to any that would abuse it to confirm and countenance delusions and impostures Nicodemus his reasoning was very plain and convictive when he concludes that Christ must needs be a Teacher come from God for that no man could do those Miracles that he did except God were with him The force of which argument lies here that nothing but a Divine power can work Miracles and that Almighty God cannot be supposed miraculously to assist any but those whom he himself sends upon his own errand The stupid and barbarous Lycaonians when they beheld the Man who had been a Cripple from his Mothers womb cured by S. Paul in an instant only with the speaking of a word saw that there was something in it more than humane and therefore concluded that the Gods were come down to them in the likeness of Men. Upon this account S. Paul reckons Miracles among the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the signs and evidences of an Apostle whom therefore Chrysostom brings in elegantly pleading for himself that though he could not shew as the signs of his Priesthood and Ministry long Robes and gaudy Vestments with Bells sounding at their borders as the Aaronical Priests did of old though he had no golden Crowns or holy Mitres yet could he produce what was infinitely more venerable and regardable than all these unquestionable Signs and Miracles He came not with Altars and Oblations with a number of strange and symbolick Rites but what was greater raised the dead cast out Devils cured the blind healed the lame making the Gentiles obedient by word and deed thorough many signs and wonders wrought by the power of the spirit of God These were the things that clearly shewed that their mission and ministry was not from men nor taken up of their own heads but that they acted herein by a Divine warrant and authority That therefore it might plainly appear to the World that they did not falsify in what they said or deliver any more than God had given them in commission he enabled them to do strange and miraculous operations bearing them witness both with signs and wonders and with divers miracles and gifts of the Holy Ghost This was a power put into the first draught of their commission when confined only to the Cities of Israel As ye go preach saying The Kingdom of Heaven is at hand Heal the sick cleanse the lepers raise the dead cast out Devils freely you have received freely give but more fully confirmed upon them when our Lord went to Heaven then he told them that these signs should follow them that believe that in his Name they should cast out Devils and speak with new tongues that they should take up serpents and if they drank any deadly thing it should not hurt them that they should lay hands on the sick and they should recover And the event was accordingly for they went forth and preached every where the Lord working with them and confirming the word with signs following When Paul and Barnabas came up to the Council at Jerusalem this was one of the first things they gave an account of all the multitude keeping silence while they declared what miracles and wonders God had wrought among the Gentiles by them Thus the very shadow of Peter as he passed by cured the sick thus God wrought special miracles by the hands of Paul so that from his body were brought unto the sick handkerchiefs or aprons and the diseases departed from them and the evil spirits went out of them So that besides the innate characters of Divinity which the Christian religion brought along with it containing nothing but what was highly reasonable and very becoming God to reveal it had the highest external evidence that any Religion was capable of the attestation of great and unquestionable Miracles done not once or twice not privately and in corners not before a few simple and credulous persons but frequently and at every turn publickly and in places of the most solemn concourse before the wisest and most judicious enquirers and this power of miracles continued not only during the Apostles time but for some Ages after X. But because besides Miracles in general the Scripture takes particular notice of many gifts and powers of the Holy Ghost conferred upon the Apostles and first Preachers of the Gospel it may not be amiss to consider some of the chiefest and most material of them as we find them enumerated by the Apostle only premising this observation that though these gifts were distinctly distributed to persons of an inferiour order so that one had this and another that yet were they probably all conferr'd upon the Apostles and doubtless in larger proportions than upon the rest First we take notice of the gift of Prophecy a clear evidence of divine inspiration and an extraordinary mission the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy It had been for many Ages the signal and honourable priviledge of the Jewish Church and that the Christian Oeconomy might challenge as sacred regards from men and that it might appear that God had not withdrawn his Spirit from his Church in this new state of things it was revived under the dispensation of the Gospel according to that famous Prophecy of Joel exactly accomplished as Peter told the Jews upon the day of Pentecost when the miraculous gifts of the Holy Ghost were so plentifully shed upon the Apostles and Primitive Christians This is that which was spoken by the Prophet Joel It shall come to pass in the last days saith God I will pour out of my spirit upon all flesh and your Sons and your Daughters shall prophesie and your young Men shall see Visions and your old Men shall dream Dreams and on my servants and on my Hand-maidens I will pour out in those days of my spirit and they shall prophesie It lay in general in revealing and making known to others the mind of God but discovered it self in particular instances partly in foretelling things to come and what should certainly happen in after-times a thing set beyond the reach of any finite understanding for though such effects as depend upon natural agents or moral and political causes may be foreseen by studious and considering persons yet the knowledge of futurities things purely contingent that meerly depend upon mens choice and their mutable and uncertain wills can only fall under his view who at once beholds things past present and to come Now this was conferred upon the Apostles and some of the first Christians as appears from many instances in the History of the Apostolick Acts and we find the Apostles writings frequently interspersed with prophetical predictions concerning the great apostasie from the faith the universal corruption and degeneracy of manners the rise of particular heresies the coming of Antichrist and several another things which the spirit said expresly should come to pass in the latter times besides that S. John's whole Book of
threefold denial had given so much cause to question should now by a threefold confession give more than ordinary assurance of his sincere affection to his Master Peter was a little troubled at this frequent questioning of his love and therefore more expresly appeals to our Lord's omnisciency that He who knew all things must needs know that he loved him To each of these confessions our Lord added this signal trial of his affection then Feed my sheep that is faithfully instruct and teach them carefully rule and guide them perswade not compel them feed not fleece nor kill them And so 't is plain S. Peter himself understood it by the charge which he gives to the Guides and Rulers of the Church that they should feed the Flock of God taking the over-sight thereof not by constraint but willingly not for filthy lucre but of a ready mind Neither as being Lords over God's heritage but as examples to the flock But that by feeding Christ's Sheep and Lambs here commended to S. Peter should be meant an universal and uncontrollable Monarchy and Dominion over the whole Christian Church and that over the Apostles themselves and their Successors in ordinary and this power and supremacy solely invested in S. Peter and those who were to succeed him in the See of Rome is so wild an inference and such a melting down words to run into any shape as could never with any face have been offered or been possible to have been imposed upon the belief of mankind if men had not first subdued their reason to their interest and captivated both to an implicite faith and a blind obedience For granting that our Lord here addressed his speech only unto Peter yet the very same power in equivalent terms is elsewhere indifferently granted to all the Apostles and in some measure to the ordinary Pastors and Governours of the Church As when our Lord told them That all power was given him in Heaven and in Earth by vertue whereof they should go teach and baptize all Nations and preach the Gospel to every Creature That they should feed God's flock Rule well inspect and watch over those over whom they had the Authority and the Rule Words of as large and more express signification than those which were here spoken to S. Peter 5. OUR Lord having thus engaged Peter to a chearful compliance with the dangers that might attend the discharge and execution of his Office now particularly intimates to him what that fate was that should attend him telling him that though when he was young he girt himself lived at his own pleasure and went whither he pleased yet when he was old he should stretch forth his hands and another should gird and bind him and lead him whither he had no mind to go intimating as the Evangelist tells us by what death he should glorifie God that is by Crucifixion the Martyrdom which he afterward underwent And then rising up commanded him to follow him by this bodily attendance mystically implying his conformity to the death of Christ that he should follow him in dying for the truth and testimony of the Gospel It was not long after that our Lord appeared to them to take his last farewell of them when leading them out unto Bethany a little Village upon the Mount of Olives he briefly told them That they were the persons whom he had chosen to be the witnesses both of his Death and Resurrection a testimony which they should bear to him in all parts of the World In order to which he would after his Ascension pour out his Spirit upon them in larger measures than they had hitherto received that they might be the better fortified to grapple with that violent rage and fury wherewith both Men and Devils would endeavour to oppose them and that in the mean time they should return to Jerusalem and stay till these miraculous powers were from on high conferred upon them His discourse being ended laying his hands upon them he gave them his solemn blessing which done he was immediately taken from them and being attended with a glorious guard and train of Angels was received up into Heaven Antiquity tells us that in the place where he last trod upon the rock the impression of his feet did remain which could never afterwards be fill'd up or impaired over which Helena Mother of the Great Constantine afterwards built a little Chappel called the Chappel of the Ascension in the floor whereof upon a whitish kind of stone modern Travellers tell us that the impression of his Foot is shewed at this day but 't is that of his right foot only the other being taken away by the Turks and as 't is said kept in the Temple at Jerusalem Our Lord being thus taken from them the Apostles were filled with a greater sense of his glory and majesty than while he was wont familiarly to converse with them and having performed their solemn adorations to him returned back to Jerusalem waiting for the promise of the Holy Ghost which was shortly after conferred upon them They worshipped him and returned to Jerusalem with great joy They who lately were overwhelmed with sorrow at the very mention of their Lord's departure from them entertained it now with joy and triumph being fully satisfied of his glorious advancement at God's right hand and of that particular care and providence which they were sure he would exercise towards them in pursuance of those great trusts he had committed to them SECT VII S. Peter's Acts from our Lord's Ascension till the Dispersion of the Church The Apostles return to Jerusalem The 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or upper-room where they assembled what Peter declares the necessity of a new Apostles being chosen in the room of Judas The promise of the Holy Ghost made good upon the day of Pentecost The Spirit descended in the likeness of fiery cloven tongues and why The greatness of the Miracle Peter's vindication of the Apostles from the slanders of the Jews and proving Christ to be the promised Messiah Great numbers converted by his Sermon His going up to the Temple What their stated hours of Prayer His curing the impotent Gripple there and discourse to the Jews upon it What numbers converted by him Peter and John seised and cast into Prison Brought before the Sanhedrim and their resolute carriage there Their refusing to obey when commanded not to preach Christ. The great security the Christian Religion provides for subjection to Magistrates in all lawful instances of Obedience The severity used by Peter towards Ananias and Saphirak The great Miracles wrought by him Again cast into Prison and delivered by an Angel Their appearing before the Sanhedrim and deliverance by the prudent counsels of Gamaliel 1. THE Holy Jesus being gone to Heaven the Apostles began to act according to the Power and Commission he had left with them In order whereunto the first thing they did after his Ascension was to fill up the
plainly confessed that he could be content 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to die a thousand times over were he but assured that those things were true and being condemned concludes his Apologie with this farewell And now Gentlemen I am going off the stage it 's your lot to live and mine to die but whether of us two shall fare better is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 unknown to any but to God alone But our blessed Saviour has put the case past all peradventure having plainly published this doctrine to the World and sealed the truth of it and that by raising others from the dead and especially by his own Resurrection and Ascension which were the highest pledge and assurance of a future Immortality But besides the security he hath given the clearest account of the nature of it 'T is very probable that the Jews generally had of old as 't is certain they have at this day the most gross and carnal apprehensions concerning the state of another Life But to us the Gospel has perspicuously revealed the invisible things of the other World told us what that Heaven is which is promised to good men a state of spiritual joys of chaste and rational delights a conformity of ours to the Divine Nature a being made like to God and an endless and uninterrupted communion with him 9. BUT because in our lapsed and degenerate state we are very unable without some foreign assistance to attain the promised rewards hence arises in the next place another great priviledge of the Evangelical Oeconomy that it is blessed with larger and more abundant communications of the Divine Spirit than was afforded under the Jewish state Under the one it was given by drops under the other it is poured forth The Law laid heavy and hard commands but gave little strength to do them it did not assist humane nature with those powerful aids that are necessary for us in our present state it could do nothing in that it was weak through the flesh and by reason of the weakness and unprofitableness thereof it could make nothing perfect 'T was this made it an heavy yoke when the commands of it were uncouth and troublesome and the assistances so small and inconsiderable Whereas now the Gospel does not only prescribe such Laws as are happily accommodate to the true temper of humane nature and adapted to the reason of mankind such as every wise and prudent man must have pitched upon but it affords the influences of the Spirit of God by whose assistance our vitiated faculties are repaired and we enabled under so much weakness and in the midst of so many temptations to hold on in the paths of piety and vertue Hence it is that the plentiful effusions of the Spirit were reserved as the great blessing of the Evangelical state that God would then pour water upon him that is thirsty and floods upon the dry ground that he would pour out his Spirit upon their seed and his blessing upon their off-spring whereby they should spring up as among the grass as willows by the water-courses That he would give them a new heart and put his Spirit within them and cause them to walk in his statutes and keep his judgments to do them And this is the meaning of those branches of the Covenant so oft repeated I will put my Law into their minds and write it in their hearts that is by the help of my Grace and Spirit I 'le enable them to live according to my Laws as readily and willingly as if they were written in their hearts For this reason the Law is compared to a dead letter the Gospel to the Spirit that giveth life thence stiled the ministration of the Spirit and as such said to exceed in glory and that to such a degree that what glory the Legal Dispensation had in this case is eclipsed into nothing For even that which was made glorious had no glory in this respect by reason of the glory that excelleth for if that which was done away was glorious much more that which remaineth is glorious Hence the Spirit is said to be Christ's peculiar mission I will pray the Father and he will send you another comforter even the Spirit of truth which was done immediately after his Ascension when he ascended up on high and gave gifts to men even the Holy Ghost which he shed on them abundantly through Jesus Christ our Saviour For the Holy Ghost was not yet given because that Jesus was not yet glorified Not but that he was given before even under the old Oeconomy but not in those large and diffusive measures wherein it was afterwards communicated to the World 10. FIFTHLY The Dispensation of the Gospel had a better establishment and confirmation than that of the Law for though the Law was introduced with great scenes of pomp and Majesty yet was the Gospel ushered in by more kindly and rational methods ratified by more and greater miracles whereby our Lord unquestionably evinced his Divine Commission and shewed that he came from God doing more miracles in three years than were done through all the periods of the Jewish Church and many of them such as were peculiar to him alone He often raised the dead which Moses never did commanded the winds and waves of the Sea expelled Devils out of Lunaticks and possessed persons who fled assoon as ever he commanded them to be gone cured many inveterate and chronical distempers with the speaking of a word and some without a word spoken vertue silently going out from him He searched men's hearts and revealed the most secret transactions of their minds had this miraculous power always residing in him and could exert it when and upon what occasions he pleased and impart it to others communicating it to his Apostles and followers and to the Primitive Christians for the three first Ages of the Church he never exerted it in methods of dread and terror but in doing such miracles as were highly useful and beneficial to the World And as if all this had not been enough he laid down his own life after all to give testimony to it Covenants were ever wont to be ratified with bloud and the death of sacrifices But when our Lord came to introduce the Covenant of the Gospel he did not consecrate it with the bloud of Bulls and Goats but with his own most precious bloud as of a Lamb without spot and blemish And could he give a greater testimony to the truth of his doctrine and those great things he had promised to the World than to seal it with his bloud Had not these things been so 't were infinitely unreasonable to suppose that a person of so much wisdom and goodness as our Saviour was should have made the World believe so and much less would he have chosen to die for it and that the most acute and ignominious death But he died and rose again for us and appeared after his Resurrection His
vacancy in their Colledge lately made by the unhappy fall and Apostasie of Judas To which end no sooner were they returned to Jerusalem but they went 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 into an upper-room Where this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was whether in the house of S. John or of John-Mark's Mother or in some of the out-rooms belonging to the Temple for the Temple had over the Cloisters several Chambers for the service of the Priests and Levites and as Repositories where the consecrated Vessels and Utensils of the Temple were laid up though it be not probable that the Jews and especially the Priests would suffer the Apostles and their company to be so near the Temple I stand not to enquire 'T is certain that the Jews usually had their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 private Oratories in the upper parts of their houses called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for the more private exercises of their devotions Thus Daniel had his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 his upper-Chamber 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the LXX render it whither he was wont to retire to pray to his God and Benjamin the Jew tells us that in his time Ann. Chr. 1172. the Jews at Babylon were wont to pray both in their Synagogues 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and in that ancient upper-room of Daniel which the Prophet himself built Such an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or upper-Chamber was that wherein S. Paul preached at Troas and such probably this where the Apostles were now met together and in all likelihood the same where our Lord had lately kept the Passeover where the Apostles and the Church were assembled on the day of Pentecost and which was then the usual place of their Religious Assemblies as we have elsewhere observed more at large Here the Church being met to the number of about CXX Peter as President of the Assembly put them in mind that Judas one of our Lord's Apostles being betrayed by his own covetous and insatiable mind had lately fallen from the honour of his place and ministery that this was no more than what the Prophet had long since foretold should come to pass and that the rule and over-sight in the Church which had been committed unto him should be devolved upon another that therefore it was highly necessary that one should be substituted in his room and especially such a one as had been familiarly conversant with our Saviour from first to last that so he might be a competent witness both of his doctrine and miracles his life and death but especially of his Resurrection from the dead For seeing no evidence is so valid and satisfactory as the testimony of an eye-witness the Apostles all along mainly insisted upon this that they delivered no other things concerning our Saviour to the World than what they themselves had seen and heard And seeing his rising from the Dead was a principle likely to meet with a great deal of opposition and which would hardliest gain belief and entertainment with the minds of men therefore they principally urg'd this at every turn that they were eye-witnesses of his Resurrection that they had seen felt eaten and familiarly conversed with him after his return from the Grave That therefore such an Apostle might be chosen two Candidates were proposed Joseph called Barsabas and Matthias And having prayed that the Divine Providence would immediately guide and direct the choice they cast lots and the lot fell upon Matthias who was accordingly admitted into the number of the twelve Apostles 2. FIFTY days since the last Passeover being now run out made way for the Feast of Pentecost At what time the great promise of the Holy Ghost was fully made good unto them The Christian Assembly being met together for the publick services of their Worship on a sudden a sound like that of a mighty wind rush'd in upon them representing the powerful efficacy of that Divine Spirit that was now to be communicated to them After which there appeared little flames of fire which in the fashion of Cloven Tongues not only descended but sate upon each of them probably to note their perpetual enjoyment of this gift upon all occasions that when necessary they should never be without it not like the Prophetick gifts of old which were conferred but sparingly and only at some particular times and seasons As the seventy Elders prophesied and ceased not but it was only at such times as the Spirit came down and rested upon them Hereupon they were all immediately filled with the Holy Ghost which enabled them in an instant to speak several Languages which they had never learn'd and probably never heard of together with other miraculous gifts and powers Thus as the confounding of Languages became a curse to the old World separating men from all mutual offices of kindness and commerce rendring one part of Mankind Barbarians to another so here the multiplying several Languages became a blessing being intended as the means to bring men of all Nations into the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God into the fellowship of that Religion that would banish discords cement differences and unite mens hearts in the bond of peace The report of so sudden and strange an action presently spread it self into all corners of the City and there being at that time at Jerusalem multitudes of Jewish Proselytes Devout men out of every Nation under Heaven Parthians Medes Elamites or Persians the dwellers in Mesopotamia and Judaea Cappadocia Pontus and Asia minor from Phrygia and Pamphylia from Egypt and the parts of Libya and Cyrene from Rome from Crete from Arabia Jews and Proselytes probably drawn thither by the general report and expectation which had spread it self over all the Eastern parts and in a manner over all places of the Roman Empire of the Jewish Messiah that about this time should be born at Jerusalem they no sooner heard of it but universally flocked to this Christian Assembly where they were amazed to hear these Galileans speaking to them in their own native Languages so various so vastly different from one another And it could not but exceedingly encrease the wonder to reflect upon the meanness and inconsiderableness of the persons neither assisted by natural parts nor polished by education nor improved by use and custom which three things Philosophers require to render a man accurate and extraordinary in any art or discipline 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 says Plutarch Natural disposition without institution is blind instruction without a genius and disposition is defective and exercise without both is lame and imperfect Whereas these Disciples had not one of these to set them off their parts were mean below the rate of the common people the Galileans being generally accounted the rudest and most stupid of the whole Jewish Nation their education had been no higher than to catch Fish and to mend Nets nor had they been used to plead causes or to deliver themselves
away rejoycing But what the carriage of Christians was in this matter in the first and best ages of the Gospel we have in another place sufficiently discovered to the World We may not withhold our obedience till the Magistrate invades God's Throne and countermands his authority and may then appeal to the sence of Mankind whether it be not most reasonable that God's authority should first take place as the Apostles here appealed to their very Judges themselves Nor do we find that the Sanhedrim did except against the Plea At least whatever they thought yet not daring to punish them for fear of the People they only threatned them and let them go who thereupon presently return'd to the rest of the Apostles and Believers 8. The Church exceedingly multiplied by these means And that so great a Company most whereof were poor might be maintained they generally sold their Estates and brought the Money to the Apostles to be by them deposited in one common Treasury and thence distributed according to the several exigences of the Church which gave occasion to this dreadful Instance Ananias and his Wife Saphira having taken upon them the profession of the Gospel according to the free and generous spirit of those times had consecrated and devoted their Estate to the honour of God and the necessities of the Church And accordingly sold their Possessions and turned them into Money But as they were willing to gain the reputation of charitable Persons so were they loth wholly to cast themselves upon the Divine Providence by letting go all at once and therefore privately withheld part of what they had devoted and bringing the rest laid it at the Apostles feet hoping herein they might deceive the Apostles though immediately guided by the Spirit of God But Peter at his first coming in treated Ananias with these sharp enquiries Why he would suffer Satan to fill his heart with so big a wickedness as by keeping back part of his estate to think to deceive the Holy Ghost That before it was sold it was wholly at his own disposure and after it was perfectly in his own power fully to have performed his vow So that it was capable of no other interpretation than that herein he had not only abused and injured men but mocked God and what in him lay lyed to and cheated the Holy Ghost who he knew was privy to the most secret thoughts and purposes of his heart This was no sooner said but suddenly to the great terror and amazement of all that were present Ananias was arrested with a stroke from Heaven and fell down dead to the ground Not long after his Wise came in whom Peter entertained with the same severe reproofs wherewith he had done her Husband adding that the like sad fate and doom should immediately seize upon her who thereupon dropt down dead As she had been Copartner with him in the Sin becoming sharer with him in the punishment An instance of great severity filling all that heard of it with fear and terror and became a seasonable prevention of that hypocrisie and dissimulation wherewith many might possibly think to have imposed upon the Church 9. THIS severe Case being extraordinary the Apostles usually exerted their power in such Miracles as were more useful and beneficial to the World Curing all manner of Diseases and dispossessing Devils In so much that they brought the Sick into the Streets and laid them upon Beds and Couches that at least Peter's shadow as he passed by might come upon them These astonishing Miracles could not but mightily contribute to the propagation of the Gospel and convince the World that the Apostles were more considerable Persons than they took them for poverty and meanness being no bar to true worth and greatness And methinks Erasmus his reflection here is not unseasonable that no honour or soveraignty no power or dignity was comparable to this glory of the Apostle that the things of Christ though in another way were more noble and excellent than any thing that this World could afford And therefore he tells us that when he beheld the state and magnificence wherewith Pope Julius the Second appeared first at Bononia and then at Rome equalling the triumphs of a Pompey or a Caesar he could not but think how much all this was below the greatness and majesty of S. Peter who converted the World not by Power or Armies not by Engines or artifices of pomp and grandeur but by Faith in the power of Christ and drew it to the admiration of himself and the same state says he would no doubt attend the Apostles Successors were they Men of the same temper and holiness of life The Jewish Rulers alarm'd with this News and awakened with the growing numbers of the Church sent to apprehend the Apostles and cast them into Prison But God who is never wanting to his own cause sent that Night an Angel from Heaven to open the Prison doors commanding them to repair to the Temple and to the exercise of their Ministery Which they did early in the Morning and there taught the People How unsuccessful are the projects of the wisest Statesmen when God frowns upon them how little do any counsels against Heaven prosper In vain is it to shut the doors where God is resolved to open them the firmest Bars the strongest Chains cannot hold where once God has designed and decreed our liberty The Officers returning the next Morning found the Prison shut and guarded but the Prisoners gone Wherewith they acquainted the Council who much wondred at it but being told where the Apostles were they sent to bring them without any noise or violence before the Sanhedrim where the High-Priest asked them how they durst go on to propagate that Doctrine which they had so strictly commanded them not to preach Peter in the name of the rest told them That they must in this case obey God rather than men That though they had so barbarously and contumeliously treated the Lord Jesus yet that God had raised him up and exalted him to be a Prince and a Saviour to give both repentance and remission of sins That they were witnesses of these things and so were those Miraculous Powers which the Holy Ghost conferred upon all true Christians Vexed was the Council with this Answer and began to consider how to cut them off But Gamaliel a grave and learned Senator having commanded the Apostles to withdraw bad the Council take heed what they did to them putting them in mind that several persons had heretofore raised parties and factions and drawn vast Numbers after them but that they had miscarried and they and their designs come to nought that therefore they should do well to let these men alone that if their doctrines and designs were merely humane they would in time of themselves fall to the ground but if they were of God it was not all their power and policies would be able to defeat and overturn them and that
raised by Demetrius and his party S. Paul ' s first Epistle to the Corinthians upon what occasion written His Epistle to Titus Apollonius Tyanaeus whether at Ephesus at the same time with S. Paul His Miracles pretended to be done in that City 1. AFTER his departure from Athens he went to Corinth the Metropolis of Greece and the residence of the Proconsul of Achaia where he found Aquila and Priscilla lately come from Italy banished out of Rome by the Decree of Claudius And they being of the same trade and profession wherein he had been educated in his youth he wrought together with them lest he should be unnecessarily burdensom unto any which for the same reason he did in some other places Hither after some time Silas and Timothy came to him In the Synagogue he frequently disputed with the Jewes and Proselytes reasoning and proving that Jesus was the true Messiah They according to the nature of the men made head and opposed him and what they could not conquer by argument and force of reason they endeavoured to carry by noise and clamour mixed with blasphemies and revilings the last refuges of an impotent and baffled cause Whereat to testifie his resentment he shook his Garments and told them since he saw them resolved to pull down vengeance and destruction upon their own heads he for his part was guiltless and innocent and would henceforth address himself unto the Gentiles Accordingly he left them and went into the house of Justus a religious Proselyte where by his preaching and the many miracles which he wrought he converted great Numbers to the Faith Amongst which were Crispus the Chief Ruler of the Synagogue Gaius and Stephanus who together with their Families embraced the Doctrine of the Gospel and were baptized into the Christian Faith But the constant returns of malice and ingratitude are enough to tire the largest charity and cool the most generous resolution therefore that the Apostle might not be discouraged by the restless attempts and machinations of his enemies our Lord appeared to him in a Vision told him that notwithstanding the bad success he had hitherto met with there was a great Harvest to be gathered in that place that he should not be afraid of his enemies but go on to preach confidently and securely for that he himself would stand by him and preserve him 2. ABOUT this time as is most probable he wrote his first Epistle to the Thessalonians Silas and Timothy being lately returned from thence and having done the message for which he had sent them thither The main design of the Epistle is to confirm them in the belief of the Christian Religion and that they would persevere in it notwithstanding all the afflictions and persecutions which he had told them would ensue upon their profession of the Gospel and to instruct them in the main duties of a Christian and Religious life While the Apostle was thus employed the malice of the Jewes was no less at work against him and universally combining together they brought him before Gallio the Proconsul of the Province elder Brother to the famous Seneca Before him they accused the Apostle as an Innovator in Religion that sought to introduce a new way of worship contrary to what was established by the Jewish Law and permitted by the Roman Powers The Apostle was ready to have pleaded his own cause but the Proconsul told them that had it been a matter of right or wrong that had fall'n under the cognizance of the Civil Judicature it had been very fit and reasonable that he should have heard and determined the case but since the controversie was only concerning the punctilio's and niceties of their Religion it was very improper for him to be a Judge in such matters And when they still clamoured about it he threw out their Indictment and commanded his Officers to drive them out of Court Whereupon some of the Towns-men seized upon Sosthenes one of the Rulers of the Jewish Consistory a man active and busie in this Insurrection and beat him even before the Court of Judicature the Proconsul not at all concerning himself about it A year and an half Saint Paul continued in this place and before his departure thence wrote his second Epistle to the Thessalonians to supply the want of his coming to them which in his former he had resolved on and for which in a manner he had engaged his promise In this therefore he endeavours again to confirm their minds in the truth of the Gospel and that they would not be shaken with those troubles which the wicked unbelieving Jewes would not cease to create them a lost and undone race of men and whom the Divine vengeance was ready finally to overtake And because some passages in his former Letter relating to this destruction had been mis-understood as if this day of the Lord were just then at hand he rectifies those mistakes and shews what must precede our Lord's coming unto Judgment 3. S. PAUL having thus fully planted and cultivated the Church at Corinth resolved now for Syria And taking along with him Aquila and Priscilla at Cenchrea the Port and Harbour of Corinth Aquila for of him it is certainly to be understood shaved his head in performance of a Nazarite-Vow he had formerly made the time whereof was now run out In his passage into Syria he came to Ephesus where he preached a while in the Synagogue of the Jewes And though desired to stay with them yet having resolved to be at Jerusalem at the Passeover probably that he might have the fitter opportunity to meet his friends and preach the Gospel to those vast numbers that usually flock'd to that great solemnity he promised that in his return he would come again to them Sailing thence he landed at Caesarea and thence went up to Jerusalem where having visited the Church and kept the Feast he went down to Antioch Here having staid some time he traversed the Countries of Galatia and Phrygia confirming as he went the new-converted Christians and so came to Ephesus where finding certain Christian Disciples he enquired of them whether since their conversion they had received the miraculous gifts and powers of the Holy Ghost They told him that the Doctrine which they had received had nothing in it of that nature nor had they ever heard that any such extraordinary Spirit had of late been bestowed upon the Church Hereupon he further enquired unto what they had been baptized the Christian Baptism being administred in the name of the Holy Ghost They answered they had received no more than John's Baptism which though it obliged men to repentance yet did it explicitly speak nothing of the Holy Ghost or its gifts and powers To this the Apostle replied That though John's Baptism did openly oblige to nothing but Repentance yet that it did implicitly acknowledge the whole Doctrine concerning Christ and the Holy Ghost Whereto they assenting were solemnly initiated by Christian
and exhibited that spiritual impurity from which men were to abstain The Moral Laws founded in the natural notions of mens minds concerning good and evil directly urged men to duty and prohibited their prevarications These three made up the intire Code and Pandects of the Jewish Statutes all which our Apostle comprehends under the general notion of the Law and not the moral Law singly and separately considered in which sence it never appears that the Jews expected justification and salvation by it nay rather that they looked for it meerly from the observance of the ritual and ceremonial Law so that the moral Law is no further considered by him in this question than as it made up a part of the Mosaical constitution of that National and Political Covenant which God made with the Jews at Mount Sinai Hence the Apostle all along in his discourses constantly opposes the Law and the Gospel and the observation of the one to the belief and practice of the other which surely he would not have done had he simply intended the moral Law it being more expresly incorporated into the Gospel than ever it was into the Law of Moses And that the Apostle does thus oppose the Law and Gospel might be made evident from the continued series of his discourses but a few places shall suffice By what Law says the Apostle is boasting excluded by the Law of works i. e. by the Mosaic Law in whose peculiar priviledges and prerogatives the Jews did strangely flatter and pride themselves Nay but by the Law of Faith i. e. by the Gospel or the Evangelical way of God's dealing with us And elsewhere giving an account of this very controversie between the Jewish and Gentile Converts he first opposes their Persons Jews by nature and sinners of the Gentiles and then infers that a man is not justified by the works of the Law by those legal observances whereby the Jewes expected to be justified but by the faith of Christ by a hearty belief of and compliance with that way which Christ has introduced for by the works of the Law by legal obedience no flesh neither Jew nor Gentile shall now be justified Fain would I learn whether you received the spirit by the works of the Law or by the hearing of Faith that is whether you became partakers of the miraculous powers of the Holy Ghost while you continued under the legal dispensation or since you embraced the Gospel and the faith of Christ and speaking afterwards of the state of the Jews before the revelation of the Gospel says he before faith came we were kept under the Law i. e. before the Gospel came we were kept under the Discipline of the legal Oeconomy shut up unto the faith reserved for the discovery of the Evangelical dispensation which should afterwards in its due time be revealed to the World This in the following Chapter he discourses more at large Tell me ye that desire to be under the Law i. e. Ye Jews that so fondly dote upon the legal state Do ye not hear the Law i. e. Understand what your own Law does so clearly intimate and then goes on to unriddle what was wrapt up in the famous Allegory of Abraham's two Sons by his two Wives The one Ishmael born of Hagar the Bond-woman who denoted the Jewish Covenant made at Mount Sinai which according to the representation of her condition was a servile state The other Isaac born of Sarah the Free-woman was the Son of the promise denoting Jerusalem that is above and is free the mother of us all i. e. The state and covenant of the Gospel whereby all Christians as the spiritual children of Abraham are set free from the bondage of the Mosaic dispensation By all which it is evident that by Law and the works of the Law in this controversie the Apostle understands the Law of Moses and that obedience which the legal dispensation required at their hands 8. WE are secondly to enquire what the Apostle means by Faith and he commonly uses it two ways 1. More generally for the Gospel or that Evangelical way of justification and salvation which Christ has brought in in opposition to Circumcision and the observation of those Rites by which the Jews expected to be justified and this is plain from the preceding opposition where Faith as denoting the Gospel is frequently opposed to the Law of Moses 2. Faith is taken more particularly for a practical belief or such an assent to the Evangelical revelation as produces a sincere obedience to the Laws of it and indeed as concerned in this matter is usually taken not for this or that single virtue but for the intire condition of the New Covenant as comprehending all that duty that it requires of us than which nothing can be more plain and evident In Christ Jesus i. e. under the Gospel neither Circumcision availeth any thing nor Uncircumcision 't is all one to Justification whether a Man be circumcised or no What then but Faith which worketh by love which afterwards he explains thus In Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth any thing nor uncircumcision but a new creature a renewed and divine temper of mind and a new course and state of life And lest all this should not be thought plain enough he elsewhere tells us that circumcision is nothing and uncircumcision is nothing but the keeping the Commandments of God From which places there needs no skill to infer that that Faith whereby we are justified contains in it a new disposition and state both of heart and life and an observation of the Laws of Christ in which respect the Apostle does in the very same Verse expound believing by obeying of the Gospel Such he assures us was that very Faith by which Abraham was justified who against all probabilities of reason believed in God's promise he staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief but was strong c. that is he so firmly believed what God had promised that he gave him the glory of his truth and faithfulness his infinite power and ability to do all things And how did he that by acting suitably in a way of intire resignation and sincere obedience to the divine will and pleasure so the Apostle elsewhere more expresly by Faith he obeyed and went out not knowing whither he went This Faith he tells us was imputed to Abraham for righteousness that is God by vertue of the New Covenant made in Christ was graciously pleased to look upon this obedience though in it self imperfect as that for which he accounted him and would deal with him as a just and a righteous Man And upon this account we find Abraham's faith opposed to a perfect and unsinning obedience for thus the Apostle tells us that Abraham was justified by faith in opposition to his being justified by such an absolute and compleat obedience as might have enabled him to challenge the reward by
Dreams the Jews distinguish into two sorts Monitory such as were sent only by way of instruction and admonition to give Men notice of what they were to do or warning of what they should avoid such were the Dreams of Pharaoh Abimelech Laban c. or else they were Prophetical when God by such a powerful energy acted upon the mind and imagination of the Prophet as carried the strength and force of a Divine evidence along with it This was sometimes done by a clear and distinct impression of the thing upon the mind without any dark or enigmatical representation of it such as God made to Samuel when he first revealed himself to him in the Temple sometimes by apparition yet so as the Man though a-sleep was able to discern an Angel conversing with him By Visions God usually communicated himself two ways First when something really appeared to the sight thus Moses beheld the Bush burning and stood there while God conversed with him Manoah and his Wife saw the Angel while he took his leave and in a flaming Pyramid went up to Heaven the three Angels appeared to Abraham a little before the fatal ruine of Sodom all which apparitions were unquestionably true and real the Angel assuming an humane shape that he might the freelier converse with and deliver his message to those to whom he was sent Secondly by powerful impressions upon the imagination usually done while the Prophet was awake and had the free and uninterrupted exercise of his reason though the Vision oft over-powered and cast him into a trance that the Soul being more retired from sensible objects might the closer intend those Divine notices that were represented to it Thus all the Prophets had the Idea's of those things that they were to deliver to the People the more strongly impressed upon their fancies and this commonly when they were in the greatest solitude and privacy and their powers most called in that the Prophetical influx might have the greater force upon them In some such way S. Paul was caught up into the third Heaven probably not so much by any real separation of his Soul from his Body or local translation of his Spirit thither as by a profound abstraction of it from his corporeal Senses God during the time of the trance entertaining it with an internal and admirable scene of the glory and happiness of that state as truly and effectually as if his Soul had been really conveyed thither 14. THIRDLY God was wont to communicate his mind by immediate Inspirations whereby he immediately transacted with the understandings of Men without any relation to their fancy or their senses It was the most pacate and serene way of Prophecy God imparting his mind to the Prophet not by Dreams or Visions but while they were awake their powers active and their minds calm and undisturbed This the Jews call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Holy Spirit or that kind of Revelation that was directly conveyed into the mind by the most efficacious irradiation and inspiration of the Holy Spirit God by these Divine illapses enabling the Prophet clearly and immediately to apprehend the things delivered to him And in this way the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or holy Writings were dictated and conveyed to the World in which respect the Apostle says that all Scripture is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 given by divine inspiration The highest pitch of this Prophetical revelation was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the gradus Mosaicus or that way of Prophecy that God used towards Moses of whom it is particularly said that the Lord spake unto Moses face to face as a Man speaketh unto his friend and elsewhere it is evidently distinguished from all inferiour ways of Prophecy If there be a Prophet among you I the Lord will make my self known unto him in a Vision and will speak unto him in a Dream my Servant Moses is not so with him I will speak mouth to mouth even apparently and not in dark speeches and the similitude of the Lord shall he behold Clearly implying a mighty preheminence in God's way of revelation to Moses above that of other Prophets which the Jewish Writers make to have lyen in four things First that in all God's communications to Moses he immediately spake to his understanding without any impressions upon fancy any visible appearances any Dreams or Visions of the Night Secondly that Moses had prophecies conveyed to him without any fears or consternations whereas the other Prophets were astonished and weakned at the sight of God Thirdly that Moses had no previous dispositions or preparations to make him capable of the Divine revelation but could directly go to God and consult him as a man speaketh with his friend other Prophets being forced many times by some preparatory arts to invite the Prophetick spirit to come upon them Fourthly that Moses had a freedom and liberty of spirit to prophesie at all times and could when he pleased have recourse to the Sacred Oracle But as to this the Scripture intimates no such thing the spirit of Prophecy retiring from him at some times as well as from the rest of the Prophets And indeed the Prophetick spirit did not reside in the holy men by way of habit but occasionally as God saw fitting to pour it out upon them it was not in them as light is in the Sun but as light in the Air and consequently depended upon the immediate irradiations of the Spirit of God 15. THESE Divine Communications were so conveyed to the minds of the Prophets and inspired persons that they always knew them to be Divine revelations so mighty and perspicuous was the evidence that came along with them that there could be no doubt but they were the birth of Heaven It 's true when the Prophetick spirit at any time seised upon wicked men they understood not its effect upon them nor were in the least improved and bettered by it the revelation passed through them as a sound through a Trunk or water through a Leaden-pipe without any particular and distinct apprehension of the thing or useful impression made upon their minds as is evident besides others in the case of Caiaphas and Balaam of which last the Jews say expresly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that he prophesied according to the will of God but understood not what he prophesied But it was otherwise with the true Prophets they always knew who 't was that acted them and what was the meaning of that intelligence that was communicated to them In the Gentile world when the Daemon entred into the inspired person he was usually carried out to the furious transports of rage and madness But in the Prophets of God although the impulse might sometimes be very strong and violent whence the Prophet Jeremy complains Mine heart within me is broken all my bones shake I am like a drunken man like a man whom wine hath overcome because of the Lord and because of the words of his holiness so
initiating proselytes by Baptism Baptism in use in the Jewish Church It s Original whence His resolution and impartiality His Martyrdom The character given him by Josephus and the Jews The Evangelical Dispensation wherein it exceeds that of Moses It s perspicuity and perfection It s agreeableness to humane nature The Evangelical promises better than those of the Law and in what respects The aids of the Spirit plentifully afforded under the Gospel The admirable confirmation of this Oeconomy The great extent and latitude of it Judaism not capable of being communicated to all mankind The comprehensiveness of the Gospel The Duration of the Evangelical Covenant The Mosaical Statutes in what sence said to be for ever The Typical and transient nature of that State The great happiness of Christians under the Oeconomy of the Gospel 1. GOD having from the very infancy of the World promised the Messiah as the great Redeemer of Mankind was accordingly pleased in all Ages to make gradual discoveries and manifestations of him the revelations concerning him in every Dispensation of the Church still shining with a bigger and more particular light the nearer this Sun of Righteousness was to his rising The first Gospel and glad tidings of him commenced with the fall of Adam God out of infinite tenderness and commiseration promising to send a person who should triumphantly vindicate and rescue mankind from the power and tyranny of their Enemies and that he should do this by taking the humane nature upon him and being born of the seed of the Woman No further account is given of him till the times of Abraham to whom it was revealed that he should proceed out of his loins and arise out of the Jewish Nation though both Jew and Gentile should be made happy by him To his Grandchild Jacob God made known out of what Tribe of that Nation he should rise the Tribe of Judah and what would be the time of his appearing viz. the departure of the Scepter from Judah the abrogation of the Civil and Legislative power of that Tribe and People accomplished in Herod the Idumaean set over them by the Roman power And this is all we find concerning him under that Oeconomy Under the Legal Dispensation we find Moses foretelling one main errand of his coming which was to be the great Prophet of the Church to whom all were to hearken as an extraordinary person sent from God to acquaint the World with the Counsels and the Laws of Heaven The next news we hear of him is from David who was told that he should spring out of his house and family and who frequently speaks of his sufferings and the particular manner of his death by piercing his hands and his feet of his powerful Resurrection that God would not leave his Soul in Hell nor suffer his holy one to see corruption of his triumphant Ascension into Heaven and glorious session at God's right hand From the Prophet Isaiah we have an account of the extraordinary and miraculous manner of his Birth that he should be born of a Virgin and his name be Immanuel of his incomparable furniture of gifts and graces for the execution of his office of the entertainment he was to meet with in the World and of the nature and design of those sufferings which he was to undergo The place of his Birth was foretold by Micah which was to be Bethlehem-Ephratah the least of the Cities of Judah but honoured above all the rest with the nativity of a Prince who was to be Ruler in Israel whose goings forth had been from everlasting Lastly the Prophet Daniel fixes the particular period of his coming expresly affirming That the Messiah should appear in the World and be cut off as a Victim and Expiation for the sins of the people at the expiration of LXX prophetical weeks or CCCCXC years which accordingly punctually came to pass 2. FOR the date of the prophetick Scriptures concerning the time of the Messiah's coming being now run out In the fulness of time God sent his Son made of a Woman made under the Law to redeem them that were under the Law This being the truth of which God spake by the mouth of all his holy Prophets which have been since the World began But because it was not fit that so great a Person should come into the World without an eminent Harbinger to introduce and usher in his Arrival God had promised that he would send his Messenger who should prepare his way before him even Elijah the Prophet whom he would send before the coming of that great day of the Lord who should turn the hearts of the Fathers to the Children c. This was particularly accomplished in John the Baptist who came in the power and spirit of Elias He was the Morning star to the Son of Righteousness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as S. Cyril says of him the great and eminent Fore-runner a Person remarkable upon several accounts First for the extraordinary circumstances of his Nativity his Birth foretold by an Angel sent on purpose to deliver this joyful Message a sign God intended him for great undertakings this being never done but where God designed the Person for some uncommon services his Parents aged and though both righteous before God yet hitherto Childless Heaven does not dispence all its bounty to the same Person Children though great and desirable blessings are yet often denied to those for whom God has otherwise very dear regards Elizabeth was barren and they were both well stricken in years But is any thing too hard for the Lord said God to Abraham in the same case God has the Key of the Womb in his own keeping it is one of the Divine Prerogatives that he makes the barren Woman to keep house and to be a joyful Mother of Children A Son is promised and mighty things said of him a promise which old Zachary had scarce faith enough to digest and therefore had the assurance of it sealed to him by a miraculous dumbness imposed upon him till it was made good the same Miracle at once confirming his faith and punishing his infidelity Accordingly his Mother conceived with Child and as if he would do part of his errand before he was born he leaped in her Womb at her salutation of the Virgin Mary then newly conceived with Child of our Blessed Saviour a piece of homage paid by one to one yet unborn 3. THESE presages were not vain and fallible but produced a Person no less memorable for the admirable strictness and austerity of his life For having escaped Herod's butcherly and merciless Executioners the Divine providence being a shelter and a cover to him and been educated among the rudenesses and solitudes of the Wilderness his manners and way of life were very agreeable to his Education His Garments borrowed from no other Wardrobe than the backs of his Neighbour-creatures the skins of Beasts Camels hair and a Leathern girdle and
almost in the very same terms and words If thine offending Brother prove obstinate tell it unto the Church but if he neglect to hear the Church let him be unto thee as an Heathen and a Publican Verily I say unto you whatsoever ye shall bind on Earth shall be bound in Heaven and whatsoever ye shall loose on Earth shall be loosed in Heaven And elsewhere when ready to leave the World he tells them As my Father hath sent me even so send I you whose soever sins ye remit they are remitted unto them and whose soever sins ye retain they are retained By all which it is evident that our Lord did not here give any personal prerogative to S. Peter as Universal Pastor and Head of the Christian Church much less to those who were to be his Successors in the See of Rome But that as he made this Confession in the name of the rest of the Apostles so what was here promised unto him was equally intended unto all Nor did the more considering and judicious part of the Fathers however giving a mighty reverence to S. Peter ever understand it in any other sence Sure I am that Origen tells us that every true Christian that makes this confession with the same Spirit and Integrity which S. Peter did shall have the same blessing and commendation from Christ conferr'd upon him 4. THE Holy Jesus knowing the time of his Passion to draw on began to prepare the minds of his Apostles against that fatal Hour telling them what hard and bitter things he should suffer at Jerusalem what affronts and indignities he must undergo and be at last put to death with all the arts of torture and disgrace by the Decree of the Jewish Sanhedrim Peter whom our Lord had infinitely encouraged and endeared to him by the great things which he had lately said concerning him so that his spirits were now afloat and his passions ready to over-run the banks not able to endure a thought that so much evil should befall his Master broke out into an over-confident and unseasonable interruption of him He took him and began to rebuke him saying Be it far from thee Lord this shall not be unto thee Besides his great kindness and affection to his Master the minds of the Apostles were not yet throughly purged from the hopes and expectations of a glorious reign of the Messiah so that Peter could not but look upon these sufferings as unbecoming and inconsistent with the state and dignity of the Son of God And therefore thought good to advise his Lord to take care of himself and while there was time to prevent and avoid them This our Lord who valued the redemption of Mankind infinitely before his own ease and safety resented at so high a rate that he returned upon him with this tart and stinging reproof Get thee behind me Satan The very same treatment which he once gave to the Devil himself when he made that insolent proposal to him To fall down and worship him though in Satan it was the result of pure malice and hatred in Peter only an error of love and great regard However our Lord could not but look upon it as mischievous and diabolical counsel prompted and promoted by the great Adversary of Mankind A way therefore says Christ with thy hellish and pernicious counsel Thou art an offence unto me in seeking to oppose and undermine that great design for which I purposely came down from Heaven In this thou savourest not the things of God but those that be of men in suggesting to me those little shifts and arts of safety and self-preservation which humane prudence and the love of mens own selves are wont to dictate to them By which though we may learn Peter's mighty kindness to our Saviour yet that herein he did not take his measures right A plain evidence that his infallibility had not yet taken place 5. ABOUT a week after this our Saviour being to receive a Type and Specimen of his future glorification took with him his three more intimate Apostles Peter and the two sons of Zebedee and went up into a very high Mountain which the Ancients generally conceive to have been Mount Thabor a round and very high Mountain situate in the Plains of Galilee And now was even literally fulfilled what the Psalmist had spoken Tabor and Hermon shall rejoyce in thy Name for what greater joy and triumph than to be peculiarly chosen to be the holy Mount whereon our Lord in so eminent a manner received from God the Father honour and glory and made such magnificent displays of his Divine power and Majesty For while they were here earnestly imployed in Prayer as seldom did our Lord enter upon any eminent action but he first made his address to Heaven he was suddenly transformed into another manner of appearance such a lustre and radiancy darted from his face that the Sun it self shines not brighter at Noon-day such beams of light reflected from his garments as out-did the light it self that was round about them so exceeding pure and white that the Snow might blush to compare with it nor could the Fullers art purifie any thing into half that whiteness an evident and sensible representation of the glory of that state wherein the just shall walk in white and shine as the Sun in the Kingdom of the Father During this Heavenly scene there appeared Moses and Elias who as the Jews say shall come together clothed with all the brightness and majesty of a glorified state familiarly conversing with him and discoursing of the death and sufferings which he was shortly to undergo and his departure into Heaven Behold here together the three greatest persons that ever were the Ministers of Heaven Moses under God the Instituter and promulgator of the Law Elias the great reformer of it when under its deepest degeneracy and corruption and the blessed Jesus the Son of God who came to take away what was weak and imperfect and to introduce a more manly and rational institution and to communicate the last Revelation which God would make of his mind to the World Peter and the two Apostles that were with him were in the mean time fallen asleep heavy through want of natural rest it being probably night when this was done or else over powred with these extraordinary appearances which the frailty and weakness of their present stare could not bear were fallen into a Trance But now awaking were strangely surprised to behold our Lord surrounded with so much glory and those two great persons conversing with him knowing who they were probably by some particular marks and signatures that were upon them or else by immediate revelation or from the discourse which passed betwixt Christ and them or possibly from some communication which they themselves might have with them While these Heavenly guests were about to depart Peter in a great rapture and ecstasie of mind addressed himself to our
they removed to Paphos the residence of Sergius Paulus the Proconsul of the Island a Man of great wisdom and prudence but miserably seduced by the wicked Artifices of Ear-Jesus a Jewish Impostor who called himself Elymas or the Magician vehemently opposed the Apostles and kept the Proconsul from embracing of the Faith Nay one who pretends to be ancient enough to know it seems to intimate that he not only spake but wrote against S. Paul's Doctrine and the Faith of Christ. However the Proconsul calls for the Apostles and S. Paul first takes Elymas to task and having severely checked him for his malicious opposing of the truth told him that the Divine Vengeance was now ready to seize upon him Upon which he was immediately struck blind The Vengeance of God observing herein a kind of just proportion that he should be punished with the loss of his Bodily eyes who had so wilfully and maliciously shut the eyes of his mind against the light of the Gospel and had endeavoured to keep not only himself but others under so much blindness and darkness This Miracle turned the Scale with the Proconsul and quickly brought him over a Convert to the Faith 4. AFTER this success in Cyprus he went to Perga in Pamphilia where taking Titus along with him in the room of Mark who was returned to Jerusalem they went to Antioch the Metropolis of Pisidia Where entring into the Jewish Synagogue on the Sabbath Day after some Sections of the Law were read they were invited by the Rulers of the Synagogue to discourse a little to the People Which S. Paul did in a large and eloquent Sermon wherein he put them in mind of the many great and particular blessings which God had heaped upon the Jews from the first Originals of that Nation that he had crowned them all with the sending of his Son to be the Messiah and the Saviour that though the Jews had ignorantly crucified this just innocent Person yet that God according to his own predictions had raised him up from the dead that through Him they preached forgiveness of sins and that by Him alone it was that Men if ever must be justified and acquitted from that Guilt and Condemnation which all the pompous Ceremonies and Ministeries of the Mosaick Law could never do away That therefore they should do well to take heed lest by their opposing this way of Salvation they should bring upon themselves that prophetical curse which God had threatned to the Jews of old for their great contumacy and neglect This Sermon wanted not its due effects The Proselyte-Jews desired the Apostles to discourse again to them of this matter the next Sabbath Day the Apostles also perswading them to continue firm in the belief of these things The Day was no sooner come but the whole City almost flocked to be their Auditors which when the Jews saw acted by a spirit of envy they began to blaspheme and to contradict the Apostles who nothing daunted told them that our Lord had charged them first to preach the Gospel to the Jews which since they so obstinately rejected they were now to address themselves to the Gentiles who hearing this exceedingly rejoyced at the good news and magnified the Word of God and as many of them as were thus prepared and disposed towards eternal life heartily closed with it and embraced it the Apostles preaching not there only but through the whole Country round about The Jews more exasperated than before resolved to be rid of their company and to that end perswaded some of the more devout and honourable Women to deal with their Husbands Persons of prime rank and quality in the City by whose means they were driven out of those parts Whereat Paul and Barnabas shaking off the dust of their Feet as a Testimony against their ingratitude and infidelity departed from them 5. THE next place they went to was Iconium where at first they found kind entertainment and good success God setting a Seal to their Doctrine by the Testimony of his Miracles But here the Jewish malice began again to ferment exciting the People to sedition and a mutiny against them Insomuch that hearing of a design to stone them they seasonably withdrew to Lystra where they first made their way by a miraculous cure For S. Paul seeing an impotent Cripple that had been lame from his Mothers Womb cured him with the speaking of a word The People who beheld the Miracle had so much natural Logick as to infer that there was a Divinity in the thing though mistaking the Author they applied it to the Instruments crying out That the Gods in humane shape were come down from Heaven Paul as being chief Speaker they termed Mercury the God of speech and eloquence Barnabas by reason of his Age and gravity they called Jupiter the Father of their Gods accordingly the Syriack Interpreter here renders Jupiter by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Lord or Soveraign of the Gods The fame of this being spread over the City the Priest of Jupiter brought Oxen dressed up with Garlands after the Gentile Rites to the House where the Apostles were to do Sacrifice to them Which they no sooner understood but in detestation of those undue honours offered to them they rent their clothes and told them that they were Men of the same make and temper of the same passions and infirmities with themselves that the design of their Preaching was to convert them from these vain Idolatries and superstitions to the worship of the true God the great Parent of the World who though heretofore he had left Men to themselves to go on in their own ways of Idolatrous worship yet had he given sufficient evidence of himself in the constant returns of a gracious and benign providence in crowning the Year with fruitful Seasons and other acts of common kindness and bounty to Mankind 6. A SHORT discourse but very rational and convictive which it may not be amiss a little more particularly to consider and the method which the Apostle uses to convince these blind Idolaters He proves Divine honours to be due to God alone as the Sovereign Being of the World and that there is such a Supreme infinite Being he argues from his Works both of Creation and Providence Creation He is the living God that made Heaven and Earth the Sea and all things that are therein Providence He left not himself without witness in that he did good and gave rain from Heaven and fruitful seasons filling our hearts with food and gladness Than which no argument can be more apt and proper to work upon the minds of men That which may be known of God is manifest to the Gentiles for God hath shewed it unto them For the invisible things of him from the Creation of the World even his eternal power and Godhead are clearly seen and understood by the things that are made It being impossible impartially to survey the several parts of the
Patmos It was of old not only rejected by Hereticks but controverted by many of the Fathers themselves Dionysius Bishop of Alexandria has a very large discourse concerning it he tells us that many plainly disowned this Book not only for the matter but the Author of it as being neither Apostle no nor any Holy or Ecclesiastical Person that Cerinthus prefixed John's name to it to give the more plausible title to his Dream of Christ's Reign upon Earth and that sensual and carnal state that should attend it that for his part he durst not reject it looking upon it as containing wise and admirable mysteries though he could not fathom and comprehend them that he did not measure them by his own line nor condemn but rather admire what he could not understand that he owned the Author to have been an holy and divinely-inspired Person but could not believe it to be S. John the Apostle and Evangelist neither stile matter nor method agreeing with his other Writings that in this he frequently names himself which he never does in any other that there were several Johns at that time and two buried at Ephesus the Apostle and another one of the Disciples that dwelt in Asia but which the Author of this Book he leaves uncertain But though doubted of by some it was entertained by the far greater part of the Ancients as the genuine work of our S. John Nor could the setting down his Name be any reasonable exception for whatever he might do in his other Writings especially his Gospel where it was less necessary Historical matters depending not so much upon his authority yet it was otherwise in Prophetick Revelations where the Person of the Revealer adds great weight and moment the reason why some of the Prophets under the Old Testament did so frequently set down their own Names The diversity of the stile is of no considerable value in this case it being no wonder if in arguments so vastly different the same Person did not always observe the same tenor and way of writing whereof there want not instances in some others of the Apostolick Order The truth is all circumstances concur to intitle our Apostle to be the Author of it his name frequently expressed its being written in the Island of Patmos a circumstance not competible to any but S. John his stiling himself their Brother and Companion in Tribulation and in the Kingdom and patience of Jesus Christ his writing particular Epistles to the seven Churches of Asia all planted or at least cultivated by him the doctrine in it suitable to the Apostolick spirit and temper evidently bearing witness in this case That which seems to have given ground to doubt concerning both its Author and authority was its being long before it was usually joyned with the other Books of the holy Canon for containing in it some passages directly levell'd at Rome the Seat of the Roman Empire others which might be thought to symbolize with some Jewish dreams and figments it might possibly seem fit to the prudence of those Times for a while to suppress it Nor is the conjecture of a learned Man to be despised who thinks that it might be entrusted in the keeping of John the Presbyter Scholar to our Apostle whence probably the report might arise that he who was only the Keeper was the Author of it 15. HIS Gospel succeeds written say some in Patmos and published at Ephesus but as Irenaeus and others more truly written by him after his return to Ephesus composed at the earnest intreaty and solicitation of the Asian Bishops and Ambassadors from several Churches in order whereunto he first caused them to proclaim a general Fast to seek the blessing of Heaven on so great and solemn an undertaking which being done he set about it And if we may believe the report of Gregory Bishop of Tours he tells us that upon a Hill near Ephesus there was a Proseucha or uncovered Oratory whither our Apostle used often to retire for Prayer and Contemplation and where he obtained of God that it might not Rain in that Place till he had finished his Gospel Nay he adds that even in his time no shower or storm ever came upon it Two causes especially contributed to the writing of it the one that he might obviate the early heresies of those times especially of Ebion Cerinthus and the rest of that crew who began openly to deny Christ's Divinity and that he had any existence before his Incarnation the reason why our Evangelist is so express and copious in that subject The other was that he might supply those passages of the Evangelical History which the rest of the Sacred Writers had omitted Collecting therefore the other three Evangelists he first set to his Seal ratifying the truth of them with his approbation and consent and then added his own Gospel to the rest principally insisting upon the Acts of Christ from the first commencing of his Ministery to the Death of John the Baptist wherein the others are most defective giving scarce any account of the first Year of our Saviour's Ministry which therefore he made up in very large and particular Narrations He largely records as Nazianzen observes our Saviour's discourses but takes little notice of his Miracles probably because so fully and particularly related by the rest The subject of his writing is very sublime and mysterious mainly designing to prove Christ's Divinity eternal pre-existence creating of the World c. Upon which account Theodoret stiles his Gospel 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Theology which humane understandings can never fully penetrate and find out Thence generally by the Ancients he is resembled to an Eagle soaring aloft within the Clouds whither the weak eye of Man was unable to follow him hence peculiarly honoured with the Title of The Divine as if due to none but him at least to him in a more eminent and extraordinary manner Nay the very Gentile-Philosophers themselves could not but admire his Writings Witness Amelius the famous Platonist and Regent of Porphyries School at Alexandria who quoting a passage out of the beginning of John's Gospel sware by Jupiter that this Barbarian so the proud Greeks counted and called all that differed from them had hit upon the right notion when he affirmed that the Word that made all things was in the beginning and in place of prime dignity and authority with God and was that God that created all things in whom every thing that was made had according to its nature its life and being that he was incarnate and clothed with a body wherein he manifested the glory and magnificence of his nature that after his death he returned to the repossession of Divinity and became the same God which he was before his assuming a body and taking the humane nature and flesh upon him I have no more to observe but that his Gospel was afterwards translated into Hebrew and kept by
the Jews 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 among their secret Archives and Records in their Treasury at Tiberias where a Copy of it was found by one Joseph a Jew afterwards converted and whom Constantine the Great advanced to the honour of a Count of the Empire who breaking open the Treasury though he missed of money found 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Books beyond all Treasure S. Matthew and John's Gospels and the Acts of the Apostles in Hebrew the reading whereof greatly contributed towards his Conversion 16. BESIDES these our Apostle wrote three Epistles the first whereof is Catholick calculated for all times and places containing most excellent rules for the conduct of the Christian life pressing to holiness and purity of manners and not to rest in a naked and empty profession of Religion not to be led away with the crafty insinuations of Seducers antidoting Men against the poyson of the Gnostick-principles and practices to whom it is not to be doubted but that the Apostle had a more particular respect in this Epistle According to his wonted modesty he conceals his name it being of more concernment with wise Men what it is that is said than who it is that says it And this Epistle Eusebius tells us was universally received and never questioned by any anciently as appears by S. Augustin inscribed to the Parthians though for what reason I am yet to learn unless as we hinted before it was because he himself had heretofore Preached in those Parts of the World The other two Epistles are but short and directed to particular Persons the one a Lady of honourable Quality the other the charitable and hospitable Gaius so kind a friend so courteous an entertainer of all indigent Christians These Epistles indeed were not of old admitted into the Canon nor are owned by the Church in Syria at this Day ascribed by many to the younger John Disciple to our Apostle But there is no just cause to question who was their Father seeing both the Doctrine phrase and design of them do sufficiently challenge our Apostle for their Author These are all the Books wherein it pleased the Holy Spirit to make use of S. John for its Pen-man and Secretary in the composure whereof though his stile and character be not florid and elegant yet is it grave and simple short and perspicuous Dionysius of Alexandria tells us that in his Gospel and first Epistle his phrase is more neat and elegant there being an accuracy in the contexture both of words and matter that runs through all the reasonings of his discourses but that in the Apocalypse the stile is nothing so pure and clear being frequently mixed with more barbarous and improper phrases Indeed his Greek generally abounds with Syriasms his discourses many times abrupt set off with frequent antitheses connected with copulatives passages often repeated things at first more obscurely propounded and which he is forced to enlighten with subsequent explications words peculiar to himself and phrases used in an uncommon sence All which concur to render his way of Writing less grateful possibly to the Masters of eloquence and an elaborate curiosity S. Hierom observes that in citing places out of the Old Testament he more immediately translates from the Hebrew Original studying to render things word for word for being an Hebrew of the Hebrews admirably skill'd in the Language of his Countrey it probably made him less exact in his Greek composures wherein he had very little advantage besides what was immediately communicated from above But whatever was wanting in the politeness of his stile was abundantly made up in the zeal of his temper and the excellency and sublimity of his matter he truly answered his Name Boanerges spake and writ like a Son of Thunder Whence it is that his Writings but especially his Gospel have such great and honourable things spoken of them by the Ancients The Evangelical writings says S. Basil transcend the other parts of the Holy Volumes in other parts God speaks to us by Servants the Prophets but in the Gospels our Lord himself speaks to us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but among all the Evangelical Preachers none like S. John the Son of Thunder for the sublimeness of his speech and the heighth of his discourses beyond any Man's capacity duly to reach and comprehend S. John as a true Son of Thunder says Epiphanius 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by a certain greatness of speech peculiar to himself does as it were out of the Clouds and the dark recesses of wisdome acquaint us with Divine Doctrines concerning the Son of God To which let me add what S. Cyril of Alexandria among other things says concerning him that whoever looks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to the sublimity of his incomprehensible notions the acumen and sharpness of his reason and the quick inferences of his discourses constantly succeeding and following upon one another must needs confess that his Gospel perfectly exceeds all admiration The End of S. John 's Life THE LIFE OF S. PHILIP St Philip After he had converted all Scythia he was at Hierapolis a City of Asia first crucified and then stoned to death Baron May. 10. St. Philip's Martyrdom Act. 5.30 Whom ye slew hanged on a tree Matth. 10.24 25. The disciple is not above his master nor the servant above his Lord. It is enough for the disciple that he be as his master and the servant as his Lord. Galilee generally despised by the Jews and why The honour which our Lord put upon it S. Andrew 's birth-place His being first called to be a Disciple and the manner of it An account of his ready obedience to Christ 's call What the Evangelists relate concerning him considered The discourse between our Lord and him concerning the knowledge of the Father His preaching the Gospel in the Upper Asia and the happy effects of his Ministry His coming to Hierapolis in Phrygia and successful confutation of their Idolatries The rage and fury of the Magistrates against him His Martyrdom Crucifixion and Burial His married condition The confounding him with Philip the Deacon The Gospel forged by the Gnosticks under his Name 1. OF all parts of Palestine Galilee seems to have passed under the greatest character of ignominy and reproach The Country it self because bordering upon the Idolatrous uncircumcised Nations called Galilee of the Gentiles the people generally beheld as more rude and boisterous more unpolished and barbarous than the rest not remarkable either for Civility or Religion The Galileans received him having seen all the things that he did at Jerusalem at the Feast for they also went up unto the Feast as if it had been a wonder and a matter of very strange remark to see so much devotion in them as to attend the solemnity of the Passeover Indeed both Jew and Gentile conspired in this that they thought they could not fix a greater title of reproach upon our Saviour and his followers than
the Brother of James a character that can belong to none but our Apostle beside that the Title of the Epistle which is of great Antiquity runs thus The general Epistle of Jude the Apostle One great argument as S. Hierom informs us against the authority of this Epistle of old was its quoting a passage out of an Apocryphal Book of Enoch This Book called the Apocalypse of Enoch was very early extant in the Church frequently mentioned and passages cited out of it by Irenaeus Tertullian Clemens Alexandrinus Origen and others some of whom accounted it little less than Canonical But what if our Apostle had it not out of this Apocryphal Book but from some prophecy currant from age to age handed to him by common tradition or immediately revealed to him by the Spirit of God But suppose it taken out of that Book going under Enoch's name this makes nothing against the authority of the Epistle every thing I hope is not presently false that 's contained in an Apocryphal and Uncanonical writing nor does the taking a single testimony out of it any more infer the Apostles approbation of all the rest than S. Paul's quoting a good sentence or two out of Menander Arâ—tus and Epimenides imply that he approved all the rest of the writings of those Heathen Poets And indeed nothing could be more fit and proper than this way if we consider that the Apostle in this Epistle chiefly argues against the Gnosticks who mainly traded in such Traditionary and Apocryphal writings and probably in this very Book of Enoch The same account may be given of that other passage in this Epistle concerning the contention between Michael the Archangel and the Devil about the burial of Moses his Body no where extant in the holy Records supposed to have been taken out of a Jewish writing called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or the Dismission of Moses mentioned by some of the Greek Fathers under the title of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or the Ascension of Moses in which this passage was upon record Nor is it any more a wonder that S. Jude should do this than that S. Paul should put down Jannes and Jambres for the two Magicians of Pharaoh that opposed Moses which he must either derive from Tradition or fetch out of some Uncanonical Author of those times there being no mention of their names in Moses his relation of that matter But be these passages whence they will 't is enough to us that the Spirit of God has made them Authentick and consecrated them part of the holy Canon 6. BEING thus satisfied in the Canonicalness of this Epistle none but S. Jude could be the Author of it for who but he was the Brother of S. James a character by which he is described in the Evangelical story more than once Grotius indeed will needs have it written by a younger Jude the fifteenth Bishop of Jerusalem in the reign of Adrian and because he saw that that passage the Brother of James stood full in his way he concludes without any shadow of reason that it was added by some Transcriber But is not this to make too bold with Sacred things is not this to indulge too great a liberty this once allowed 't will soon open a door to the wildest and most extravagant conjectures and no man shall know where to find sure-footing for his Faith But the Reader may remember what we have elsewhere observed concerning the Posthume Annotations of that learned man Not to say that there are many things in this Epistle that evidently refer to the time of this Apostle and imply it to have been written upon the same occasion and about the same time with the second Epistle of Peter between which and this there is a very great affinity both in words and matter nay there want not some that endeavour to prove this Epistle to have been written no less than twenty seven years before that of Peter and that hence it was that Peter borrowed those passages that are so near a-kin to those in this Epistle The design of the Epistle is to preserve Christians from the infection of Gnosticism the loose and debauched principles vented by Simon Magus and his followers whose wretched doctrines and practices he briefly and elegantly represents perswading Christians heartily to contend for the Faith that had been delivered to them and to avoid these pernicious Seducers as pests and fire-brands not to communicate with them in their sins lest they perished with them in that terrible vengeance that was ready to overtake them The End of S. Jude 's Life THE LIFE OF S. MATTHIAS S. MATHIAS He preached the Gospell in Ethiopia suffered Martyrdome and was buried there S. Hierom. St. Matthias his Martyrdom Hebr. 11.37 They were stoned they were sawn asunder they were tempted were slain with the sword S. Matthias one of the Seventy Judas Iscariot whence A bad Minister nulls not the ends of his Ministration His worldly and covetous temper His monstrous ingratitude His betraying his Master and the agravations of the sin The distraction and horror of his mind The miserable state of an evil and guilty Conscience His violent death The election of a new Apostle The Candidates who The Lot cast upon Matthias His preaching the Gospel and in what parts of the World His Martyrdom when where and how His Body whither translated The Gospel and Traditions vented under his name 1. SAINT Matthias not being an Apostle of the first Election immediately called and chosen by our Saviour particular remarks concerning him are not to be expected in the History of the Gospel He was one of our Lord's Disciples and probably one of the Seventy that had attended on him the whole time of his publick Ministry and after his death was elected into the Apostleship upon this occasion Judas Iscariot so called probably from the place of his nativity 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a man of Kerioth a City anciently situate in the Tribe of Judah had been one of the Twelve immediately called by Christ to be one of his intimate Disciples equally impowered and commissioned with the rest to Preach and work Miracles was numbred with them and had obtained part of their Ministry And yet all this while was a man of vile and corrupt designs branded with no meaner a character than Thief and Murderer To let us see that there may be bad servants in Christ's own family and that the wickedness of a Minister does not evacuate his Commission nor render his Office useless and ineffectual The unworthiness of the instrument hinders not the ends of the ministration Seeing the efficacy of an ordinance depends not upon the quality of the person but the Divine institution and the blessing which God has entailed upon it Judas preached Christ no doubt with zeal and servency and for any thing we know with as much success as the rest of the Apostles and yet he was a bad man a man acted by