture in a right Sence from those who interpreted it wrong And therefore if Eusebius or Athanasius who were present at the Council or any other Writer cotemporary or near in Time to it says any Thing of this Nature he must be judg'd to mean That the same Scriptures were acknowledg'd by the Nicene Council which he himself owns So that if Eusebius or Athanasius own'd all the Books of the New Testament which we do 't is manifest That when he talks of the Scriptures in the Account he gives of the Nicene Council he must mean the same that he does when he mentions them upon any other Occasion And the like will hold of other Writers But further to put this Matter past all doubt 't is certain That the Canon of Scripture was some time or other afterwards fixed as we find it now with all the same Books in the New Testament that we have at present The Occasion of making such a Canon was because it was doubted of some of the Books Whether they were the genuine Works of those whose Names they bore and if they were not Whether they were of equal Authority with the rest Now the way that was taken to remove all Objections and fix the Authority of those Scriptures which were to be the unalterable Standard of the Christian Religion was by examining the general Tradition of all the different Churches where Christianity was professed upon which Examination when it was certainly known That such and such Books which were doubted of by some because they had been but lately received among the Christians of those Provinces and Churches to which they belong'd had been constantly acknowledg'd under the same Style and Character with the rest by the Generality of the other Churches of Christians these were likewise as universally receiv'd as the other and their Authority in the same manner allow'd The Consent of so many different Churches in the same Opinion concerning certain Books and agreeably to their Opinion in the same careful Preservation of them unalter'd most of which Churches had continued separate and independent one of another ever since the Date they ascribed to those Writings and several of them at such a Distance as to have had no communication with one another since that Time such a Consent I say as this whensoever the Canon of Scripture was first determined in a general Meeting was thought sufficient to establish the Authority of any Book that was doubted of and accordingly the whole Canon we now have was afterwards universally acknowledg'd Since therefore we find That all the Scriptures of the New Testament were universally received some time after the Nicene Council and since the Establishment of the Canon and universal Submission to it were founded upon a general Tradition so faithfully preserved in the far greatest part of Christian Churches that all other Christians were fully satisfied of it From hence it follows That the greatest part of the Nicene Bishops must own the same Scriptures we do now because the greatest part of the Churches from whence they came did But not to insist upon this we will consider only those Scriptures which were never doubted of by any Christians and consequently must have been received by the whole Council of Nice These were according to Eusebius who in his History gives us a Catalogue of them the Four Gospels Acts of the Apostles the Thirteen Epistles of St. Paul which have his Name to them the First Epistle of Peter and the First Epistle of John And Eusebius could not say this had he known of any of his Fellow-Bishops of the Council who denied either the Authority or general Reception of any of these Books Supposing therefore That these were the only Scriptures acknowledg'd by all the Nicene Bishops then what was said before concerning several Religious Customs and Practices there mention'd will hold in like manner of those Books of Scripture and such or such a particular Bishop that was present at this Council might himself by a short easy and unquestionable way of conveyance be assured That for 150 Years last past the same Scriptures had been acknowledg'd as well as the same Religious Customs practised in that Church and Province from whence he came and consequently That the main Scheme of Christian Doctrine and the publick Profession of it had been all that Time the same Now if we apply the foregoing Observations to all the several Bishops of this Council and suppose them all satisfied of the constant Tradition of the same Scriptures Customs as are before specified in the several Churches and Provinces from whence they came as the History of these Times relates the Matter of Fact to have been then is the unanimous consent of all these Bishops an infallible Argument of the truth of what they testifie And if there had not been such a constant Tradition in any of these Churches or Provinces as we suppose then the Original Introduction or Intermission of any of those Scriptures or Customs within the same compass of Time would have been in the same Way and Manner and with the same Certainty known to the Bishops of those Churches and Provinces where such Introduction or Intermission happen'd and what was first introduced
that being but 150 Years before the Council of Nice the same it was then And if the Christian Religion was as far spread in the time of Trajan as it was Sixty Years afterwards the same will hold as to all the Roman Empire and if it was not it must be derived to those Provinces that wanted it from those where it was profess'd which amounts to the same thing for if the Christian Religion in the time of Trajan was not the same it was Sixty Years afterwards no account can be given of so general and wide an Agreement then in so many different Provinces as has already been prov'd the same Christian Religion was profess'd in at that time in all which the Religion then profess'd must be supposed different from the Original it was derived from Sixty Years before even in those very Provinces where it had been so long ago established as well as in those where it was later entertain'd which is absurd to imagine And further since by the account we have of these Times it plainly appears that the Christian Religion was very far spread under the Reign of Trajan and consequently published long before and since as far as it was then spread it was the same it was Sixty Years afterwards when as we have already proved the greatest part of the Roman Empire agreed in the same general Form or Scheme of Religion which was profess'd at the Council of Nice and in the same Religious Institutions and Practices as were then in use it follows from hence and from what has been before advanced that the Christians we find in Nero's Time were of the same Religion and Faith with those that lived at the time of the Council of Nice and consequently that all the common Historical Matters of Fact mention'd in the New Testament respecting the Original of the Christian Religion the Place where it first appeared the Time and Manner of Publishing and Propagating it the Characters of those concern'd in the Work and the Fortune that attended both them and their Doctrine must necessarily be true as I shall endeavour to shew more particularly by summing up the whole Argument in this manner It has been proved before That the generality of Christians at the time of the Council of Nice acknowledg'd all the same Scriptures that we do now and that most of the Books of the New Testament were universally received then and believed by all Christians of that Time to have been so from their first appearance in the World The Books which were thus universally received were as universally thought to have been written by those Authors to whom they are ascribed and to have been all written by their several Authors at several times between the end of Caligula 's Reign and the beginning of Trajan's And indeed if they believ'd the Scripture-History as 't is plain the Christians who received these Books did they must have believed likewise that all the Books of the New Testament being written by such Authors whose Names they bear were writ within the compass of Time assigned for them for from the Time and Manner of the Publication of the Christian Religion it appears that they could not have been any of them written sooner and from the Age of the Authors it is plain that they could not have been Works of a later Date This being the general Faith of all Christians at the Time of the Council of Nice must likewise according to what has been already proved the universal Belief of Christians 150 Years before this Council sat and if the same Scriptures were in the same Manner received and acknowledg'd in the greatest part of the Roman Empire 150 Years before this Council of Nice they must have been generally known and received in the Time of Trajan as far as the Christian Name then reach'd they could not otherwise have been propagated so far and wide in less than Threescore Years time And if the Christians in Trajan's Time knew and believ'd these Scriptures then was the Christian Religion under Trajan the same it was under Nero For in every Book of the New Testament the Author plainly supposes the Christian Religion established and all the principal Matters of Fact and Doctrines there recorded believed before he wrote and therefore if all or any of these Books were received at Rome in the Time of Trajan as the Epistle to the Romans must have been when Sixty Years afterwards it was believed by the greatest part of the Roman Empire to have been sent to them then does it follow that all the Christians that received them must have certainly known that they believed the same Facts and Doctrines which they found in those Books ever since they profess'd the Christian Religion and that all others who were of the same Name must have profess'd to believe the same things too the Nature of that Religion so requiring and consequently that the Christian Religion at Rome was the same in the Time of Nero it was then the Neronian Persecution being not above Thirty five Years before the Reign of Trajan which is so short a Period that several Christians of Trajan's Time might have been Christians under Nero too and must have known whether Christianity then Preach'd to them was the same with what they found written supposing they were converted before they had seen any of the Books of the New Testament and if they were not they might as easily have inform'd themselves whether that part of the Christian History they found in these Books respecting Rome and particularly Nero's Time were true or not And their Conversion to Christianity by the means of these Books necessarily proves them satisfied of the truth of the Relations there given Now if most of the Books of the New Testament were received in Trajan's Time and if Christianity was the same under Nero as under Trajan and the same Preach'd as Written then does it necessarily follow not only that these Books were written by those Authors whose Names they bear some time between the Death of Tiberius and beginning of Trajan's Reign but that all the common Historical Facts mention'd in the New Testament and which I have undertaken to prove under this Head are certainly true otherwise they could not have been so generally and firmly believed so near the Time they are there reported to have happen'd in For the Christians that lived in Trajan's Time and received these Books as written by such Authors must consequently believe that the first Promulgation of the Gospel or Christian Religion by Jesus Christ happen'd but Seventy Years before and that during that space it was Preach'd throughout the Roman Empire by such Persons and in such a Manner as is there related that it was embraced by great numbers of People in all the considerable Provinces and Cities of it established by the Vnion of large Societies and Congregations under the same common Form of Discipline and Witness'd and Confirm'd by the various Sufferings of the first
their Faith and Christian Resolution this way But the general Character of these Writers as well as the Authority of what they say will be further made out from the consideration of the Subjects they writ about the several kinds and sorts of their Writings and the Manner in which they are writ All which I shall endeavour to bring under one view and raise such Observations from them as will plainly confirm the main Conclusion I am to establish The common Subject of all the Books and Writings of the first Orthodox Authors was the Christian Religion though in several Ways and Methods discoursed of Most of these concern the History of Christian Affairs either expresly or occasionally For besides those Authors who purposely designed an Historical Relation either of the Church in general or of some particular Ecclesiastical Matter there 's hardly a Christian Writer within the Time of our present Enquiry but has some occasion or other to mention several Historical Passages in almost every Book that he wrote in order to some further end he proposed to himself in writing Now concerning the Writings of Christian Authors considered under this Character of Historians I have these Things to observe First That they do manifestly confirm the truth of all those Traditions and standing Monuments before mentioned For we have frequent Proofs of the Antiquity of the Scriptures and all those Religious Customs and Institutions in use amongst Christians in Eusebius's time and the General Tradition strengthen'd by abundance of New Circumstances such were the great Controversies and Quarrels about some Christian Usages particularly Baptism and the Feast of Easter together with the Canons and Decrees that were made and the Letters that were writ with relation to these Affairs Here is likewise mention made of the same Christian Relicks and Momonuments and the same publick Acts and Records which Eusebius saw and the Accounts and Extracts of them in several Authors agree with what Eusebius himself was witness of In the next place 't is very plain that they give us an account of several other Customs Monuments and publick Acts and abuudance of other particular Historical Passages besides those mention'd in Eusebius the Truth of which or the Antiquity of their Fiction being proved they are so many new Arguments in behalf of the Christian Tradition or the truth of those Facts we are now to prove Thirdly I observe that most of these Authors considered as Historians were very Competent Judges and Credible Reporters of the truth of the Facts they relate For either they were actual and immediate Witnesses of what they tell us themselves or they took a great deal of care to inform themselves right or the Facts were of that nature that they could not be deceived though they did not examine them very strictly and which way soever they came by them they were Faithsul and Sincere in their Relation Several things they tell us of their own Knowledge others they quote their Authors for and others they deliver only as Traditional Reports which they distinguish also into Probable and Fabulous according to the Evidence that then appeared to them upon a diligent Examination And several of them have given great Marks of their Diligence and Care in enquiring as well as Sincerity in reporting as particularly Hegesippus who gave an account of the Unity of Faith in several Cities after having travell'd through them and convers'd with the Bishops of them Clemens who used all the care he could to inform himself of the Truth and Sincerity of the Christian Tradition from several Eminent Persons of different Countries Irenoeus who carefully remember'd the Conversation he had with Eminent Christians in his Youth and was very much concern'd to have his own Writings deliver'd down faithfully to Posterity a proof of which first Remark concerning Irenaeus we have in an Epistle of his to Florinus quoted by Eusebus part of which I think worth the Transcribing when reproving Florinus for some ill Opinions he held he speaks to him in this manner Eus Ec. H. l. 5. c. 26. These Opinions the Presbyters who lived before our times who also were the Disciples of the Apostles did in no wise deliver unto thee For I saw thee when being yet a Child I was in the Lower Asia with Polycarp behaving thy self very well in the Palace and endeavouring to get thy self well esteemed of by him for I remember the things then done better then what has happen'd of late for what we learnt being Children increases together with the Mind it self and is closely united to it insomuch that I am able to tell where the Blessed Polycarp sate and Discoursed also his goings out and comings in his manner of Life the shape of his Body the Discourses he made to the Populace the familiar Converse which he said he had with John and with those who had seen the Lord and how he rehears'd their Sayings and what they were which he had heard from them concerning the Lord concerning his Miracles and his Doctrine according as Polycarp received them from those who with their own Eyes beheld the Word of Life so he related them agreeing in all things with the Scriptures These things by the Mercy of God bestowed upon me I then heard diligently and copied them out not in Paper but in my Heart and by the Grace of God I do continually and sincerely ruminate upon them And the same Irenaeus at the end of one of his Pieces says thus I adjure thee who shalt Transcribe this Book by our Lord Jesus and by his Glorious coming to Judge the Quick and the Dead that you compare what you shall Transcribe and correct it diligently according to that Copy whence you shall Transcribe and that in like manner you ascribe this Adjuration and annex it to your Copy Which concern of Irenaeus for the faithful conveyance of Truths contained in his own Writings to Posterity is a very good argument of his care in examining the Traditions and Writings that came down to him from elder times respecting the same Important Truths A great many other such like Instances as these may be given where the Primitive Christian Writers positively and expresly declare that they had seen and convers'd with the immediate Successors of the Apostles and with those upon whom several great Miracles had been wrought by them had themselves been Witnesses of a great many wonderful Gifts remaining in the Church in their time as likewise where they demonstrate by many sensible Marks and Signs the great Care and Diligence they had taken in examining the Informations they received from remoter Hands and all other concurring Presumptions arising from Circumstances of Fact and Rational Inferences And as they were competent Witnesses and careful Relators in General so are they more especially to be relied upon as to those two great and concerning Matters of Fact the Scriptures of the New Testament and Persecutions of Christians The Truth and Authority of the Scriptures
was with much enquiry and examination Established This every one made it his business to be well assur'd of and a free disquisition concerning the truth of some or other of the Books of Scripture is every where to be found among the Antient Writers Then as to the Persecutions they were so many they continued so long together were so widely spread were attended with so vast a number of very new and remarkalbe Facts and so many of the Writers lived in the heat of them and had so large a share and concern in them themselves that 't is impossible that the accounts they give of them should not be most of them at least very true The Fourth Observation I have to make upon the Historical part of the first Christian Writers is that there are so many Notes of time to be found in them such a particular Designation of Places and Persons and such a mixture of Jewish and Heathen Affairs with the Christian History as rendred any Errours or Mistakes so liable to a discovery at those times when the several Books that treat of these Matters were first Published to the World that by not being confuted they are as to the main substance of what they declare irrefragably confirm'd The other Writings of OrthodoxChristians of the first Ages which do not concern the History of Christianity are either Vindications and Defences of the Christian Religion against all the Objections and Calumnies raised by any of the Enemies of it or Explications of the Christian Doctrine Government and Discipline or Exhortations and Directions to Practise or Animadversions and Reproofs for Errours and Offences All which are written under the form of Orations or Apologies Letters Disputations Comments c. Now it 's plain from all these Writings that the several Authors of them were throughly convinced of the Truth of the Christian Religion This appears from the Zeal and Warmth with which many of them writ upon several occasions to one another and to Hereticks the readiness they testifie to quit all they have and to lay down their Lives rather than do any thing contrary to their Profession the concern they express for the continuance of their Fellow-Christians in the same Faith and the Conversion of others to Christianity the Boldness and Courage they shew to Persons of Power and Authority when the truth of their Religion or their own Innocence is call'd in question and from many other unquestionable marks of Honesty Sincerity and a through Perswasion visible almost in every Page 'T is manifest likewise that all these Authors believed the Scriptures of the New Testament and Founded their Religion upon them Several of them have writ Comments upon them all quote them and confirm the Doctrines they deliver and the Rules and Directions they give from them and all their Writings plainly declare they were very well vers'd in them and influenced by the same Spirit that governs there and distinguishes those Writings from any other and when ever any Controversy happen'd in matters of Christian Faith or Practiced the Appeal is constantly made to these Scriptures Several other Remarks and Observations might be drawn from the Writings of those Christians call'd Orthodox but these are sufficient for what I design to prove by them and so I pass on to consider what we have written by Heretieks Jews and Heathens with relation to Christianity A great many things were written by Persons of these several Denominations in the Three first Ages of the Christian Aera but very little of them that expressly concerns Christianity remains now and a great many of these Writings were lost in Eusebius's Time so that almost all we know of them is contained in the Orthodox Writers In many of which there are several considerable Fragments yet to be found and accounts of what is lost From all which we may collect that none of the Enemies of the Christian Religion neither Hereticks Jews nor Heathens did at any time offer to disprove or contradict those Christian Facts I have been now Establishing but did in several respects strengthen and confirm the truth of them We find by the Orthodox Writers that there were in the most Primitive Times and continually in all the after-Periods of Christianity a great many Hereticks of very different Characters and Opinions who troubled the Peace of the Church and endeavoured to corrupt the Christian Doctrine and Tradition Their Writings are full of the strange Opinions of Hereticks they are oftentimes very large in giving a History of the Men their vicious Lives and wicked Designs and in confuting their Absurd and for the most part Blasphemous Doctrines From hence we find that several of these Hereticks in order to justifie their Errors made use of all the Arts and Shifts they could and some denied one Book of Scripture and some another some took upon them to reform the Scriptures and added what they thought serv'd their turn or took away what they did not like Others made new Scriptures and put them out in the Names of the Apostles but none of them denied the principal matters of Fact contained in the New Testament neither Miraculous nor Common though their Character oftentimes allow'd and their Cause requir'd such a denial if the Evidence of those Facts had not appear'd to them so strong as to render all contradiction Vain and Ineffectual The Jews who writ against the Christian Religion allow'd most of the principal matters of Fact Recorded of Christ in the New Testament even his Miracles as well as the Common History of his Life and when they deny the Reality they grant the Pretence are wholly concern'd to shew that Christ was not the Messias promised them notwithstanding his extraordinary Character because as they thought several of the Prophecies in the Old Testament which were agreed on all hands to relate to the Messias could not be apply'd to Christ In this consisted wholly the Controversie betwixt them and the Christians and therefore are the Jews of these times censur'd by the Christian Writers as corrupting the Old Testament in such Passages of it as seem'd to them to make most for the Christian Religion Particularly Justin in his Dialogue with a Jew endeavors to evince That several Testimonies of the Prophets which he quoted was cut out of the Bible by the Jews which charge whether true or false proves thus much that the Jews had no other way of resisting the Evidence of the Christian Religion but by denying or in some manner evading the Arguments drawn from the Prophecies of the Old Testament Here they placed the chief strength of their Cause and not in the Confutation of the Christian History the greatest part of which is plainly granted in the Arguments they make use of to overthrow the Faith built upon it and the Inferences drawn from it Particularly Josephus does comfirm the truth of several of the Facts related in the New Testament and such as necessarily determine the Oririginal of Christianity The like
but upon the Testimony of those also that heard them and some of them were spoken before much Company particularly what John said of Christ was very publick and frequently repeated and consequently there were great numbers of Witnesses of it The particular Prophecies of the first Apostles and Disciples and other Christians preserved in the New Testament are but few and most of the Events foretold were so near the time of their Prediction that we cannot certainly tell whether they were written before they were fulfilled but some of them there were many Witnesses of and consequently the truth of them does not depend wholly upon the credit of their Relation But what is frequently mentioned in the Scriptures of the New Testament concerning the Gift of Prophecy in the Church by which Expression is often signified an extraordinary Power of foretelling future Events as well as interpreting Scripture is a plain Appeal to the Testimony of all Christans in general For according to the account there given so many were indued with it that 't was an easy matter in any place where the Gospel was spread to be satisfied of the truth of the matter whether there were any Christian Prophets or not Thus have I taken a short view of the Miracles and Prophecies Recorded in the New Testament and shewn how they were all attested and upon what grounds they were at first believed In the next place I shall make some general Reflections upon the account here given in order to evince the truth of these extraordinary Facts and the reasonableness of those Grounds upon which the first Christians believed them It has been observed before that when any Matters of Fact are attested by such Witnesses as cannot be imagined capable of being deceived themselves or willing to deceive others and the Facts related by them are such as could not possibly be represented falsly without a certain discovery no greater evidence can be required for the proof of them And that the Miracles and Prophecies mentioned in the New Testament are such kind of Facts and so attested will plainly appear from the following Considerations First of all 't is certain from the account before given that Christ pretended to do a great many Miracles and that vast Multitudes of People pretended to have seen a great many Miracles done by him and to believe that what they saw was truly and really performed by his means and some pretended further to have experienced the effects of this strange power in themselves From whence it evidently follows that all these Miracles so attested were true because it was very easie for Christ to know whether he had such a Power as this or not by an immediate Consciousness and therefore he could not be deceived in pretending to what he had not and the Sincerity Innocence and Integrity of his Life the Disinterestedness of all his Actions the Humility and Uprightness of his Carriage and the many Troubles Sufferings and Afflictions he was actually exposed to upon account of these Pretences and which by his great Wisdom and Knowledge of Men he easily soresaw would happen to him all these I say do sufficiently assure us that he would not offer to deceive others by pretending to such Works which he knew he had not done or could not do Then as to the Persons pretending to have seen and for that reason to believe his Miracles they could not be deceived because the matters of Fact they are Witnesses of are such as were the proper Objects of Sense and were as easily distinctly and fully perceivable as any other the most common obvious Events dayly taken notice of so that every one who had Ears to hear and Eyes to see was a capable Judge of what Christ said and did and there wanted no great skill or capacity of understanding to compare his Pretences with his Performances But those who felt the effects of this wonderful Power in themselves had a more intimate and more infallible preception of the truth of his Miracles which gave them greater assurance of their not being deceived And when we consider the number of those who had all at the same time the same Preceptions 't is a further confirmation of the truth and reality of the Appearances especially when we observed that a great many of these were possessed with violent Prejudices against the Person and Doctrine of Christ and were unwilling to believe any thing that seemed any way to justifie his Pretences And as all these Witnesses of the Miracles of Christ cannot possibly be imagined to have been mistaken themselves in thinking they perceived what they did not really perceive so neither was it possible for them to deceive others by telling them such things were done in their presence which they knew were not done For besides that 't is utterly inconceivable how so great a Multitude of Persons of different Places Degrees and Opinions as the first Witnesses of these Miracles were should agree together to assert that they saw such Facts as were never done and this constantly without any ones ever discovering the Cheat besides this I say the Characters of the Witnesses will not suffer us to think they could entertain a design of imposing upon the World and the Manner and Circumstances of their first Declaration of their Belief of the Miracles makes a Confederacy to deceive utterly impossible As to the Characters of the Witnesses they were either such Persons as after they had seen believed and imbraced the Gospel of Christ or such as continued in the Religion they were before educated in notwithstanding all the Miracles they saw Most of the former sort were Persons of remarkable Probity and Integrity and of great Simplicity of Life and Manners who renounced all the Interests and Advantages of this present World and exposed themselves to great variety of Troubles and Afflictions for their constant profession of their Faith in Christ and his Miracles and it cannot be supposed of Persons of this Character that they would invent and industriously propagate what they knew to be false if the agreement of so many in the same design had been possible But if so many People could be supposed capable of forming such a design and of putting on such a false Character for the better promoting of it it is not imaginable that they should be able to continue their Plot and preserve their Character so long as they did without betraying themselves when they lost and suffered so much for carrying on the Cheat had no prospect of future success answerable to their present Sufferings and might have been very well rewarded by the Enemies of Christianity for a seasonable Discovery But all the Witnesses of Christ's Miracles who afterwards entertained his Gospel were not of the same Character with the former some of them confessed him with their Mouth but in their Works denied him they acknowledged his Authority and admired his Doctrine but being led away by their Lusts or distracted by the Cares
of the World they continued still in their Sins and never lived up to those holy Rules he prescribed These who never felt the power of the Christian Religion could never be so concerned for the Interests of it as constantly to vouch and maintain an unprofitable Lye in its defence when 't is very probable they might have had easier Consciences and better Fortunes for disproving the Pretences it was built upon Others of them made Shipwrack of their Faith and turn'd again unto those beggarly Elements or Idols they were freed from neither can these be suspected of justifying what they knew to be false in behalf of a Religion they had forsaken 'T is more reasonable to suppose had they been privy to any deceit that they would have been very zealous in the discovery of it Then as to those who rejected the Authority and Doctrine of Christ and continued in the Religion they were at first Educated in notwithstanding all the Miracles they saw who as we find by the History of the Gospel were frequently reproached by Christ and his Apostles for their Infidelity and obstinate adherence to the Religion and Traditions of their Fathers the greatest part of whom and those Persons of the greatest Dignity Authority and Learning among them made it their business to Persecute Christ and his Apostles and all that professed the Christian Religion 'T is plainly as impossible to imagine that Persons of this Character should agree to own the truth of Christ's Miracles which they knew to be false as that honest sincere Christians who abhorred a Lye and were throughly perswaded Eternal Misery was the certain Punishment of Lying should conspire to deceive the World by contriving spreading and continually supporting what they were sure was the grossest Cheat imaginable But without considering the Characters of the Witnesses the Manner and Circumstances in which they first gave Testimony to the truth of Christ's Miracles makes a confederacy to deceive utterly impossible For in many Instances of Publick Miracles in the New Testament we find that upon the sight of something done by Jesus Christ the whole Multitude of Spectators immediately declared their Belief and Admiration by openly glorifying God or expressing their Wonder to one another So that it plainly appeats from hence that they were all severally convinced of the truth and wonderfulness of what they saw before they could know one anothers Minds concerning it and therefore the agreement of their Testimony could not be the effect of any antecedent concert among themselves Thus have I evidently proved the truth of the Publick Miracles of Jesus Christ and whatever has been said upon this Subject will hold with the same or rather greater degrees of certainty concerning the Publick Miracles of the first Apostles and Disciples of Christ who received that Power immediately from their Master and of all other Christian Believers to whom the same Gifts were conveyed by their Hands For the Signs and Wonders Recorded to have been done by any of them were as easily known and distinguished by vulgar Senses and Capacities as those of Christ the Characters and Circumstances of the Witnesses so far as concerns the credibility of their Testimony was very near the same But the number of those who by an intimate consciousness of their own Power knew they performed such Works of those who felt the Effects of this Miraculous Power in themselves and of those who saw the External Signs and Appearances of it in the Facts that were done was very far greater than in the former Case and the impossibility of a general agreement to deceive more manifest here than there and consequently the truth of all these Facts is as evident as that of the other before proved As to the more Private Miracles done by Jesus Christ himself in the presence of his Disciples only and the Signs and Wonders imployed by some other Power for the manifestation of Christ to a few chosen Persons we have these reasons to believe them true The Facts were of the same nature and as easy to be known and discerned as the other before mentioned the several Witnesses of these things which happen'd at several times taken altogether were a great many which makes an agreement of them all to deceive and a constant invincible Perseverance in a Cheat very difficult to imagine the Characters of them as far as appears from the History of the New Testament were such as leave no room to suspect the Fidelity of their Relation for they are all of them the Apostles and first Disciples especially who are principally concern'd in the present Cause represented as honest sincere undesigning Persons that feared God and loved Mankind that were free from Pride and Vanity and were so far from seeking their own Interest or Advancement in this World that they were despised and set at nought and evilly intreated whereever they came and were as to this Life of all Men most miserable for constantly asserting the truth of the Resurrection and Ascention of Christ and such other Facts now in question all which they were as firmly perswaded of as of any of the Publick Miracles of Jesus Crrist and several of them they Preach'd up as more necessary and impottant to be believed Besides all this many of these Miraculous Facts which were fully discovered only to a few were accompanied with several Circumstances more publickly known with which they have so near and almost necessary a connexion that 't is very difficult to imagine these Circumstances should be true and not the principal Facts also as will easily appear from the Instance of the Resurrection of Christ In the account of which wonderful Fact we find that it was known to the Chief Priests and Pharisees among the Jews that Christ had said while he was yet alive after three Days I will rise again for which reason they make Application to Pilate to secure his Sepulchre that his Disciples might not come and steal him away by Night and take occasion from thence to give out he was risen from the Dead The Sepulchre was accordingly made sure by rolling a great Stone to the Door of it by Sealing the Stone and setting a Watch But 't is further said that at the time appointed and foretold for the rising of Christ there was a great Earthquake and that then the Angel of the Lord descended from Heaven and rolled back the Stone from the Door of the Sepulchre and sat upon it that his Countenance was like Lightning and his Raiment White as Snow that the Keepers saw all these things and for fear of the Angel did shake and became as dead Men Afterwards we read that some of the Watch came into the City and shewed unto the Chief Priests all the things that were done that the Chief Priests when they were Assembled with the Elders and had taken Counsel gave large Money to the Souldiers to say his Disciples came by Night and stole him away while they Slept which the Souldiers
Prediction was fulfilled and that therefore it was a true Prophecy 't was enough to know that Jerusalem was Destroyed and the Jewish People driven out of their Country whatever way this came about but to know that such a Man was Well or such another Alive or that the one had been Sick and the other to all appearance Dead is not sufficient to convince a Man of the truth of the Miracle in either case and a Person who did not see the Manner and Circumstances in which each of these Facts was done can receive no assurance of them afterwards but from the Testimony of others because there are no visible Remains and Footsteps of the Miracle left after the Action is over whereas in the other Instance of Prophecy the Event is constantly the same it was at first and equally convincing at all times to every one that will take the pains to satisfie himself And further if a considerable time intervene between the Prediction and the Accomplishment and the Record of the Prediction was very publick before the thing happen'd the Persons who live after the Accomplishment and so were immediate Witnesses of neither part of the Prophecy may be more easily and fully satisfied of the truth of a particular Prophecy than of a particular Miracle they were not Witnesses of themselves because both the Prediction and the Accomplishment being Common Facts considered in themselves without any relation to one another are less liable to suspicion than unusual Events of a more surprising Nature and the truth of the latter Fact being often certainly cognizable at any time of inquiry there is so much time supposed between this Accomplishment and the former Prediction that 't is easie to find out whether that really happened out before this which is all that is required for the truth of the whole Prophecy the extraordinary nature of which arises from the comparison of both together in order to know the reason of their Connexion and not from any thing in the Facts themselves severally considered as it does in Miracles where the Facts themselves are wonderful without any consideration of the Causes or Occasions of them Thus are the first Christian Miracles and Prophecies related and attested These are the Grounds and Reasons upon which they were believed and this is the summ of all the Evidence that is brought for them which is capable of being illustrated and confirm'd by a vast variety of particular Observations but my intended Method not allowing me to make such Inlargments I shall conclude the Proof I was upon with this General Reflexion From the account that is given in the New Testament of the Miracles and Prophecies there Recorded and of the manner of Preaching the Gospel and Converting People to the Christian Religion it plainly appears that the first and principal Motive upon which any Persons believed in Christ and imbraced the Doctrine taught by him and his Apostles was some Miracle they themselves were actual Witnesses of for Miracles were then so common every where that there was hardly any Christian even among the Gentile Converts for above Threescore Years after the Promulgation of the Gospel by Christ but was himself a Witness of some Miracle wrought by others So that tho' they might be further confirm'd in the belief of what was taught them by the Characters of Christ and his Apostles the Testimony of Jewish Christians who upon the several Persecutions in Jerusalem and all Judea were scattered and dispersed among the Gentiles of all Nations and the Accomplishment of Prophecies written in the Books of the Old and New Testament which they knew to have been written before the Events happen'd yet the first and chief ground of their assent to the Miracles and Doctrines of the Gospel was some Miraculous Power they had themselves been Witnesses of When therefore we consider the vast number of Converts that were made to Christianity in the first Age of the Gospel and consequently the vast Multitude of seeming Miracles that must have been continually wrought for their Conversion in all Places together with the steady and invincible Perseverance of Christians in the Faith notwithstanding all the variety of Sufferings they indured for believing 't is impossible to imagine there should be a whole Age of Delusion and Deceit that there should be such a long continued train and series of meer empty Appearances without any reality under them which produced such real Effects as remain till this Day and Effects of such an extraordinory nature as in a very short time gave a new turn to the whole Scheme of Affairs in the most considerable part of the World Since therefore all the common Matters of Fact mentioned in the History of the Gospel as we find it delivered in the New Testament are true as I have shewed before and consequently that among the rest that the Miracles Recorded in the New Testament were believed according to the relation there given of them it necessarily follows from hence that there were such Facts as those in appearance at least otherwise there could have been no ground for believing them in that manner as 't is said they were believed and if there were all those appearances of something done I shall take it for granted for the reason just before given that there were so many true real Facts And if the Miracles are allowed to be real the Prophecies must be so too as being freer from all suspicion of wrong appearance 3. The next step I am to make in the proof of the Christian History is to shew that what is said in the New Testament concerning Divine Assistance and Revelation is true Now 't is frequently and positively asserted there not only that such and such Signs and Wonders were wrought such Prophecies uttered and fulfilled and such Doctrines preach'd but that all these things were performed by the immediate Power and Authority of God This is every where acknowledg'd and insisted upon by Christ and his Apostles and all that were concerned in the Work and Ministry of the Gospel What they constantly affirm of themselves is that they were sent from God that they were authorized and ordained by God to Preach the Gospel that they were doing the Work of the Lord that the Doctrine they taught and preached came from God that they had it by Revelation that God shewed them things to come that they spake by the Spirit of God that the Power they had was from God and that God was with them continually assisting them and revealing himself to them Whether the Matters of Fact were really so as they affirmed we have no other ways of knowing but these two their own Testimony and the nature of the things said and done by them As to the Testimony of those who declare all these wonderful things of themselves their Condition Character and Sufferings have been considered already and found to be such as are a sufficient warrant to secure us from any fear or suspicion of
believe there are other Beings besides God of a Superiour Nature to Man who 't is probable may and do by some invisible unperceivable way act upon the Mind of Man as we are sure Men act upon one another by the means of External sensible Signs but if God so please we may distinguish as truly and certainly betwixt the Revelations of God and the Suggestions of other Spirits as we can betwixt the thoughts arising within us from our selves and those raised in us by other Men upon occasion of External Signs And though some may have mistaken the Suggestions of other Spirits for the Voice of God there is no more reason from hence for those who have had true Revelations to doubt of the certainty of them than there is for me to distrust the evidence of my own Perceptions when I judge such Ideas were occasioned in me by the real Voice and Presence of other Men because some have imagined they heard such and such Words spoke by such Persons when these Ideas came from their own Minds only without any External Occasions to execute them From all which it necessarily follows that Christ and his Apostles might be infallibly convinced that the Signs and Wonders they wrought were done by the Power of God that the knowledge of future Events was communicated to them by God and that the Doctrines they preached were delivered to them by God All this I say they might be infallibly convinced of by an immediate Consciousness not only of their own Disability to do and say such things of themselves without the assistance of some higher Power but of God's express Revelation of himself to them in all these Instances Which sort of Evidence and Satisfaction though it reaches no further than the Persons themselves who pretend to have received any Revelation from God yet is it of great use for the Conviction of others by making way for such Proofs as are proper to that end and which will not have any Force at all without it For except it be supposed that Divine Revelation is possible and that the Person to whom the Revelation is made may be certain of it 't is in vain to perswade any Man that he is obliged to believe and do such and such things because they were revealed by God For if Revelation be impossible 't is plainly absurd to make that a foundation either of Faith or Obedience and if Revelation be possible but no Man can be certain when any thing is revealed to him and when not there can be no Arguments found to convince another of the truth of a Revelation which the Person that pretends to it cannot be satisfied of himself But both these things being proved we are in the next place to examine how other People can be satisfied that God revealed himself to Christ and his Apostles Now 't is plain by the Account before given that they themselves might be intirely satisfied by the immediate assurance of their own Minds that God had given them a Power of saying and doing such things and had made such things actually present to their Minds as could proceed from him only and from no other Being But except they communicated what was given and revealed to them by External Signs 't is very plain that the Revelation could not be known to or concern any other but themselves and therefore the only way that others have of knowing the truth of the Christian Revelation is from the External Signs and Appearances by which it was communicated to them from those who first received it which as has been before observed may be considered under the style of Miracles Prophecies and Doctrines So that if it can be proved that the Miracles Prophecies and Doctrines Recorded in the New Testament did proceed from God this is sufficient to convince us that God has spoken to us by Christ and his Apostles and that we are obliged to believe and obey the Christian Religion as delivered to us by Divine Revelation and Authority The proof I shall give of this great and concerning Point shall consist of these three parts First I will indeavour to shew that Christ and his Apostles considered as meer Men unassisted by any higher Power could not be the Authors of the Miracles Prophecies and Doctrines Recorded in the New Testament Secondly I will make it appear not only that God might be the Author of them but that they have such certain Marks and Characters of Divinity upon them that we cannot be mistaken in attributing them to God Thirdly I will prove that 't is very improper and absurd to ascribe these things to Evil Spirits First Then I am to shew that Christ and his Apostles could not by any Humane Skill or Power be the Authors of those wonderful things said and done by their Ministry 'T is said of Christ that he spake as never Man spake and he says of himself that he did those things among the Jews that Man never did which he uses as an Argument to prove their unbelief in him inexcusable The plain meaning of both which Phrases here is not only that no Man could of himself speak like Christ or perform such things as he did but that no Man had ever spake like him or done what he did however assisted by any other Power This appears from several other Passages in the New Testament and particularly from Christ's own Argument against the Jews For he knew that they believed in Moses and the Prophets and were perswaded of the truth of all the Miracles Recorded in the Old Testament and therefore he did not think it sufficient for them to believe in him for the sake of his Works though he had done what no Man without Divine Assistance was able to do if he had not also done greater things than Moses or any other Person Divinely assisted had done before So much was necessary to convince the Jews and supersede a former Revelation but for the truth of Revelation in general both Christ and his Apostles seem to make this the only Test that what they said and did exceeded the Power and Wisdom of Men from whence they immediately concluded that therefore it was from God If this then be the Standard we are to judge of Revelation by 't will be easily made out that neither the Miracles Prophecies nor Doctrines of the New Testament could be from Men and therefore that they came from God who assisted and revealed himself to those Men that appeared to be the Authors of them It has been observed already that a Man may take such a certain estimate of his own Capacities and Powers and of his Present stock of Knowledge as to be infallibly sure that he cannot do or know such and such things either at all or not after such a manner And if we know any thing certain of the nature of Man in general we may confidently affirm that we are made and fashioned with such resemblance to one another that notwithstanding the
great variety and disproportion of Faculties and Attainments observable among us a Man may be able by what he knows of himself so far to determine the Limits of Humane Force and Skill as to be firmly assured such and such things cannot possibly lye within the reach and comprehension of meer Man unassisted by any other Being Thus for Example to use the former Instances we are fully and intirely assured that no Man whatsoever barely by his own Power without the Assistance or Application of any other Being can Cure the Sick or Raise the Dead or Speak a Language he knew nothing of just before he spake it or foretell such Events as that of the Restoration of the Jews We may likewise be as fully sure that Persons of such an Education and Course of 〈◊〉 could not possibly of themselves by the force of their own Capacities and Acquisitions conceive speak write or do such and such things in such a particular way and manner as we can suppose or may actually find Whoever therefore believes the Miracles Propheâ—â—s and Doctrines of Christ and his Apostles according to the History given of them in the New Testament must have this assurance that if these Matters of Fact were so as they are there delivered 't is impossible that those Men should be the Authors of them as I shall shew more particularly by considering them apart To begin with Prophecies which have been always reckoned the most unexceptionable Testimonies of an Intelligence exceeding Humane Knowledge If the Books of the Old Testament were writ long before Christ came into the World and all those Passages out of them which we find applied to Christ and the Dispensation of the Gospel in the New Testament 〈◊〉 a designed relation to those Events they are there applied to 't is impossible to imagine that either the Prediction or Accomplishment of them was the effect of meer Humane Knowledge and Power Such a multitude and variety of surprizing Events never before heard of in the World that had no manner of perceivable connexion with the state of things when they were foretold nor indeed at any other time before they happened could not by any force of Humane Wisdom be so particularly and circumstantially foreknown Neither can it be supposed that Christ made all those Relations in the Old Testament pass for Prophecies by an Arbitrary Application of them to such Events as were in his own Power to bring about in such a manner as he thought would bear the nearest resemblance to those accounts of things he found already written for 't was manifestly impossible for Christ to order and contrive the time place and manner of his Birth and all the other Circumstances which attended his coming into the World and yet these things are as particularly and remarkably expressed in the Writings of the Old Testament as any other matters whatsoever applied by Christ to himself and as certainly believed by the Jews to belong to the Messiah before the Pretensions of Jesus Christ were heard of as any other Prophecies that were ever thought by them to concern him If the Prophecies cited out of the Scriptures of the Jews relating to the Death Resurrection and Ascention of Christ the Mission of the Holy Spirit Propagation of the Gospel Rejection of the Jews and Destruction of Jerusalem and the success and continuance of the Christian Religion among the Gentiles were allowed by the Jews of that time to belong to the Messiah when Christ applied them to himself then are they certain Arguments of a knowledge in the Prophets who uttered them exceeding all Humane Sagacity and Foresight But if none of the Jews understood them in that sence or would grant the Passages referred to to be Prophetical of any thing then must the Application of them to such and such future Events by Christ be reckoned as new distinct Prophecies uttered first by himself and so they will be equal proofs of an extraordinary and more than Humane Knowledge in Christ because the Events foretold were such as 't was plainly impossible for Man to foresee or accomplish by his own Power For not to mention the vast unlikelihood there was according to all Humane Measures of Judging that Jerusalem should be utterly destroyed and the whole Nation of the Jews rooted out so soon after the time it was foretold this should happen and in that very manner in which the whole Fact stood described not to insist upon all the amazing Difficulties that might be urged against the success of the Gospel which render'd it in all Humane Appearance a thing impracticable that Christian Religion should so mightily and suddenly prevail and spread by such means and instruments as is foretold it should be propagated by Waving I say all Reflexions of this nature that might be made which are a great many this must certainly be granted that 't was utterly impossible for Christ by any Humane Skill or Wisdom to know that he should rise again and ascend into Heaven and that afterwards his Apostles should receive such Knowledge Courage and Power as to Preach his Gospel boldly indure Afflictions patiently confirm their Doctrine by many Signs and Wonders and Convert great Multitudes to the Christian Faith And if it was impossible for him of himself to know all these things it must be accounted much more impossible for him to effect and accomplish them by his own Power But if it be said that all these great and wonderful Events were really foretold in the Old Testament though so darkly and obscurely exprest that no Man before Christ understood the method and way of applying them right whence had he the Art and Skill of Interpretation This is as great a Mark and Character of an extraordinary and more than Humane Wisdom as Prophesying it self would be But then besides this wonderful Skill of Interpreting he must be allowed the Talent of Prophesying too by reason of several new Circumstances and Particulars relating to those great Events which are plainly and expresly mentioned by Christ and cannot be deduced from any Passages of the Old Testament as will easily appear upon a Comparison of the several Predictions of Christ and the ancient Prophecies of the same Events referred to by him Which Particulars foretold by Christ himself and others afterwards by some of his Disciples and Believers are most of them such as could not be foreseen by any Labour Art or Force of Humane Understanding because they are such Matters of Fact as before they did actually happen no Man without an over-ruling Conviction could possibly perswade himself to believe would ever happen at all much less to expect that others should believe they would upon his Testimony From hence it evidently appears that most of the Prophecies Recorded in the Old and New Testament relating to Christ and his Gospel must be the results of some Higher Knowledge than that of Man because they are such as cannot possibly be accounted meer lucky Conjectures nor skilful
came first by these Opinions that 't is highly suitable to the Nature of God to give Men true Notions concerning himself to acquaint them how and in what manner they ought to Obey and Worship him and to direct them in the Knowledge and assist them in the Attainment of their Happiness We are very sensible of our own Ignorance Misery and Impotence We cannot by any Arguments of Reason find out how or when we were made what should be the occasion of that contrariety of Principles and Inclinations we experience within us why we should act contrary to what we our selves think our selves obliged to act and be more disposed so to act than otherwise why we should be determined to pursue Hapness and yet be Miserable why the injoyment of several Pleasures we are inclined to should be often attended with greater degrees of Pain and acting as our Reason approves and prescribes should be oftentimes as prejudicial to our present Happiness why we should look upon it as our Duty to serve God and yet in several Instances indure more Trouble and Misery upon that account than those who live in defiance of Religion these are Things our Reason is puzled to explain to us And if there should be a future State after this Life as we have very good grounds to believe there is how can we be sure our Religion or Piety was acceptable to God And supposing our service was proper so far as it went what assurance can we have that the many constant violations of our Duty which our own Consciences accuse us of may not render our small Service ineffectual Besides the Bounds and Limits of our Conduct and Behaviour with regard to our selves and one another must be very uncertain and precarious when we have no other Guide but our unassisted Reason and no Man is obliged to submit to any other Judgment but his own for in this Case every Man according to the difference of his Passions Prejudices and Interests must have a different Standard to regulate his Actions by These are Things we are all sensible of now and which without allowing Revelation we are not able to account for or satisfie our selves about notwithstanding all the improvements of Rational Knowledge we at present enjoy And the expediency of being rightly inform'd in all these Matters is esteemed so great that 't is urg'd by some as an Argument against the Truth of the Jewish and Christian Revelation that they have not been Universal enough it being look'd upon by the Objectors as a Thing inconsistent with the Goodness of God to suffer so great a part of the World in all Ages to live in a State of gross Ignorance Barbarity and Disorder as Ancient History and Modern Experience inform us of Since therefore we cannot but be satisfied from Reflections upon our own Nature improved and from Observations upon the wretched State of a large part of Mankind who live in Ignorance that the Difficulties which concern the Knowledge of Religion are very great that the Effects and Consequences of the want of Religion are very Dismal and Calamitous and that Men in such a State of Ignorance as we find some whole Countries are would very probably never by any force of their own Faculties without foreign Helps and Assistances reach to that Knowledge of Natural Religion that some Nations of the present Age are arrived to which is manifestly owing to those Books they have among them and which they look upon as communicated to them from God Since we are further convinced that Persons in such a State of Ignorance as we now suppose if they should be allowed to make some advances in the Knowledge of Natural Religion could not by meer Reason without Revelation proceed so far as upon good grounds to be fully assured of the Truth and Obligation of what they knew and the Advantages or Dangers that attended their Performance or Transgression of the Rules they laid down that they would never be able to explain any of the Difficulties before mentioned and that in a short Time by the over-ruling prevalence of present Pleasures and Passions working differently in different Men they would relapse into their former State again Upon all these Accounts it seems very expedient that God should give Men a true and perfect Scheme of Religion agreeable to the Reason and fitted to all the Wants and Exigencies of Mankind However I dare not venture to argue that because it appears so very expedient for us and so suitable to the Nature of God that there should be some Revelation made to the World therefore God has actually done it because I cannot comprehend all the particular Reasons and Ends of God's acting with regard to Men here nor what allowance he will be pleased to make in his Future Judgment upon them in order to an other State But if there be a Revelation pretended to and I find upon a strict Examination of it that it has all the Marks and Characters of such a Revelation as our Reason tells us Men wanted and was very proper and becoming God to give and such a one as has been proved before Man himself could not be the Author of I must be convinced from hence that it came from God And such a Revelation as this is the Christian There we find a very just and rational Account of the Nature and Attributes of God of the Original Formation of the World and particularly the Creation of Man the change and alteration of his first Condition and the unhappy Consequences of it from thence we are enabled to explain these contrary Tendencies and Principles of Action we experience in our selves that unequal Composition of Perfections and Weaknesses Capacities and Wants we are sensible of the Ignorance of which makes Man the most unaccountable part of the whole Universe There we are acquainted with the most proper suitable way of Worshipping and Serving God There we have the truest draught of Morality the best and most exalted Scheme of all the Duties which concern the Government of our selves and our Behaviour to one another By this Revelation we are assured that the observance of Religious Duties in such a manner will be acceptable to God all our Doubts about the Imperfections of our Obedience are removed and our Consciences intirely satisfied a way being there shewed us how our Piety and Vertue may be rendred well pleasing to God notwithstanding the many failings they are accompanied with the Wisdom and Kindness of which Expedient we cannot but acknowledge and admire The same Revelation does likewise fix and ascertain our Belief of a Future State and proposes such Rewards and Punishments in another World as are proper and sufficient Motives to determine us to the Practice of Religion in this and gives us a satisfactory Explication of all the present Inequalities of Providence in the conduct of Humane Affairs This is certainly a very rational Scheme of things and very agreeable to all the Notions our
where every body was as capable and certain a Judge of the Cheat as they Was not there such a Man as Christ Did he not in all appearance maintain such a Character Did he not pretend to such Discoveries and Wonderful Works and did he not really Suffer such things upon account of his Pretences as we find Recorded in those Books call'd the Gospels All this must be granted in the present Supposition which fixes the real Publication of that Religion we now profess at the same date we find mentioned in the New Testament And if it be allowed that these Facts were true then does it certainly follow that all the Pretences of Christ were real for otherwise they could never have been believed as has been sufficiently proved already and will more fully appear under another Head where I shall shew the necessary Connexion betwixt the truth of the Common and the Extraordinary Facts mentioned in the New Testament But if these Common Matters of Fact just now instanced in were false as well as the other then must the whole Story be much more Ridiculous and Incredible If the Forgery be dated about Forty Years lower at some time near the Destruction of Jerusalem then must we take in the Acts of the Apostles and the other Books of the New Testament into our Account which will render the difficulty of believing the Christian Religion much greater For here we have abundance of New Matters of Fact to believe as strange as those in the Gospels and as easie to be known and disproved but vastly more Numerous and more Publick to the truth of which a great many more Cities and Nations are brought in as Witnesses all which are supposed false and consequently could never obtain Credit in the World at that time If the Christian Religion was not heard of any where till some time after the Destruction of Jerusalem how could it possibly be then believed when its chief Pretence was that it had been Published Believed and Establisted in many places long before which was palpably and notoriously false Now that this must be the Pretence upon which the Christian Religion was first Founded whatever Period we suppose this Event happen'd in after the Destruction of Jerusalem is very plain from the Nature of the Religion its self and the Manner of its Publication which are intirely built upon Matters of Fact so that if the History of Christianity or the Principal Matters of Fact contained in the New Testament are false the whole Religion must fall And the Nature of those Facts 't is built upon is such that 't is imposible for any body to believe them at any distance from the time in which they are affirmed to happen if they were then first invented when he is required to believe them For let us fix the Period when we will how can we imagine that the History contained in the Books of the New Testamen should be believed by those who are supposed to live after the Times of all the Transactions therein mention'd and yet who had never before heard or read of any of them Can it possibly be thought that any People would change their Laws and Religion upon such a Story as this without enquiring into the truth of it And how could they be satisfied upon enquiry when the supposition of an Imposture makes all other Information but that of the Publishers utterly impossible And what reason could there be to believe him who gives only a positive bare Relation of Matter of Fact done before his time which he delivers without any pretence to Revelation himself and without any Authority but his own to confirm the truth of what he endeavours to impose upon the World Would not these have been every Man's Questions Why was not the Religion now offered to us imbraced when it was first prescribed to Mankind with all those wonderful Evidences of its Divine Original we are told of Why were not those strange Facts believed by those that were the immediate Witnesses of them If they were and if the Christian Religion spread and increased upon the Credit of them as is affirmed and if the Miracles were true must needs be allow'd How came it to pass that neither We nor our Forefathers ever heard of these things and that we have no History or Monuments of them remaining How should such a New Religion as this Establish'd upon the evidence of Sense and Propagated by vast Multitudes of Professors be quite lost and worn out of the memory of Men already How came you that Publish it to be the only Person that could recover the Knowledge of it What reason have you now to believe what has been laid aside by those who by being nearer the Original were better Judges of the truth of it And what Authority have you to receive it and enjoyn Mankind the belief of it These were Questions which an Impostor could never give any Answer to and without satisfaction in these Matters so great and wise a part of Mankind as are now and were formerly throughly perswaded of the truth of the Christian Religion could not voluntarily lay aside all their ancient Prejudices and Ingagements and imbrace a New Religion with all the dangerous Consequences that they knew must attend such a change It is therefore manifestly absurd to suppose there ever were any Men Foolish and Impudent enough to Publish a false History of Matters of Fact pretended to be done just before the Publication and in the very Place where the Scene is laid within the immediate Cognizance of all the People to whom the Relation is directed and if there were any such Pretenders 't is impossible to think there should be any People so Stupid as to believe they themselves saw and heard such Things as were never said or done among them and this purely upon the Information of others without which they had remained intirely ignorant of them from whence it necessarily follows that the Christian Scheme could not be Published at the Time 't is dated at if it were meer Forgery and Invention It is likewise very ridiculous and irrational to imagine that a long series of Publick Notorious Facts said to be done in the presence of great Multitudes of all sorts of Persons in different Countries and Nations the Consequences of which are pretended to be very great and concerning to all Mankind and which by the Credit they had obtained and the Opposition that had been made to them had occasioned mighty Changes and Alterations in the World 'T is very absurd I say to maintain that such Facts as these which never happen'd at all should at any distance from the Time in which they are pretended to have happen'd ever come to be genenerally believed in or near those Places they are appropriated to barely upon the Authority of their Publication when those that were supposed to believe them can have no other Reason for their Faith but this That some body had the confidence to
Publish a strange unheard of Story And if there be any absurdity in this supposition 't is impossible the Christian Religion should have been first Promulg'd any time after the Period assign'd for its Publication in the New Testament because it was impossible it should ever have been believed as it now is if it had A great deal more might be said to prove the Christian Religion no Imposture and to expose the gross absurdity of such a Supposition but I do not think it necessary to inlarge upon this Point both because I have in a great measure prevented my self in the direct Proofs I have before given of the Truth of the Christian Religion which with a different manner of Application would serve the same purpose here and because this is thought by the Enemies of Christianity themselves too weak a Post to defend and is rarely insisted upon by them any further than as Trick Cheat and Imposture are odious discrediting Names which serve to blacken the Cause they want Arguments to overthrow The chief strength of Modern Infidelity or as its Favourers and Professors delight to call it Deism consists in a great many loose Objections levelled against something or other in the Scriptures without any certain aim without any relation to a Scheme or Hypothesis to account for all standing Appearances and without any regular Deduction of Consequences from what is Objected or Answer to contrary Proofs But before I enter upon a particular Examination of these Objections it is to be observed that they are directed indifferently against any part of the Scriptures of the Old or New Testament and therefore I shall think my self obliged to consider them only so far as they are made use of or intended to lessen the certainty of Divine Revelation in General or of the truth either of the Jewish or Christian Religion both which we pretend and undertake to maintain did come from God I have not indeed given a particular Proof of the Jewish Revelation because it is supposed in the Christian and confirmed by it and therefore what proves the Latter must establish the Former But if any Man will take a short view of the Jewish Revelation as we find it delivered in the Books of the Old Testament and impartially consider the Nature Variety and Number of the Facts there Recorded the Relation and Connexion they have to one another the Time and Manner in which they were Recorded the Ways and Methods of preserving the memory of them together with the Characters and Circumstances of all the Persons concern'd in them He will never be able to doubt but the Principal Matters of Fact mentioned in the Old Testament were true it being impossible to conceive they should have been Forged either altogether or separately since they are the Foundations of all the Jewish Religion and Policy and are of such a nature that we cannot suppose any time when the Forgery should begin without a discovery of it which would appear more evidently if we applied all the Characters of Truth and Divinity remarkable in the Christian Revelation to the Jewish but such a Repetition being altogether unnecessary in its self and without the bounds of my Present Subject I shall immediately proceed to examine the Deist's Objections to Scripture and Revelation Now the summ of what they have to say which has not been already particularly considered tends to shew that the Miracles and Prophecies mentioned in the Scriptures allowing the Accounts there given of the Facts to be true are no Proofs of a Divine Revelation and that there are a great many such Faults observable in the other parts of Scripture as prove the whole to be a pure Humane Composure What they object against Miracles being used as an Argument to prove a Doctrine Revealed from God is that it Derogates from the Nature and Perfection of God to work Miracles and that the Regular Frame of the World with a constant unalterable Connexion of Causes and Effects in it gives us a truer and juster Idea of God and is a better Argument of his Being than any Extraordinary Interposition of Providence which alters and perverts the course of Nature To which I answer First That I cannot see how it Derogates from God to suppose his immediate Interposition in some Cases or how his working of Miracles is a perverting of the Course of Nature any more than it Derogates from the Soul or the Soul perverts the Course of Nature when by a Thought it changes or stops the Motion of the Animal Spirits which according to their usual course would have moved otherwise When the Soul exercises this Power over the Body the Sinews and Bones continue as they were and so do the bulk and principal parts of Nature for all Miracles God does not order Men to be born of Beasts nor change Beasts into Men nor create New Suns nor annihilate any Systems of Matter to work Miracles but by a Thought he separates or unites the insensible parts of Matter he stops retards or quickens their Motion or alters their Figures This is God's common Method of working Miracles But in the next place what if we should say that God did every thing by an immediate Will What if we affirm'd that he often Created some Beings and Destroyed others that he changed the Laws of Motion and suspended the Effects of it None of these ways of acting can Derogate from God forasmuch as they cannot be proved either to imply a Contradiction in themselves to be inconsistent with the Happiniss of God or to be repugnant to the Goodness or Justice of his Dealings with his Intelligent Creatures These are the true and only Measures of all the other Notions we frame of the Perfections of the Divine Nature And therefore when we say God cannot act contrary to Nature we must mean it in one of these Senses either that he cannot act what is a Contradiction in it self or what is contrary to his own Nature or to the Nature he has given his Intelligent Creatures But when any Changes or Alterations in Material Beings consistent with the fore-mention'd Principles are said to be contrary to Nature that is only a popular Expression which signifies that the course of things is different from what it constantly appeared to us before but no colour of reason can possibly be given either from the Properties of Body or the Constancy of Appearance why such a change should not be made by God That Miracles are not in their own Nature a better proof of the Being of God than the standing Frame and regular Order and Disposition of things is certain but if the generality of Men are apt to forget God notwithstanding they are surrounded with so many visible Evidences of his Being Why is it not agreeable to the Wisdom and Goodness of God to raise and excite their Attention by new and surprizing Manifestations of his Power the impression of which would be much livelier and stronger than those they
received from a constant Repetition of the same appearances But 't is not to prove a God or Providence or the first General Principles of Natural Religion that Miracles are urged these things are all so plain and easie without such a confirmation that they are altogether without excuse who do not believe them or act contrary to their belief but when Men are lost and gone out of the way and are become altogether Corrupt when through Blindness and Ignorance they know not how to serve God aright and when those who use their endeavours to do it can have no assurance of being accepted if in compassion to this sad and distressed Estate of Mankind God is pleased to reveal himself to them and acquaint them with a true and certain way to Happiness which they were not able to find out of themselves what Perfections of God is it contrary to to make such a discovery to his Creatures And how could he take a more effectual way to convince them of the truth of the Revelation than by Miracles which are real Effects of Divine Power and which Men are readily disposed to acknowledge as Infallible Signs and Indications of it If these were the Works of God and might certainly be known to be so as has already been proved in the former part of this Discourse then were they very fit and proper Proofs that the Doctrine they were intended to comfirm came from God though they were not brought about by an immediate Interposition but were part of the General Scheme of Nature And therefore though it should be allowed to be a Derogation to God to make him the Author of those Works we call Miracles by a present and immediate exercise of his Power yet it can be no diminution to any of his Perfections to affirm that originally at the beginning of the World he ordered such Effects to proceed from the General Laws of Nature at such a time that they might be for Signs and Tokens to Mankind that the Revelation which should then be given them came from him Another Objection made to the Argument of Miracles is that Miracles have been wrought by other Men as well as Moses and Christ and as great as those that were Recorded of them from whence it is inferred that the Doctrines they taught are never the truer for their Working Miracles To which I Answer that the Matter of Fact is none of it sufficiently attested a great deal or it manifestly false and were it all true the Inference drawn from it does not hold To make good this Charge I shall instance in the Miracles attributed to Vespasian and Apollonius Tyanaeus which have been particularly made use of by the Enemies of our Religion to lessen the Credit and Authority of it Of Vespasian it is Recorded That he once cured two Blind Men but the strange and wonderful Works of Apollonius fill a Book writ on purpose to give an account of them Now as to Vespasian's Cure of the Blind 't is but one single Miracle and therefore is very unjustly compared with that Multitude of mighty Works that were wrought by the Hands of Christ neither is it so well attested but Reasons may be given why it should be false notwithstanding the reality of all the appearing Circumstances of it Several Inducements might be alledged that very probably disposed this Emperor to pretend to such a Miracle 't is very easie to conceive how his Design might be brought about in the Presence of a great many People without their discovering the Cheat and should any have found it out 't is very obvious to imagine why they did not Publish it But nothing of all this would hold when applied to Christ had he pretended to no more than the Cure of two Blind Men A Man of his Character and Condition in the World could not promise himself any Honour Respect or Advantage from such a Pretence and should he have made this use of it he would very probably have raised the Envy of all the People of the same Rank and the Jealousie of his Superiors upon these and other Motives as well as Natural Curiosity a great many would have been very Industrious and Inquisitive in searching into the Truth of the Fact and whom can we imagine so far concern'd for such a Pretender as to be privy or assisting to his Cheat at the first or to conceal his shame after they had found it out But supposing an Account could be given in one or two Instances how 't was possible for Christ to pretend to such Works as were never done there are abundance still remaining upon Record that are manifestly incapable of such a Solution which puts an unanswerable difference betwixt the Miracles of Christ and the Pretences of other Men. As to the Story of Apollonius the whole Credit of it depends upon the Testimony of one single Author who lived too long after him to be a competent Witness of the Truth of what he Relates and was too Credulous and Partial to be believed if he had lived at the same time with him The strange unusual Things Related to have been done by this Apollonius bear no Proportion to the Miracles of Christ either as to the Number of the Facts and Persons concern'd in them the Wonderful and Extraordinary Nature of them the beneficial Design of them or the publick and hazardous Manner in which they were done and a great many of these have been proved to be false upon examination from the manifest inconsistencies and contradictions in the Relation of them But supposing the Miracles attributed to Vespasian and Apollonius were true in Fact what Reasons can we alledge either from the Characters of the pretended Authors the Ends and Designs they acted upon the Consequences and Effects of the Pretences or from any other Circumstances of their Story that the strange Things Recorded of them were not done by the Ministry of Evil Spirits Let us suppose farther That the Facts were not only real but true and proper Miracles performed by the express and immediate Assistance of God What can be inferred from thence Not that the Heathen Religion was true because these Miracles were not design'd or intended for a Confirmation of it Not that the Christian Religion was purely Humane because the whole End of Christ's working Miracles was to prove that his Doctrine came from God There may be several Reasons given why it may please God sometimes to work Miracles indifferently by the Hands of good or ill Men Men of a true or false Religion but it cannot possibly be supposed of God that he should imploy Good Men or concur with the Wicked in working Miracles in order to their deceiving Mankind and establishing a Lye by such Evidence as cannot be disproved and no Instance can be given where any one true Miracle was wrought by a Person that made use of it to prove any other Doctrine by than what we have delivered in the Scriptures By a true Miracle
I mean such as is as well attested to have been done as those Recorded in the Scriptures and can no more be accounted for without the Power of God than they can many of which I will allow to have been done upon other occasions without any Application of them to the advantage of the Religion of those that performed them 'T is true indeed many Signs and Wonders may have been wrought for the Confirmation of false Doctrines and may have deceived many whom Simplicity and Bigotry to the Cause they made for disposed to entertain them but we have no Records of any such ill-intended Miracles left which by the Nature Circumstances Effects or Attestation of them can dispose a rational Man to ascribe them to God And whatever Pretences of this kind there may have been 't is a very good Argument that the World can distinguish betwixt the wonderful Works of God and the little Feats of Men and Evil Spirits That there are now no Opinions or Doctrines whatsoever remaining besides what are contained in the Jewish and Christian Revelations nor any particular Explications of or Deductions from them which were at first Believed and Propagated upon the Strength and Authority of strange and wonderful Facts publickly and really done for that end The next Intimation made use of to overthrow the Truth of the Scripture-Revelation concerns the Prophecies which make a great part of it And this as well as the first Objection against Miracles is wholly new the Invention of these latter Days wherein the Improvements of rational Knowledge have forced the Patrons of Irreligion upon new Absurdities Now the Argument as far as 't is capable of being expressed in such a form is this That the Prophecies of the Old Testament upon which the Christian Religion is principally built proceeded from Impressions made upon the Imaginations of the Prophets which Impressions were always agreeable to their several Tempers Complexions and Opinions from whence it must be inferr'd that such Visionary Scenes and Figurative Expressions as these Prophecies are delivered in could be attributed to God only in a popular way as all other extraordinary and unusual Events were and therefore cannot be made use of to prove a Divine Revelation because they proceeded wholly from Natural Causes though unknown to us But whatever of this nature is advanced by Spinoza or whatever Inferences are drawn from it by others who apply it further than he durst openly assert nothing can be concluded from his Account of Prophecy to the Prejudice of the Scripture-Revelation were all his Observations upon this Subject true as 't is manifest to any one that reads the Bible they are not For supposing all he says upon this Head were true viz. That the Prophets were Persons of livelier Imaginations than others as 't is plain of some of them that they were not That the Angry Chearful or Melancholy Prophet always Prophesied things suitable to his particular Temper as there are several Instances to be given to the contrary and that the Jews had a pious way of Attributing every thing strange or unusual to God c. What if all these things were so as Spinoza observes The Knowledge which these Angry Chearful c. Prophets of lively Imaginations had of Future Things must be allowed to come from God in a different manner from that whereby they received all their other Knowledge as Spinoza himself plainly owns and if it be so 't is a very good Argument that the Doctrines Preached by those Prophets were delivered to them by God also in the same way that their Prophecies were which is sufficient to inforce the Obligation of them upon us whatever Natural Causes God was pleased to make use of in the Revelation and that is all we contend for or are concern'd to maintain This is all that either the Ancient or Modern Enemies of the Christian Religion had or can have to object to the Miracles and Prophecies Recorded in the Bible excepting what has been already Answered in the direct proof that was given of the Truth of them The other parts of Scripture are charged with almost all the Faults which any Humane Writing is capable of viz. Contradictions to Reason and Philosophy Contradictions of one part to another Mistakes as to the Authors of the Books Connexion of the Parts Chronology Geography c. Ridiculous and Improbable Stories Absurd and Irrational Laws and Injunctions Trifling and Impertinent Reasons and Arguments Low and Unartful Language The Injustice of which Objections I shall shew very briefly as sying very open and obvious As to Contradictions to Reason and Philosophy pretended to be in the Scriptures no body has been acute enough yet or sufficiently instructed in the true System of things to make good this Charge We have lived to see several New Schemes Hypotheses and Theories of the World Confuted and Exploded but the Plainest Simplest and most Demonstrative Account of Nature that is now extant is found to be the most agreeable to Scripture and answers all the Ancient Blasphemies against Providence which were grounded upon false Hypotheses then in Reputation But after all the Scriptures were not written to teach us Philosophy If this had been the Design of them no doubt but we had had a truer Scheme of Knowledge than any Philosopher has been yet able to give us but then 't is certain we should have had much less Religion if that and our Philosophy had been revealed to us together Had the Language of Scripture been every where adapted to the true Nature of Things 't is hard to conceive how it should ever have come to be believed For supposing these Notions to be true That the Earth moves That the Sun is a Hundred thousand times bigger than the Earth That the Moon and the other Planets are inhabited That Beasts are senseless Machines and meer Clock-work and the like And supposing all the popular Expressions of Scripture concerning such Matters were changed and suited to these Notions would not all the Learned part of Mankind who lived before these new Discoveries in Nature were made have been apt to reject the whole Revelation as absurd and unphilosophical But if some of the Learned had been so sensible of their Ignorance of Nature and the Power of God as to make all the Prejudices of their Reason Submit to their Faith 't is hardly possible to imagine how the People should ever have been induced to believe such Opinions as shock those Common Natural Notions they have of Things which come to them without teaching and Opinions that will always seem to contradict their Senses The greatest Evidence of Miracles would not be sufficient to convince the People of the Truth of such Notions as those before-mention'd for though strange and wonderful Things which they actually and certainly perceive come to pass may satisfie them that as strange Things as these may happen hereafter yet even such Signs and Wonders as these which they see can hardly be supposed
Senses or first obtain Credit among those who lived afterwards without any proof of their being done or believed before And if we suppose the Christian Morality Entertained and Established in the World without the present History we have of it the Forgery of that afterwards would have been wholly unnecessary and the difficulty of getting such a Forgery believed much greater From hence then it plainly follows that there could never have been such a state of things in the World as we now perceive if all the Principal Parts and Substance of the Christian History as it is at present generally believed were not true and had some time or other really happen'd out according to the Relation we find given of them This does likewise further appear from the way and manner in which those Books that contain this History are Written where we find so many extraordinary Marks and Characters of the Simplicity Integrity and undesigning Humility of the Writers their hearty Belief of what they wrote themselves and their great Zeal and Concern for the Good of Mankind as plainly shew them to have been Influenced not only by the force of well-attested Truth but by some extraordinary and more than Humane Impressions 3. These are in short the Reasons we have to believe the Truth of the Christian Religion The Validity and Force of which I shall endeavour to make out more fully under the Third Head where I am to shew the Sufficiency of the Proof that has been given of the Christian Matters of Fact from the Nature of Things upon which the certainty of all Matters of Fact as well as other Truths is ultimately founded Now the chief and immediate Reason of believing most Facts being taken from the Nature of Man and there being nothing we are so well acquainted with as the common Original Capacities and Powers Inclinations and Aversions of Mankind and consequently their Ends and Motives of acting it will be easie to shew from hence that the proof of the Christian Religion before given is not only sufficient to determine our assent to it but does in Evidence and Multiplicity of Conviction far exceed the Proof any other Matters of Fact are capable of In the first place then let us consider why we believe any Matter of Fact which never fell within our own particular and immediate Cognizance Why do we so firmly believe the Story of Julius Cesar and William the Conqueror that there is such a place as Italy or China c Now the reason of this upon examining our selves we shall find to be because a great many Men have acquainted us that there were formerly such Persons who did such and such Things and that there are now such Places in the World c. which Men were competent Judges of what they tell us had sufficient Opportunities of knowing the Truth themselves no Motives conceivable that could dispose them to lye to others and are contradicted by no body of equal Authority with them these are all the grounds of Credibility upon which Matters of Fact are generally believed and no further Characters of Truth are required by one that is satisfied of these But we have all these Reasons to believe the Common Matters of Fact related in the New Testament in the fullest Force and Extent of them and several other besides as the Incapacity of the Witnesses to deceive if they had been disposed to do it the greater Motives they had not to say what they did than to say it if it had been false and the greater Motives other Persons had to contradict them if they could have been disproved Let us examine all these Characters of Truth and see how far the Proof of the Christian History exceeds that of other Matters of Fact and how far the supposed Falshood of it notwithstanding these Characters is consistent with that certain Knowledge we have of Humane Nature As to the first Character required for the Proof of Matters of Fact the Number of the Witnesses there never was certainly so vast a Multitude of Persons all unanimously agreeing to assert the Truth of so great a variety of Matters of Fact as there is in the Case before us because the Progress of Christianity was so swift that we cannot suppose more Persons could have been acquainted with the History and Doctrines of it in so short a time and there never was such industrious Care taken to propagate the Belief of any other Facts and Opinions that we ever read of It is likewise as certain that the whole Multitude of the first Publishers and Professors of Christianity were as competent Judges of the Matters they bear witness of as 't is possible for any Man to be of any thing else whatsoever We will only suppose now that Christ and his Apostles and Disciples pretended to such Things as are Recorded of them in the Scriptures and consequently to believe their own Pretences and that all others who profess'd the Gospel of Christ did declare their Belief of all those Things which are related as said or done by Christ and his Apostles And surely a Man may infallibly know his own Thoughts and Imaginations he can tell whether he believes such or such a Thing or no or at least he can be certain that he thinks or fancies he believes it and if there be any Intercourse or Communication betwixt Men one Man may know that another pretends to believe or do a Thing whether he really believes or does it or no. If a Multitude of Men can be deceived in such Judgments as these concerning themselves and one another 't is evident that there is no such thing as Knowledge at all If therefore it must be allowed that a vast Multitude of Persons did pretend to believe all those things that they are said to believe in the New Testament it necessarily follows from hence that they did really and truly believe them or else they pretended to believe what they certainly knew to be false But that they did not pretend to believe what they knew to be false will evidently appear from these further Reflections upon Humane Nature First then 't is certain that every Man must act for some End or Motive and here is no End or Motive conceivable that could determine any of the first Publishers or Professors of Christianity to pretend to believe those Facts which they knew to be false All the Ends and Motives we can imagine any Man to act upon in such a Case we have reckoned up before and we find that if we put our selves into the same Circumstances with those first Witnesses of Christianity it would have been impossible for us to have been influenced by any of them to make the same pretences being infallibly assured at the same time that they were utterly false and groundless from whence we conclude that neither did they since all Men are so made and contrived as to be determined by the same general Motives though according to the difference of
Indirectly and Negatively by shewing that none of those Suppositions which exclude the Being of God can be true p. 57. Matter alone considered at rest could not be Eternal and in time produce the Present Frame of the World p. 59. 'T is impossible to account for the Production of the World by the Atheist's Hypothesis of moving Atoms p. 61. 'T is absurd to suppose that the World has Existed Eternally under the same Form we now behold it without a God p. 64. The Eternal Coexistence of Matter and Mind improbable p. 71. Supposing it probable neither Matter alone nor Matter and Motion nor the present Constitution of things could have been Eternal Independently of God p. 77. The Original of all things from God further evinced from General Reflections p. 81. A positive and direct Proof of Religion drawn from the Nature of God and Man and the Relations there are betwixt them p. 91. Of the Nature and Ground of Obligation together with the Right and Power of Obliging Ib. That Man is obliged to order his Life according to the Will of God is proved p. 102. From the Natural Judgments we make concerning our Actions p. 105. From the End and Design of God in making us which appears by several Tokens and Indications p. 117. in the Frame and Disposition of our Mind p. 118. and in the Oeconomy and Constitution of Humane Society p. 125. From the Nature of Religion it self a regular practice of which conduces to the greatest Happiness we are capable of in this Life p. 129. And from the certainty of a Future State which is proved p. 137. From the defect of a General and Regular Practice of Religion here p. 138. And from the General Wants Necessities and Imperfections of our present Nature p. 141. From all which Considerations it appears that 't is more for our Happiness to live Religiously then otherwise and therefore we are obliged to live so p. 146. The Certainty and Necessity of Religion further shewn from the pernicious effects of all kind of Irreligion with respect to the Happiness of Mankind p. 149. The absurdity and folly of all the Grounds and Pretences of Irreligion and whatever is alledged in defence of it p. 181. Irreligion not capable of any direct proof p. 183. The usual Ways and Methods of defending it Improper and Insufficient p. 187. Ridiculing Religion proves nothing against it Ib. Requiring a more certain and Mathematical proof of it unreasonable p. 188. Schemes and Hypotheses to account for the present state of things without God and Religion absurd and inconsistent p. 192. The chief and most common Objections against Religion answered viz. p. 200. Mysteries seeming Inconsistencies and Absurdities in Scripture p. 201. Extravagant Notions and Pernicious Doctrines maintained under the name of Religion p. 202. Variety of Opinions among the Professors of the same Religion p. 204. Foolish and Ridiculous Arguments urged in defence of it p. 205. Scandalous Lives of great pretenders to Piety and Virtue p. 206. Religion the effect of Fear and Education p. 209. Religion a politick Contrivance p. 211. The absurdity and folly of Irreligious Principles and Practices demonstrated from General Reflections upon the different Grounds and Foundations Religion and Irreligion stand upon and the different Conduct of those that act under the Influence of the one and the other p. 213. Irreligion further exposed from the causes and Reasons that induce Men to take up Atheistical and Prophane Opinions p. 227. The chief Causes of Atheism shewn to be these two The Fear of an after reckoning for a wicked Life and the Vanity of appearing greater and wiser than other Men. p. 230. The Doctrines of Irreligion the sole result of Prejudice and not deliberate reasoning more plainly made out p. 239. From the Character and Capacities of the Atheists Ib. From the manner and process of their Infidelity p. 242. And from the Confession of several Atheists themselves p. 246. An account of the Notions of Atheism and Deism and how they are to be distinguished p. 249. THE CERTAINTY Of the Christian Revelation And the Necessity of Believing it c. The Contents THe Connexion of this Discourse with the former Page 1. The Method laid down for the Establishing the Certainty of the Christian Revelation p. 3. An Abstract or Summary of the Christian Scheme as it is delivered in the Books of the New Testament p. 8. The General Subject of the several Books or Volumes of the New Testament p. 9. The Character of Jesus Christ p. 19. A short Account of his Doctrine or Gospel p. 31. The Character of those that believed in him and that assisted him in the Publishing and Propagating his Gospel p. 42. The Character of those that Persecuted Him and his Disciples and opposed the Establishment of his Religion p. 50. The way and manner in which the Books of the New Testament are writ with all the important Circumstances which refer to the form and composition of those Writings p. 51. All the Principal Matters of Fact related in the New Testament shewn to be true by a plain direct proof according to this distinction of them premised viz Common Matters of Fact Miracles and Prophecies Divine Assistance and Revelation p. 59. The Common Historical Facts mentioned in the New Testament proved to be true in the following manner p. 60. The Original of Christianity rightly assigned in the New Testament p. 61. A Survey of the Christian Religion in the time of Constantine p. 70. The Christian Faith the same in the time of Constantine as it was at and immediately after the first Publication of the Gospel p. 74. This Proposition made out from the constant Tradition of such a Belief together with many sensible Infallible Effects of it p. 75. And from many other extrinsick Signs and Monuments remaining at the Meeting of the Council of Nice under Constantine p. 105. Such as were several Customs and Vsages p. 107. Relicks Buildings and other the like Monnments p. 108. Books and Written Records of several kinds viz. p. 109. Copies of the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament p. 110. Publick Acts and Records belonging to Societies p. 113. Genuine Writings of Orthodox Christians p. 119. Books Written by Hereticks p. 132. Jewish and Pagan Books p. 133. Forged and Suppositious Writings of uncertain Authors p. 137. The Miracles and Prophecies Recorded in the New Testament shewn to be true Facts according to the Relation there given of them p. 140. An Account by way of Introduction of what is meant by Miracles and Prophecies in this place p. 141. And what kind of Evidence these Facts are capable of p. 143. The Miracles considered by themselves according to the different Periods in which they were done and the different Persons they were done by p. 144. The Prophecies considered apart according to the same distinction of Times and Persons p. 158. The Truth of these Extraordinary Facts call'd Miracles and Prophecies and the Reasonableness of those