the holiness of that Society whereof they are no Members nor the Efficacy of that Religion they either never came under the power of or have rejected the yoak of what must it be presum'd that the Sun shines not that its beams warm not because those men see not its Light are not refresh'd and vegetated with its Warmth who either shut their eyes or remove into a Clime it never visits Dr. Hammond An. in Heb. 4. 2. But the word that was heard did not profit those who were not by Faith joyned to them that obeyed it Shall we condemn the Seed because it thrives not to maturity of Fruit in the ground of a dishonest heart where either the fowles of the Air pick it up or it wants depth of earth or is choak'd with Thorns and Weeds Shall we question whether Christ be risen because men whose affections are so strongly set upon the earth as they cannot elevate them towards Heaven are not risen with him when we see such palpable Effects and Demonstrations of it in his raising those to a newness of Life who do not resist grieve or quench his Spirit but with an humble teachableness follow its conduct in that way of holiness his Word hath chalk'd out before us In order to our perseverance in this way and confirmation in our assurance that it will infallibly lead us to Peace here and eternal Glory hereafter I have undertaken this vindication of the Christian Faith against the prejudices which our modern either Scepticks or Atheists have taken up against it which as they took their rise from the Scandals which have been cast upon Religion by the woful miscarriages of men professing it in guile and hypocrisie so they must fall before a Spirit of Grace and Glory resting upon the embracers of it in Truth and Sincerity and shining out upon the World in their so peaceable humble meek and every way Christian deportment and men seeing their good works may glorifie their Father who is in Heaven and revere that Discipline as proceeding from that Father of Lights by whose influence the wildness of common Nature is abated and its vertuous Seeds so improved as to bring forth Fruit chearing the heart both of God and Man To which if thou beest instigated Christian Reader to aspire by the perusal of this Discourse and so become one of Christs Witnesses by sealing to the Truth of the Gospel by a Life answerable to its most holy just and yet easie Precepts thou wilt lay up for thy self a good Foundation for time to come and contribute towards the conviction of the Adversaries of the Christian Faith by an Argument so familiar as it incurrs into every mans sense and so strenuous as the most stubborn Atheist will not be able to resist it but be forc'd to confess the unreasonableness of his own Exceptions against a Religion that brings forth such Divine Effects Would we all study thus to adorn the Doctrine of God our Saviour in all things such real exornations would render Religion more venerable in the eyes of the VVorld than all verbal Encomiums those whom the close fist of the most Logical Arguings cannot force the commanding beck of that open-handed Eloquence would allure to a silent admiring of that sacred Fountain whence they see such healing VVaters flow That this my Request to my Readers may take effect I shall back it with that Request to God which my Dear Mother the Holy Church of England hath put into her Childrens mouth More especially we pray for the good estate of the Catholick Church that it may be so guided and govern'd by thy good Spirit that all who profess and call themselves Christians may be led into the way of Truth and hold the Faith in Unity of Spirit in the Bond of Peace and in Righteousness of Life And this we beg for Jesus Christ his Sake To whom with the Father and the Holy Ghost be all Honour and Glory world without end Amen FINIS To their old Cells and Altars the whole crew Of Guardian Gods Troy falling bid adieu While impious Caesar and his Godded rout Spurn Phoebus Tripos with insulting foot The learned Varro useth to expend So many hours in reading as we deem A winged minutes scantling can scarce lend It self unto his pen yet that doth seem To trust more notions to his sweating Page Than quickest eye can run o're in an Age. To my dark Cabin in the Stygean strand Dismiss me or if that be too much ease Send me to Phlegethon where I may stand Rather than here chin-high in fiery seas Haled from Styx to Thebes my ancient seat Had I my choice hard choice I would retreat If Heaven the fire and Earth the dam of things Had been from Ever whence is 't no Poet sings Of Wars more old than Troy of Floods than Noah Of Rapes than Jove and thousand wonders moe Had men nor hands to act nor hands to write During the seculum Prae-Adamite Had Nile for ages numberless no Reed Nor Bees Wax nor Trees Bark nor Hills a breed of Sheep nor Sheep a Skin nor Goose a Quill Nor Polypus his native Ink distil Or Man the Goose of all not wit to learn To make a Pen much less to guide a Stern Or build a Ship or break a Horse or bring The Oxe to th' yoke the Hawk to lure or string The warbling Lute or count the Stars by name Or other Arts whose birth we know by fame Whose growth we see come on with age We owe to thee great Caesar Triumphs many More Temples built and Temples that lay waste Repair'd more Cities Gods and Shews than any But most that thou hast taught Rome to be chaste Whom we invoke for Gods 't is Jove's decree Were Men of Bounty once and Gallantry But now with highest Deities attend On our affairs and us toth ' Gods commend The Father Word and Spirit God alone That Cotternal Three in one Thy will Theodames for Hecate Forc'd by thy charms dares not say nay Your Charms from me against my will commands These Responds I have said now loose my bands Judea worshippeth alone The God elsewhere unknown Him Pan men call Because he succours all They lay on tepid Altars Babes not born Of Mothers Wombs but from their Bellies torn Issa Bills sweeter than a Dove Issa's more blith than Mal or Siss No Pearls equal Issa's love What Issa's this Publius his Bitch Thus against Hercules vext the field to lose From wounded Hydra heads more fierce arose Who outstript all the Sophs in this Essay Quenching their Star-light with his Solar Ray.
Proaem Empedocle Plinius sic nobile illud apud Graecos volumen Heraclidis septem diebus feminae exanimis ad vitam revocatae The like does Plutarch report of Aristaeus in his Romulus and of Thespesius de sera numinis vind We have here supererrogated having produc'd Pagan Testimony not only for the proving of matter of Fact to wit that this Article which we now profess was delivered by the Apostles to the Primitive Church but also their Confessions of the possibility of the thing believed § 6. Article 6. He ascended into Heaven and sitteth at the right hand of God The Argument of Christ's Divinity drawn from his assumption into heaven they darken with so great a volly of Examples of their own Hero's as it would tire me to take up those Arrows one by one But that he ascended with that body that was crucified Celsus one while attributed to to delusion it being impossible as he argues that a body can be made immortal that being the Creature of inferiour Nature not of God as the soul is and all other immortal beings This Principle he borrows of the Manichees out of the dispute betwixt Jason and Papiscus concerning Christ lib. 4. cal 22. 23. Another while granting it true he denys it to be a sufficient proof of Christ's Deity because Cleomenes had by what Art God knows obtain'd that agility of body as he could fly up as fast and as far as a dart could even out of sight and that was as far as the Disciples could see Christ ascend But the gift which Christ shed forth after his Ascension spake him to have ascended far above the highest Heavens And as to the truth of this assertion That this was an Article of the Apostolical faith that Christ did ascend into heaven This Epicures carping at it is proof sufficient and his not daring to stand to his first Cavil that it was impossible but flying to another Salvo But it was no more than others before him bad done who yet thereby obtained not the repute of their deserving divine Honours is a tacit Concession to the Truth of the thing it self which is more than I here need to prove I will therefore hasten to the next Article which because of its relation to this I shall annex to the same Section Article 7. From thence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead The Epicurean Beast runs full mouth upon this Article and raiseth this crie It is the common guise of all Fanatick Prophets to profess themselves God or the Son of God or the divine Spirit and to give out such pretences as your Jesus made I am come into the world to save it from those impending judgements that are ready to fall upon it for its sins happy they that believe in me I will appear for their salvation when I come again in glory and great power with the heavenly host at which my coming I will adjudge all that reject me to everlasting Fire and they that now despise my menacies shall then when its too late to repent mourn and lament No Christian Catechist can better express the mind of this Article than this Philosopher here doth lib. 7. cal 3. A man of greater Reading than Celsus will be hard put to it to find one man before Christ's coming who did so much as pretend to his being appointed of God to be the Judge of all men And for those Mock-christ's who afterwards would have rob'd the blessed Jesus of this Prerogative and challeng'd it to themselves not one of them could shew their Commission under Gods hand as he did § 7. Article 8. I believe in the holy Ghost 1. As this implies the Equality and Consubstantiality of the Spirit with the Father and the Son and his being therefore together with them to be worshipped as the Nicen Fathers expound it Porphyrie who for all Celsus his brags that he himself understood the bottom top and middle of our Religion was the best acquainted with our Scriptures both old and new of any Heathen Philosopher parallels it with his Master Plato's Opinion in St. Austin de Civitate 10. 23. quoted by R. vives and thus exprest by Porphyrie as St. Cyril contrà Julianum relates it Plato as well as the Christians held three Subsistences in the divine Essence to wit the All-Good and All-Great God the Father then the Creator God the Son and the third the Soul of the World the holy Ghost Tres Substantias in Essentia divina statuit Deum Opt. Max. deinde Creatorem tertiam Animam Mundi to wit that which moved upon the Waters the Lord and giver of Life as the abovesaid Fathers describe him What Beetle-brow'd Novices in Christianity are the Socinians who will not acknowledge the Revelation of the ineffable sacred Trinity to be communicated in these Evangelical VVritings wherein the Athenian Owls the Pagan Philosophers saw it so plainly exhibited as they not only take notice of it as an Article of our Religion in their Polemical Animadversions but offer to make proof that this point of Doctrine was embraced by their Wisemen even before it was attested by those wonders which God set as his seal for the confirmation of the Gospel So little did they deem it to be against Reason as by the conduct even of Reason they stumbled upon that Divine Notion which the Socinians will not submit their vain Reason to the belief of upon the strongest of all Reasons Divine Revelation proved to be so by the clearest of all evidences the demonstration of power exerted at the first manifest revelation of this Mystery at the Baptism of Christ when the heavens were opened and the Spirit descended upon the Son and a voyce was heard from the Father 2. As it implies still to go along with the same Father the Churches confession of her belief that the holy Ghost spake by the Prophets It is thus assronted by Celsus lib. 8. cal 16. what you boast of the Spirit speaking by your Old and New Testament-prophets we can out-vie if we had a mind to repeat those many Oracles of our Prophets and Prophetesses who sung future things with a Prophetick voice which they suck'd in from the Recesses of the Gods those many which were delivered from the Entrails of Sacrifices and premonstrated from other Prodigies or reveiled by the vive-voyce of the Gods themselves appearing in visible forms How many Cities have been founded by the advice of Oracles and been freed from Famine and Pestilence by following their direction or brought to utter ruine hy forgetting or despising their Counsels How many Colonies have been sent forth upon their Order thriving exceedingly while they followed their counsel To how many Princes and private men has it been fortunate or fatal to observe or sleight them How many barren Women have become fruitful How many maimed persons have recovered the use of their Limbs How many distracted persons the use of their Reason by following the advice of Oracles
as asserted by the Church in those writings which opposed Christian Religion § 1. Maker of Heaven and Earth § 2. His only Son § 3. Conceived by the holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary § 4. Suffered under Pontius Pilate c. § 5. Rose again the third day § 6. Ascended into Heaven thence c. § 7. The Holy Ghost § 8. Holy Catholick Church c. CHAP. V. The Truth of the Gospel-History attested by Secular Writers § 1. Old Antagonists did not persist in the denial of any point of Gospel-History save that of Christs Resurrection and the manner of their denying it proves the Truth of it § 2. Josephus his Story of John Baptist accords with Gospel-History § 3. His Text in testimony of Jesus vindicated from the Exceptions of Vossius c. § 4. Josephus his date of Christs and the Baptists Story falls in with Gospel-Chronology § 5. The Stories of Herod Herodias Aretus Artabanus Philip Lysanias in Josephus Tacitus Suetonius timed to Sacred Chronology § 6. The Twin-Priesthood of Annas and Caiphas at Christs Baptism and Passion cleared § 7. The Date of Philip the Tetrarch his Death CHAP. VI. The Date of Christs Birth as it is asserted by the Church maintain'd by Scripture § 1. Christ homaged by the Magi early after his Birth § 2. Christ born and Baptized the same day of the year § 3. God would have the Church observe the day of Christs Birth The Priestly Courses the Character of it which from the first Institution by Solomon to the last and fatal year of the Second Temples standing were never interrupted § 4. The Calculation of these courses leads us to the Conception and Birth of the Baptist and our Saviour § 5. Christs Baptism and John's Ministry in the same year of Tiberius Reign point out the same thing Objections answered § 6. The taxing of all the world ill-confounded with that of Syria CHAP. VII Josephus his Suffrage to the Evangelists in the Substance of their History of Christ. § 1. He appropriates the Compellation Christ to our Jesus speaks of the Churches growth in a Gospel-stile § 2. Describes Christs Disciples by Evangelical Characters gives the Evangelists Reasons why others did not embrace the Gospel § 3. He peremptorily asserts Christs Miracles how he came to a certain information thereof Appion and Justus would have found it out if he had proceeded here upon presumptions and uncertainties § 4. He describes Christs Miracles after the Evangelical Model § 5. And affirms them to have been such as the Prophets had foretold The Touch-stone of Canonical History § 6. He asserts Christs Resurrection with all its Circumstances CHAP. VIII Josephus confirms St. Lukes History of Herod Agrippa § 1. He paints him in Evangelical Colours as the Jews favourite as a Prodigal as much in the Tyrians Debt and therefore displeased with them c. § 2. He Dates his Death according to St. Luke St. James Martyred in the third a Famine at Rome in the second and third In Judaea in the fourth of Claudius § 3. He describes his Death after St. Lukes Style Two Acclamations immediately after the second he was struck by a Messenger of Death an Owle § 4. Angels assume what form the divine mandat prescribes Evil Angels God's Messengers § 5. Herod the Great died of the like stroke Josephus gives the natural Symptoms of Agrippa's Disease § 6. A Digression touching St. Paul's Thorn in the Flesh. CHAP. IX Other Secular Witnesses to the Truth of Sacred History § 1. Phlegon of the Darkness and Earthquake at Christs Passion § 2. Thallus his mistaking that Darkness for an Eclipse § 3. The Records of Pagan Rome touching that and other Occurrences § 4. The Chronicles of Edessa though Apochryphal yet true Julian's Prohibition of the use of secular Books in Christian Schools his Testimony § 5. Moses his History of Joseph attested by Pagans § 6. His History of himself § 7. Of Noah Balaam c. avouched by Secular Writers CHAP. X. The Adversaries forced upon very great Disadvantages to their own Cause by reason that they could not for very shame resist the Evidences brought in defence of Sacred History § 1. Christ accused of working by the Prince of Devils that Accusation withdrawn in open Court and this Plea put in against him that he made himself a King and therefore was an Enemy to Caesar § 2. Pety Exceptions rebound upon the heads of their Framers § 3. The Modern Sceptick's half-reasons too young to grapple with old Prescription § 4. Christs Works Gods Seal to his Mission § 5. The present Age as able to judge of the Nature of those Works as that was wherein they were done § 6. Atheistical Exceptions against particular points of Religion an Hydra's head yet they all stand upon one neck and may be cut off at one blow by proving the Divine Original of Religion BOOK IV. THE ARGUMENT 4. The Divine Original of Sacred Writ is as demonstrable as the being of a God from the Infinity of Wisdom express'd in its Prophecies and of Power in its miracles THE CONTENTS CHAP. I. The Being of a Deity Demonstrated § 1. The Existence of a Deity demonstrable from the frame of the world the composition of humane bodies § 2. The Garden of the Earth did not fall by chance into so curious and well order'd knots The ingenuity of Birds sings the Wisdom of their Maker c. § 4. The Heavens declare the glory of God CHAP. II. The Author of Christian Religion hath stamp'd thereon no less manifest Prints of infinite Science than the Maker of the World hath left upon that his Workmanship § 1. Heathen Prophecies the Result of Ratiocination § 2. From general Hints which for mens torments God might permit the Devil to communicate § 3. The Ambiguity of Oracles on purpose to hide the Ignorance of them that gave them § 4. It was by chance they spake truth § 5. Scripture-Oracles distinct of pure Contingencies their Sence plain punctually fulfill'd CHAP. III. Instances of Prophecies fulfill'd whose Effects are permanent and obvious to the Atheists Eyes if he will but open them § 1. Predictions that Israel would reject their own Messia made by Jews Confession many hundreds of years before Christ. § 2. The Prophets foretell Gods Rejection of the Jews for their Rejection of his Son § 3. Texts proving a final Rejection Christs Blood calls down this vengeance § 4. These Menacies executed to the full Temple City and all vanish'd Spirit of Prophecy past from the Synagogue to the Church CHAP. IV. Gematrian Plaisters too narrow for the Sore § 1. The Ark. § 2. Holy Fire § 3. Urim and Thummim § 4. Spirit of Prophecy in the Second Temple § 5. Exorcisme and Bethesda's all-healing vertue the second Temples Dowry CHAP. V. The Jews rejected Messias to be called the God of the whole Earth and all other Gods eternally to be rejected § 1. The God of Israel every where worship'd where Christian Religion
the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be the Son of God by whom he made the World to be in the Order and Degree of a Principle which was all I produc'd it for in this Section but my general Position laid down in the first Section of this Chapter That what the Gospel asserts in Thesi of our Jesus the Platonick School asserted in Hypothesi concerning him that was to relieve Mankind Plato's Doctrine of Purgation came so near ours saith St. Austin de vera Religione cap. 4. as many Platonicks upon that account turn'd Christian Paucis mutatis verbis sententiis aut si hoc non facerent nescio utrùm possent ad ea ipsa quae appetenda esse dixerunt cum istis faecibus viscóque revolare ex Platonis Phaedro de Legibus Timaeo With the alteration of a few words and sentences and if they had not I cannot tell how they could with the Birdlime and dregs of those their Errors which Christian Religion confuteth have flown back to that good they said was to be desired and those their sound Principles which both we and they joyntly hold The only thing they disgusted being the application of those things to Christ they stumbling at the same Stone at which the Jews stumbled the Cross of Christ and taking it in scorn that so mean a man as Jesus of Nazereth should be reputed to be the Saviour to be that Principle that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that Son of God that was to enlighten every one that comes into the World out of whose fulness all our wants were to be supplied by the participation of whose Wisdom we are made wise c. For St. Austin when he saith He could not find in their Books that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was come into the World came to his own and his own received him not took upon him the Form of a servant and humbled himself to the death of the Cross. Must not be understood to deny that it was to be found or that himself had found in the Platonick Writings that the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in order to humane Redemption was to come into the World to assume our nature to be wounded for our Transgressions for whoever it was by one or more that man-kind was to be relieved that one or more must as we have heard the Oracle the God of Philosophers as they stiled him deliver descend from his or their supercelestial place into his Dungeon of Earth and in 〈◊〉 or their assumed body or bodies endure all the miseries of this life c. as Sect. 3. cap. 4. hath been quoted out of which sentence not only of Plato but of all that exchanged not the old Traditional Philosophy for the Kitching-Experiments of Greece whom Jamblicus compares to Ships without Balast for that they had emptyed themselves of what they had received by the old Tradition de mysteriis tit de nominibus sacris we have been all this while boulting the Bran of their conceipted Multiplicity of God-saviours by the Sierce of their more sober and considerate Doctrine poured out into the bosom of their friends sequestred from the Censure of the Vulgar before whom it was not safe to speak all they thought Difficile est negare credo si in concione quaeratur sed in hujusmodi concessu facillimum Cicero de natura deorum lib. 1. It is an hard matter I confess to deny this in the hearing of the multitude but very easie in such a select Assembly of friends and Philosophers And have thereby gain'd from them the unforc'd confession of this Evangelical Truth That man's restauration unto Communion with and Conformity to God cannot be obtained by the Incarnation of separate Spirits or blessed Souls but of God himself descending into the Dungeon of this Earth assuming our Nature and in that Nature suffering what was due to us and delivering to us the Divine Oracles Plato therefore in assigning this effect to a Multiplicity of holy Souls or Spirits coming down from Heaven in several Ages and Countreys was a popular Complyance with the vulgar Errour either out of fear to in 〈…〉 his Master Socrates his fortune or out of design to have the World believe as some of his great admirers did that himself was one of those officious Spirits or if he spake as he thought it was the froth and ebullition of that vanity of mind judicially inflicted upon such as knowing God did not worship him as God That this was his Errour and such an Errour as himself in his lucid Intervals renounc'd and was forsaken in by his own followers hath been sufficiently cleared if the weight of this point and the dissatisfaction of some most deservingly eminent Modern Divines did not make it shake upon its strongest supporters and as it were by its nods becken to us to strengthen it by Buttresses I shall therefore beg my Readers patience which I doubt not but to obtain of him if he can but construe that of the Epigrammatist Non sunt longa quibus nihil est quod demere possis Sed tu Cosconi disticha longa facis Mart. while I make it yet more manifest CHAP. V. None of their Local Saviours were able to save § 1. Their white Witches impeded in doing good by the black Lucan's Hag more mighty than any of their Almighties § 2. None of their Saviour's Soul-purgers § 3. Porphiry ' s Vote for one universal Saviour not known in the Heathen World Altars to the unknown Gods whether God or Goddess § 4. The unknown God § 5. Great Pan the All-heal his death § 6. Of their many Lords none comparable to the Lord Christ to us but one Lord. § 1. POrphyry Aug de Civitat 10. 9. 10. reference from experience confesseth the inability of those reputed good Spirits or God-Saviours to whom the Heathen applyed themselves for cure to gratifie the commerce to them their most severe worshippers in their desired Soul-purgations in that they were often impeded by their Superiours and their Superiours manacled in the Conjurers bands so as they durst not effect the desired Purgations so terrified by the black Witch as the white Witch could not loose them from that fear and set them free to do that good to which their own natures inclin'd them and their most religious Votaries solicited them Whereupon St. Austin facetiously thus explains Ergo ligavit iste iste non solvit O animae praedicanda purgatio ubi plus imperat immunda invidentia quà m impetrat pura beneficentia ubi plus valet malevolus impeditor quà m beneficus purgator animae The Cacodemon it seems could bind and the good Angel could not lose Oh praise-worthy purgation of Soul where unclean Envy obtains that power which pure Bounty cannot where the malicious opposer is of more strength than the liberal purger of the Soul But however ridiculous either the opinion or grownd of it were This Doctrine the Platonicks grounded upon that complaint which a
as Actions that have past over the Stage of the World and as such the Spectators are as competent Judges of them as of any that are brought before them All that is demanded of Tradition is whether it saw Christ and his Apostles doing such things whether it heard them deliver such Doctrines or what it ever heard or saw tending to the disproof of that Relation we call her not to pass judgement upon the Nature or Quality of either Words or Works we summon her to do the part of an Historian not Commentator And what hinders but that she may gratifie us in this as well as in any other Case were not Christs Actions as visible as Caesar's his Words as audible as Cicero's § 4. Having thus stated the Question and assigned to the Witnesses what we expect from them as to the Resolution of it we will call them in and take their depositions 1. Had we nothing to produce but those almost numberless Copies and Translations of the Text into most of the Languages of the anciently-known World those Cart-loads of Commentators Paraphrasts c. upon the Text all agreeing in substance and out of which we may with facility gather not only the Matter but the very Words and every Word of the Gospels this would be a full-measure Proof that the Books of the New Testament as they stand now in the sacred Canon are as faithful a Repository of the Actions and Doctrine of Christ and his Apostles as any Writings whatsoever can be of the Subjects contain'd in them This would be a better Evidence for instance that the History and Doctrine therein contain'd is the genuine Off-spring of those whose Names they bear than any man living can produce to prove that the Books going under the Names of Virgil Horace Cicero are those mens Works whose Names they bear That the Deeds and Conveighances whereby he holds his Estate are those mens Deeds whose Names and Seals are affixt to them or that he is that Man's Child whom he calls Father This comes near enough to the state of the Question and one would think it concern'd the VVorld to repute that Generation of men the bane of Mankind who with their insociable infusions of Suspitions into mens Heads that possible it might be otherwise deprive all men Princes and Peasants of power to make a rational Proof of their Title to what they hold from their Ancestors as their Heirs at Law And the Sceptick cannot in reason expect a more satisfactory Answer to his Misprisions than such like as Plutarch in his Apothegms reports Cicero to have given his Nephew Metellus to whom demanding of Cicero to tell who was his Father it was replyed thus It would be a far harder thing to tell who was thy Father for thy Mother was accounted an errant Strumpet and mine an honest Matron The truth is all the claim that any body can make to him whom he calls Father depends wholly upon the single twine of one VVomans Honesty which be it never so apparent is not to be cast in the Scales with the Fidelity of the immaculate Virgin-spouse of Christ the Apostolical Church But I will wave this odious Comparison partly because I would not create jealousies of this Nature in the Ranters Head to harden him against his poor Mother to whom it is affliction enough to have been the Parent of such a Son and partly that I may not cast the least suspition of dishonour upon our Female-Gentry whose inconquerable Vertue necessitates our Goatish Males to turn Channel-rakers and to scrape off Dung-hills fuel for their Lusts the scum and off-spring of the fordid and Rascal vulgar the scrapings and garbish of the Body Politick such as that Nobleman of the East would hardly have set before the Dogs of the Flock How many courses of Purification must such Lumps of Dirt mixt with the Dregs of English Blood undergo before he that values the Nobility of his own can think them fit for his touch even by the proxy of a pair of Tonges The Bawd washes the Cats face pares her Claws by the transforming power of the exchange dubs her a Gentlewoman and then though all the Castle-sope in Christendom cannot wash out Pusse's stains contracted in the Chimney-corner nor all the perfumers Shops in Level-land take away the Nautious scent of her rank Blood presents her as the great Beauty of the Land an Helen a Venus a Peer for a Prince a Bed-companion for a Peer Issa est purior osculo columbae Issa est blandior omnibus puellis Issa est carior Indicis lapillis Issa est deliciae catella Publii If there be no difference of Blood why do we boast of Nobility If there be why does it not recoil even in spight of the most lustful Titillations into those Vessels we extracted from our noble Progenitors or at least for shame into our Faces fitter Receptacles of it than such common Jakes such unequal mixtures are a kind of Buggery For though in Religion there 's none yet in Nature there 's as great and in Politicks a greater distance between the Cream of Nobility and the Sediments of Vulgar Baseness than there is betwixt this and some ingenious Animals And in Ethicks 't is a less Indecorum to see a Ladies Dog in bed with her than her Groom Publius commits a less Solecism in dallying with his Bitch than with his Laundress Catullus may with less Absurdity bill with his Sparrow than his Maid That our delicate and spruce Gallants who cannot relish Prayer and Fasting which would cure them of this Canine Appetite after strange Flesh of this Orexis after dirty Puddings should be brought to this necessity of feeding their Wolf with such course fare at such three-penny Ordinaries That they who will not lose so much of their height as the bending of their Knees to him who has promised to give his holy Spirit to them that ask would put them to the expence of should by an unclean Spirit be precipitated from the top of Honour's Scale to the foot of the Hangman's Ladder with that Wanton in Petronius Vsque ab Orchestria quatuordecim transilit ut in extrema Plebe quaerat quod diligat amplexus in crucem mittat He leaps down at least fourteen steps from the top of the stairs of Nobility that he may seek a Mistress amongst the basest of the Vulgar and obtain the Embraces of one of Mal-Cutpurse Nymphs who last Assizes held up her hand at the Bar and hardly escap'd the Gallows That our fine-nosed Gentry who can smell State-plots and humane Inventions in the most sacred Religion should not smell the Plot which their own lusts have upon their Honour nor how rank their Mistresses smell of the Dunghill can proceed from nothing but their habituating themselves to such Carrion for want of better fare And that they are fain to feed the Flame of their Green-sickness-lusts with Coal and Cinders must with all thankfulness be ascribed to the Chastity
frightning men to obedience by menacies of Hell-fire c. But all will not be won by Love the fear of approaching death was of more avail to perswade Celsus his Master Epicurus that there is a God than all the sweet morsels he cramb'd his belly with Let the Antinomian here acknowledge his first Father Besides saith he lib. 6. 19 Do not the Christians charge God with want of Power or Foresight in his permitting the Serpent so far to deface his Image in Man as that in order to the restoring of it he is forc'd to send his only Son to become Man's Advocate God knew how to use his Power and VVisdom better than in prevention of that evil viz. by bringing a greater good out of it Conceived by the Holy Ghost Touching the Christian's belief that Christ was conceived by the Holy Ghost he hath this Animadversion lib. 6. cal 35. What need was there that the Holy Ghost should over-shaddow the Virgin and frame Christ a Body in her womb could not God have shaped him a Body he could not have a Body of the Seed of the Woman without the Seed of the Woman without immersing his own Spirit into so great contamination Celsus might have learn'd better Language of Proclus the Pagan Philosopher Secundum nihil omnino providentiam ex gubernatis accipere nec eorum natura repleri nec eis alicubi commisceri non enim ex eo quòd omnia disponit admiscetur proptereà gubernatis Proclus de anima daemone tit providentia per singula percurrit interim nullis addit pag. 191. If he had been conceiv'd by the Holy Ghost his Body would have excelled all othets in Stature in Form in Strength in Voice nec vox hominem sonat in Majesty and in Elocution for it is incredible that he who had so much Divinity who was formed by so divine an hand should not surpass all men but Christ as the Christians confess was but like to if not inferiour to other men His face according to Prophecy was to be mar'd more than any man's low mean humble yea deformed Why should the holy Spirit be sent to one in a corner of the World in Judea and not be inspired into all men man must let the work of Redemption alone for ever if God have a purpose to save all men As to the last clause of this Article he brings in a Jew lib. 1. cal 20. thus scoffing at Christ for chusing to be born of so mean a Woman at so mean a Town he was to be born in the form of a servant and Bethlehem-Judah was the least of the Cities of Judea as Bethlehem c. did her beauty her inward Beauty being full of Grace invited God to chuse her for the Mother of the Son of God before others invite God into her embraces how could she conceive and bring forth a Son without the knowledg of man c. which Origen retorts thus how do the Vultures breed as your own Pagan Writers report without companying with the Male why could not God make the second Adam without a Father as well as the first without either Father or Mother and lastly that we Christians are not the only men who embrace such admirable stories is manifest from your believing that Plato was conceived by Apollo and born of his Mother Amphictione yet a Virgin before her Husband Aristo had knowledg of her being prohibited by a Vision to touch her At the same point the Seeker whom Volusianus mentions strains August ep 2. Who is there among you saith he so well versed and established in the Christian Religion as can resolve me where I stick I wonder how the Lord of the Universe could take up his lodging in the body of a spotless Virgin how she could go out her ten Months and then bring forth a Child and after that continue a Virgin how could he lurk in the little body of a Vagient Infant whom the Heavens are not able to contain how could the Ancient of days endure to undergo so many years of Infancy of Childhood of Youth of Man-hood or the everlasting God that faints not neither is weary submit to sleep to hunger and thirst to cold and wearisomness and the rest of humane weaknesses cease this wondring man Christ did all this to make it manifest that he was the Son of Man as well as of God Jam illud quòd in somnos solvitur c. hominem persuadet hominibus quem non consumpsit utique sed assumppsit August epist. 2. Volusiano and as to her continuing a Virgin St. Austin answers Ipsa virtus per inviolatae Mariae virginea viscera membra infantis eduxit quae posteà per clausa ostia membra juvenis introduxit that power which brought Christ through the shut door did bring him out of the shut womb It is St. Austin's Observation that the Philosophers in questioning the truth of the Church touching the Incarnatlon overthrew their own Principles It is their Assertion saith he de civit 10. 29. that the intellectual Soul may by purging become consubstantial paternae menti with the Father's Mind which they confess to be the Son of God what absurdity then can there be in the Christian Belief that one individual soul being the purest that ever was created for the salvation of many was assumed into Union with the Son of God Now that the Body must adhere to the Soul that he may be a perfect man we learn by the Testimony of Nature it self which Union of Body and Soul if it were not usual would be less credible than the union of an Humane Soul to the Mind Word or Son of God For 't is casier to be believed that an incorporeal should be united to an incorporeal than that a corporeal and incorporeal Being should conflate into one And Tertullian observes Apol. priùs citato that nothing was more common in the Heathen World than Virgin-births of divine Conceptions and yet they had been more common if some like Olympias had not been jealous of Juno's Jealousie after whose Copy she return'd this answer to her son Alexander's Letter thus superscribed King Alexander the Son of Jupiter Hammon to his Mother Olympias all health I pray thee Son do not traduce me and accuse me to Juno as one that had been naught with her Husband for I shall never be able to bear the burden of that her spightful jealousie which she will conceive against me upon thy writing thy self the Son of Jove and thy insinuating me to be his Whore Agellius Noct. Attic. lib. 13. cap. 4. This Text of St. Austin Ep. 2. beside that that I quoted it for points to a great many Circumstances in the History of the blessed Jesus mention'd in the Gospel all which are from this allegation of the Adversaries acknowledged to have been the Doctrine of the Apostolical as well as Modern Church § 4. Article 4. Suffered under Pontius Pilat was crucified dead and buried and descended into Hell
will attest the intire sum and compleat form of sound Words to have been from Heaven For God by granting Miracles to be wrought by Christ and his Apostles in Christ's Name did immediately seal to Gods sending Christ and Christ's sending his Apostles as Heavens Plenipotentiaries to treat with the World about the Matters of Eternal Life The miraculous descension of the holy Ghost upon our Saviour at his Baptism was to point him out to his Fore-runner John the Baptist as that true Light which according to Prophecy and the general expectation of the Jews was come into the World he it is upon whom thou shalt see the Spirit descend Upon seeing of which and hearing that voyce from Heaven This is my well-beloved Son the Baptist asserts him to be that Prophet which God promised to send to communicate his whole pleasure to the sons and daughters of men Christ's transformation in the holy Mount was to confirm the three Apostles in the Truth of that Voyce they heard This is my Son hear him that is whatever he shall speak in my Name what terms soever he shall propound to the World what way soever he shall chalk out to reconciliation let them be observ'd let no other be expected For I have made him my Ambassadour and given him full power to treat with the World When the Apostles returned from working Miracles the Question that Christ propounded to them was Whom do men say I am and the question he put to such as upon hearing or seeing the miraculous Cures he wrought on others applyed themselves to him for Cure was Believest thou that I am be Infinite Examples might be produc'd But this Proposition Miracles do immediately confirm the Divine Authority of the Speaker and consequently the Truth of whatsoever he delivers is so evident as it needs no proof 4. Lastly Matters of Fact granted and the Supernaturalness of any one thing done in confirmation of the Gospel proved affords Christians of the meanest Capacities ability sufficient to confirm themselves in a full assurance of the Truth of all Gospel assertions to convince the subtilest Gain-sayers as that Laick did the Arrians in the Council of Nice and to answer all Objections that ever were made or can be invented from those seeming absurdities impossibilities contradictions c. which the wittiest Sophister can make himself believe he finds in the Evangelical Religion For there cannot be yea and nay with God nor any thing impossible to him to whom it is possible to raise the dead and to do such stupendious Works as were wrought for the demonstration of the Divine Authority of the Gospel Si Ratio contrà Scripturarum authoritatem redditur quamlibet acuta sit fallit verisimilitudine nam vera esse non potest rursùs si manifestissime certaeque rationi velut Scripturarum authoritas objicitur non intelligit qui hoc facit non Scripturarum sensum ad quem penetrare non potest sed suum potiùs objicit veritati nec quod in eis sed quod in seipso velut pro eis invenit opponit August Marcellino Ep. 7. If Reason be alledged against the Authority of divine Scripture be it never so acute it is not true but deceives us with an appearance of Truth with a shadow of Reason Again if the Authority of Scripture seem to oppose manifest and certain Reason he that alledgeth that Authority does not understand the Text he quoteth and objects against that Truth which Reason presents not the sence of Scripture which he is not able to dive into but his own conceipt Neither doth he oppose against such Reason what he finds in the Text but his own gloss and Comment which he frames to himself And therefore when that Affricane Light thought he found any thing in Scripture that seemed contrary to Truth he concluded That it was but either a shew of Truth or a shew of Scripture and that either the Copy was corrupt or the Translation false or that he himself did not understand the Text aright August Hieron Ep. 19. vel mendosum ese codicem vel interpretem non esse assecutum quod dictum est vel me minimè intellexisse The same Purity and infinite Perfection of the Divine Nature that makes it impossible for God to lye makes it impossible that he should give his approbation and the Imprimatur to a self-contradicting absurd or unreasonable Book § 6. Judicious Plutarch in his Treatise of the Fortune of Alexander compares his attempt to subdue the World to Hercules his Combat with Hydra in that though he had no sooner dispatch'd one War but another sprung up yet by searing the places of the neck where the heads grew which he cut off he prevented the pullulation of fresh heads from those places that is by fortifying the places he gain'd with Garrisons he prevented the rising of the conquer'd at his back by which means at last he conquer'd all Nations Of like difficulty and immense labour is the undertaking to subdue Atheism in an heart posfest with which is a world of Devices and a Tongue prompted by such an heart is a World of Iniquity if not Epicurean infinite Worlds Jacob. 3. 6. Three of this Hydra's most lofty and blasphemous Heads are already dispatch'd and the Topicks whence they were rais'd the necks on which they grew sear'd by so feeling an application of each Argument to the Serpents only beloved temporal and earthly concerns as it may be hoped his delicacy will hardly indure the pain of a new fracture in those tender parts by the reviving of those Arguments against the Gospel which speak him a mere Novice in the great affairs of the World and not to know the State of that virile Age of the Roman Empire when the Gospel was first publish'd or render him uncapable of knowing when to hum when to kiss in a Play-house or of maintaining his right to what he challengeth as his Fathers Heir as his Mothers Son It may be some daunting to the Atheists some encouragement to the Church to see so many heads lye gasping at the feet of the meanest of her Sons And perhaps satisfie the expectations of modest persons as to what my Title promiseth to see three of those Horns that have with the greatest spite and disdain been pushing at the Gospel cast out by one so unskilful a Carpenter A work for three of the ablest Artists for God allows to every Horn a Carpenter Zech. 1. 20. Had this Monster no more Horns than Zechary saw in that prophetical Vision had this Hydra no more heads than Alexander's World had Kingdoms than that Lernean Serpent which Hercules flew had heads be they seven according to Naucrates Erythraeus nine according to Zenodotus or fifty according to Heraclides Ponticus his opinion my success hitherto might give me hopes at last to excind the last of them But how many Heads this Monster of Monsters hath he only knows before whom Hell is bare-fac'd and who searcheth the above-measure
he was Israels Sheepherd By what terrible Earthquake is the Holiness of that place flitted which he chose to put his Name in as long as he would have that Nation called by his Name Where is that holy and beautiful House the joy of the whole Land where their Fathers worship'd him of which Judah's God had said Here will I meet you here will I dwell for ever that is while I dwell with you out of which no Sacrifice was acceptable but polluted and unclean Hag. 2. 14. By what power hath that Royal Pallace of the great King been laid in the dust and kept from a Resurrection but of his Arm who said it should be perpetual desolations Israel's sometimes God and of his word who said One Stone shall not be left upon another Israel's rejected Saviour Where is that Copy of it the Temple of Heliopolis erected by Onias in a precocious humour to fulfill the Prophecy of Isaiah Chap. 19. 19. and in his conceipt built as a Trophy of the God of Israels Victory over the Idols of Aegypt in a place full of the Ruines of the Shrines of their Sacred Animals Joseph an t 13. 6. was it able with all its weight to suppress those Rat and Mice-Gods while it stood And did it not fall at last with the Idol-Temples Was it not blown down by the Breath of him for whom the Conquest of Aegypt to the Obedience of Israels God was reserved our great High-Priest who hath erected there the Altar of his Cross after it had first been prophan'd with the Image of that Monster of Men-Gods Caligula and shut up against the Jews at the end of the Jewish War by Lupus and kept shut by Paulinus Joseph Jud. Bell. 7. 30. Where is their High-Priests spirit of Prophecy since Caiaphas Prophesied it was necessary that one man should die for that Nation hath not that one Man's Blood so discoloured the Gems of the Ephod as they never since sparkled out a Respond Hath it not so fast Cemented the Names of the twelve Tribes to the Plate on which they were set as the Letters of those Names could never since stand up above their fellows so as by those prominent Characters the enquirer could spell out the Determination of his propounded Question Hath not God called that his Leiger that his Resident Agent from amongst them and sent him to the Christian Church in the virtue whereof Christ and his Apostles have foretold the sacking of their City the demolishing of their Temple the overthrow of their Politie and dispersion of their persons and whatsoever else conduceth to the strengthning of our Faith or the engaging us to possess our souls in patience In the virtue whereof our old men have dreamt Dreams our young men have seen Visions our Daughters have been Prophetesses and by this means the Extremity of Famines have been provided against as by Agabus his Prophesie of an Universal Famine loss of Lives in Shipwrack prevented as in St. Pauls Voyage to Rome mens hearts have been secured against fear in the greatest danger as St. Pauls was by a Vision at Corinth Men have been resolved in their doubts as St. Peter was in his whether he ought to Preach the Gospel to the Gentiles time would fail me should I reckon up those multitudes of Christian Prophets mentioned in the Canonical Books much more should I name those that were famous after the sealing of the Canon unto the Council of Nice Alii autem in Ecclesia praescientiam habent futurorum visiones dictiones propheticas Irenaeus adv Heres 2. 58. Many others in the Church have the prescience of future things and visions and prophetical predictions Quemadmodum multos audivimus fratres in Ecclesia prophetica habentes charismata per Spiritum universis linguis loquentes abscondita hominum in manifestum producentes Irenaeus advers Haer. l. 5. p. 539 We have heard many Brethren in the Church who had Prophetick Gifts and would speak by the spirit with divers Tongues and brings into open light the hidden things of mens hearts In his time also some by the Prayers of the Church were raised from the dead l. 2. cap. 58. Et Mortui jam Resurrexerunt perseveraverunt nobiscum multis annis We have seen the dead to have been raised who after that have lived amongst us many years But in all this time the Jews have had no Prophets but such as to their cost and ruful experience they have found to prophesie the Deceits of their own hearts while our great Divine in the Isle of Patmos is receiving the Light of Prophesie from our Jesus Their Barcocab the Son of a Star is abusing them with such palpable Delusion as this light of theirs goes out with a stink and gains himself the name of the Son of a Lye Such Meteors have all the Stars prov'd that have appeared in their Horizon since the Star of Jacob set upon them since then the Sun is gone down upon their Prophets The virtue is past out of their Elijah's Staff into our Apostles Rod out of his Mantle into their Handkerchiefs out of his body from which stretch'd upon the Child life return'd into him into St. Peters shadow by which they that were over-shadowed as he passed by were healed Acts 5 15. the Fleece is dry and void of all that Heavenly Influence which bedews the Floor of the Gentile World about it CHAP. IV. Gematrian Plaisters too narrow for the Sore § 1. The Ark. § 2. Holy Fire § 3. Urim and Thummim § 4. Spirit of Prophecy in the Second Temple § 5. Exorcisme and Bethesda's all-healing virtue the second Temples Dowry § 1. THeir Cabbalists have attempted to supple and allay the Inflamation of this mortal Wound by the application of this Oyntment by a kind of Cabbala which they call Gematria they observe upon Hag. 1. 8. it is written Ekkabbda I will be glorified where because the word wanteth the Letter 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the end of it which Letter in Numeration stands for 5 they say that the want thereof sheweth the want of 5 Things in the second Temple which were in the first The Ark and its appurtenances the Mercy-seat and Cherubims Secondly the Fire from Heaven Thirdly the Majesty of Divine presence called Shechina Fourthly the Holy Ghost And Fifthly Urim and Thummim From whence they draw these two Conclusions 1. That their want of their antient Glory is not to be imputed to their putting Christ to Death seeing that was departed from them many Ages before he was born 2. That the Apostles were not moved to write the New Testament by the Inspiration of the Holy Ghost for they wrote during the standing of the Second Temple Though the Answers which are commonly return'd to these Parologisms are Butteresses strong enough to secure the Christian Cause against these assaults to wit That though the Second Temple wanted the Shadows it had the Substance of all these the things
themselves though not the Types and therefore was filled with a greater Glory when he appeared in it in whom the Godhead dwells bodily who is the Ark and Propitiation c. And that Gods withdrawing these visible Signs by degrees was an Argument the Sun was towards Rising and should have been to the Jews a provocation to expect so much more earnestly its arising as they saw the Stars disappearing one after another Yet because these Answers do not beat the Jew off from his presumption but by seeming to yeild that as to matter of fact all these were wanting harden him in his conceit that he has not sustain'd this loss upon the account of his being found guilty of our Saviours Blood I shall here shew that most of if not all these five things were in the Literal sence in the Second Temple and in being in or not long before our Saviours Time That the Ark was in the Second Temple against the Testimony of the Cabbalists I set the whole Company of the return'd from the Babylonish Captivity to attest in one of those Songs of degrees so called not because they were sung upon steps either the 15 of the ascent into the Temple or other places of advantage where the Levites stood for all Psalms were sung upon Ascents or Scaffolds Nehem. 9. 4. but because they were Sung at the Dedication of the second Temple by them that had ascended out of the Abyss of Captivity as the Chaldee Paraphraseth this Title upon their fixing of which Title first to the 120 Psalm grew that wild Talmudical story of the rising up of the Abyss at the building of that Temple which I would not have nam'd but that as ridiculous as it is it serves to prove that in their opinion the Psalms thus intituled by whomsoever at first pen'd were by the Spirit of Prophecy fitted to the case of them that ascended from the Captivity and accordingly used by them in their Singing Praise Of which mind also is Theodoret and Euthymius and to this agrees the Syriack making the Contents of Psalm 120. to be a Prayer of the People detain'd in Babel and of the following a Song of Eduction or Ascent out of Babel the best exposition of the Septuagint 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 cùm Cyrus praecepit ut ascenderet Captivitas These Captives return'd in Psal. 122 mention the Thrones of Judgment there set the Thrones of the House of David one of which Thrones was that of the Glory of God the Ark of his presence saith R David and ver 4. they mention the going up of the Tribes to the Testimony of Israel that is saith R. Obad. to be resolv'd in their doubts that could not by other evidence be determined by the Priest consulting God before the Ark as they were directed Deut. 17. The Ark is called the Ark of Testimony partly because the Law was kept in the Ark in its Original by which all Copies were to be examin'd and what was doubtful in them by it to be determined partly because from the Oracle over the Ark between the Cherubims God testified what his will was in such cases which he had not so distinctly declared in that common Rule hence the Oracle upon the Ark or the Ark in respect of that Oracle is called simply The Testimony in distinction to the Law in that Text Isa. 8. 26. To the Law and to the Testimony where we must not think the Holy Spirit Tautologizeth in giving so short a direction but as the Heathens enquired in their Pontifical Books and at vive-voyce Oracles where those Books came short of a Determination so God appoints his people first to the Law and then to the living Oracle The sence then which their own most learned Rabbies and such as flourish'd before their Enmity to the Gospel put their Expositors to wrest the Scriptures into a thousand forms that they might not speak for the Christians put upon those Texts is such as speaketh the return'd in the Second Temple to have rejoyced in this that they had an opportunity and invitation to go up to the Ark of the Testimony to the Throne of Gods presence the Ark. The learned Castellio goes so far along with me and these most antient Rabbies as to render Testimony by Oracle In another of those Psalms of ascent the whole Choire of them ascended out of Babylon introduce the Ark into the second Temple in this form of words Psal 132. 8. Arise O Lord and come into thy resting place thou and the Ark of thy strength the same in sence that Solomon used at the Dedication of the first Temple saith R. David For the Ark as it went with them into so it returned with them out of Captivity saith Heb. Syr. upon Verse 6. We found it in the Fields expounding the Fields by Mich. 4. 10. Thou shalt dwell in the Field thou shalt go to Babylon I do not mean it was carried into Babylon but hid together with the Tabernacle and Altar of Incense by Jeremy 2 Maccab. 2. 4. an authority which though ingeniously confest by the Writer to be but humane will with unbyast Persons out-weigh the word of the whole Tribe of Cabbalists And that the Ark was restored is further manifest because the return'd from Captivity do direct their Worship towards it in ver 7. We will worship at his footstool Whether of these Opinions is of harder digestion That those purified sons of Levy newly come out of the Furnace of Affliction should offer the Sacrifice of Fools not considering what they said should sprinkle God with the Court-holy-water of Complemental Thanks for what they had not been blest with should dance before the Lord after the Pipe of their own deluded Fancy and praise him with Songs made in their golden Dreams of an Ark when they had not the Ark or that their degenerate successors should belye the goodness of God in denying the Typical as they do the real Ark of Gods presence to have been in that Temple and which of these Testimonies is most credible This of the blinded modern Jewes who that they might with more liberty blaspheme the blessed Jesus have conjured out of one Letters want in a word the Second Temples want of five things which the First had and among them the Ark of the Covenant Or that of the antient and impartial Rabbies who in their Comments upon these Texts introduce their Forefathers blessing God after their Restauration from the Babylonish Bondage for restoring to them that Symbol of his presence upon whose Testimony 't is so far from being a Fable as Weemes is pleas'd to call it I think it may be concluded as more then probable that the Second Temple enjoyed the Ark as long as Jerusalem enjoy'd the Temple that is till it was brought in Triumph to Rome § 2. But they are more impudent in reckoning the holy Fire to have been wanting in the Second Temple against the manifest Testimony of their Progenitors the Jews of
not see the approaching Light of that Pretious Stone God was about to lay in Sion to the proximity of that Age to the appearance of that true Light of that only infallible living Oracle This by the way To this Testimony of Josephus for the Second Temple's enjoyment of this Oracle the Son of Sirach seems to give his Suffrage Chap. 33. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Law is as faithful as the Responses of Urim and Thummim of that Oracle which from its Clarity and Veritie had these names given it interpreted by the Septuagint 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Light and Truth The first used by Siracides and is the Radix of that Sirname of Apollo Delius so called properly enough if Apollo be the Sun but cannot be applied but abusively to his Daemon or Genius that gave Oracles most of which were darker than darkness it self The latter given to that famous Saphire which the Antient Kings of Aegypt who were also Priests wore about their neck as Aelian reports Var. Hist. 14. 34. This for the illustration of the Terms as to the Text it self it imports that at the making of that Book of Wisdom which the Author saith was in the Reign of Evergetes the Oracle of Urim and Thummim was still in being for he brings that in as a thing Notius notorious and well known to illustrate the perspicuity and faithfulness of the Law Lastly though it was wanting at their first Return before the Temple was finish'd yet they expected it would be restored and therefore Ezra 2. 62 63. the Tirshata would not take them into the number of Priests that could not shew their Pedigree Till there should rise up a Priest with Urim and Thummim and in all reason was restored as soon as the Temple was finish'd a Vision whereof Zachary seeth c. 3. where Joshua is cloth'd with that change of Raiment wherein it is promised him He shall judge Israel Post ablationem vestium sordidarum restitutam mundi sacerdotii dignitatem promittitur quòd ipse judex sit domus ejus After the taking away of his filthy Raiment and restoring to him the dignity of a clean High-Priest-hood it is promised to him that he should judge Gods house as St. Jerom from the Hebrews expounds that Text a clear Paraphrase of the Pectoral of Judgment of the stones whereof Zachary affirms that they are the ingravings of God c. and in the 6 Chapter of Zach. vers 14. and 10. I find Tobijah among those that attend upon the holy things who was one of those whose Pedigree could not be found and were therefore excluded from the Sanctuary till a Priest should arise with Urim Nehem. 7. 62. § 4. As to the Spirit of Prophesie its being under the Second Temple in both those Degrees of it implied Revel 4. 2. that which inspired holy men with Prophecy or to be Prophets and to Preach and that which inspired them to be Penmen or to write Prophecies Is so palpable by the date of the Prophecies of Haggai and Zachary as nothing but malice can hoodwink the Jew from seeing it And though it be true the Sun set upon their writing Prophets about the Reign of Alexander the Great yet they had speaking Prophets as long as the Temple stood of which Josephus gives many instances of Judas whose Prophecies used to prove so infallible as when he saw Antigonus going to the Temple the afternoon of that day on which he had prophesied he should die and that at Straton's Tower which was 600 Furlongs distant he cried out to his Disciples in the words of the Prophet Jonah when God spared Ninivie after he had threatned the destruction of it within 40 days I now grow weary of my life seeing Antigonus his life convinceth me to be a false Prophet for it is impossible he should die this day at Straton's Tower who is here alive after so much of the day is spent and at so great a distance from that place But there was a Tower in the Palace of that name in the Vault whereof Antigonus was Murdered in his return from the Temple and news thereof brought to Judas while he was tormenting himself for fear of the miscarriage of his Prophesie Joseph an t 13. 19. Of one Jesus who four years before the beginning of that War which ended with the Desolation of Jerusalem at what time the City enjoy'd as much peace and plenty as ever coming up to the Feast of Tabernacles suddenly broke out into these Exclamations A Voyce from the East a voyce from the West a voyce from the four Winds a voyce against Jerusalem and the Temple a voyce against the Bridegroom and the Bride a voyce against this whole Nation and without ceasing day or night carried this burthen of Prophesie through all the Streets and Lanes of the City from which no punishment could restrain him And to spare the alledging of more Examples Of himself who prophesied to Vespasian that he should be Emperour against which Vespasian making this Exception How canst thou foreknow my Fortunes that couldst not foresee thine own Captivity nor the taking of Jotopata of which thou was Governour Why replied he I told the Jotopatanes that within 47 days they should be destroyed and my self become a Prisoner to the Romanes By this we see how false as well as blasphemous this Assertion is that the Second Temple wanted the Spirit of Prophecy and how far wide of Daniels sence the modern Jews are in expounding The sealing of Prophecy whereby he means the fulfilling and ratifying thereof by the Blessed Jesus to be the cessation of it of which cessation of all Prophecy they sometimes make the Aera to concur with that of the defiling the Temple by Epiphanes sometimes with that of the League which Judas Maccabeus made with the Romanes sometimes to the first year of Seleucus Nicanor Whereas speaking Prophets continued to the end of the Jewish State and writing Prophets ceas'd long before the eldest of these Dates and therefore the Author of the Book of Maccabees speaks of that as falling out a considerable time before the discumfiture of Judas by Alcimus and Bacchides 1 Mac. 9. 27. So there was a very great Affliction in Israel the like whereof was not since the time that a Prophet was not seen amongst them that is a writing Prophet Vide comput Jud. Scal. de emend temp lib. 7. pag. 628. 654. That the Shechina or Majesty of the Divine presence wherein God appeared to be present by the appearance of Angels those Courtiers of Heaven either in a lucid flaming shining appearance as that Host of Heaven those Angels of God's presence that pitcht their Camp before Israels Camp in the Wilderness appeared in the night or in a thick Cloud or Smoak such a bodily appearance as they assumed on the day vide Hamond an on Mat. 3. 16. that this Majestick presence of the Lord did fill the Second Temple as well as the First is attested by the
Jerusalem Jews 2 Mac. 2. 7. where they write to their Brethren of Aegypt that Jeremy when he had hid the Tabernacle and the Ark told the Priests that when God restored that Captivity he would shew them his Glory that the Glory of the Lord should appear and the Cloud also as it was shewed under Moses and Solomon For the Truth of all the Contents of this Letter they appeal to ocular evidence wishing their Brethren if there were need they would send some to see Heliodorus would not believe that God dwelt then between the Cherubims till he had been soundly beaten into the belief of it and scourged by the Angel of Gods presence into a Confession of what he had seen with his eyes and felt upon his ribbs advising Demetrius if he had any Enemy or Traytor he would send him to rob the Temple for thou shalt saith he receive him well scourg'd if he escape with his life for in that place without doubt there is an especial power of God 2 Mac. 3. 36. It was in this Temple Hircanus the High Priest had conference with God by an Angel appearing to him while he was offering Incense that Zachary the Father of the Baptist had the appearance of God by an Angel A thing so ordinary as the people without Hesitancie conclude he had seen a Vision when he did but becken to them But what need of proving that by Induction of Particulars which naturally follows from the Premisses for must not the Divine Presence be there where was the Ark of Gods Presence Could the Temple which had the Fire want the Smoak want the Cloud § 5. It is manifest then that under the Second Temple the Jews enjoyed all these Prerogatives Nay they were so far from wanting what they had under the first as even in respect of external indications of Gods gracious presence amongst them the Glory of the Second exceeded the Glory of the First Temple For under the later House they had 1. The power of ejecting Devils out of the possessed which we do not find they had under the First Temple for that melancholy Spirit which David cast out of Saul by his playing upon the Harp comes not up to the case either as to time being before the First Temple or as to the thing being the removal only of melancholly But that under the Second Temple there was a stated Order of Exorcists who by invocating the Name of God over such as were possessed with unclean Spirits did cast them out is manifest from our Saviours urging that practice in vindication of his own and professing that he cast out Devils by the same power by which their Children did If I by Beelzebub cast out Devils by whom do your children cast them out therefore they shall be your judges Mat. 12. 27. In virtute scilicet Creatoris By the power of the Creator as Tertullion expounds this Text contrà Marcion lib. 4. 26. and maintains that Exposition by this Reason that Christ upbraiding their Children with casting out Devils by Beelzebub was inconsistent with what he had said before If Satan cast out Satan c. Hâc voce quid magis portendit quà m in to ejicere se quo filii eorum in virtute scilicet Creatoris What can Christ mean by this word but that he cast out Devils by the same power by which their Children cast them out in the virtue to wit of the Creator Thus Irenaeus quoted by Dr. Hammond annot on Mat. 12. 27. By the invoking the name of the most high and mighty God even before the coming of Christ men were delivered from the wicked Spirits and all kind of Devils So powerful then was the Name of the God of Abraham the God of Isaac the God of Jacob saith Origen contrà Cels. l. 1. l. 4. But the use of this form of Exorcism grew so ineffectual after Christs Name was called upon them that were possessed as the Jewish Exorcists were willing to change it into that Form We adjure you by the Name of Jesus 2. The all-healing Virtue of the Pool of Bethesda the house of mercy for the poor into which whosoever first stepped down after the troubling of the water by an Angel at a certain time was cured of whatsoever disease he had Job 5. 4. of which thus Tertullian advers Judaeos cap. 13. Fuit piscina Bethesda usque ad adventum Christi curando invalitudines ab Israel desiit a benefieiis deinde ex perseveratione erroris sui quo nomen Domini per ipsos blasphemaretur The Pool of Bethesda had virtue to heal infirmities unto the coming of Christ but it ceas'd to put forth that beneficial gift after that the name of God was blasphemed by the Jews perseverance in their error And de baptismo c. 5. Having observed how the Gentiles in an Apish imitation of the Israelites initiating Proselytes in the Sacred Religion by Baptism used to initiate themselves some to Isis some to Mithra by washings and to expiate their Houses Temples and whole Cities with sprinkling of holy water and to sprinkle themselves in the Pelusian Solemnities and the Games of Apollo in order to their regeneration and purgation from the guilt of Perjury or Manslaughter Plutarch de oracul defectu And that unclean Spirits in emulation of the Spirit of God its moving upon the Waters chose to frequent Waters gloomy Fountains solitary Rivulets Groves Wells c. where they made their appearances wrought their lying wonders and laid their baits of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 mischievous benefits He tells us that the God of Israel to prevent his peoples seeking cure at the hands of those Quacks and going a Whoring after those abominations and to shew that his good Angels were not behind those filthy Daemons in their power of communicating a saving influence to that Element with the commerce whereof evil Angels sought to bring men to perdition sent his Angel to move the Pool of Bethesda which virtue that Pool retain'd till our Saviour by curing the impotent man that lay there gave notice that the Operation of that Pool was now to cease and invited the sick to come to him the Fountain of living Water I know Theophilact makes not so great a matter of this Pool as did the Fathers before him and that the Learned Dr. Hammond strains courtesie with almost every material word in the sacred Text John 5. to bring that Story into a compliance with Theophilacts Opinion that the Angel which descended was but some Officer who at certain times that is at the great Festivals when the greatest number of Sacrifices was slain went down and stirred up those grosser parts which came from the Beasts washed therein after they were slain for Sacrifice the congelations of Blood that went to the bottom by which means they infused themselves more strongly into the Water and conveighed to it such a medicinal Virtue as is in the Skin of a Sheep newly flead or the warm vital
propounded as the Results of Reason as the collections of humane Ratiocination while in the mean time their Gods taught them by their Examples the quite contrary Ut ab ipso caelo traduci in terra satis idonea videatur authoritas That the inartificial argument that of divine Authority for Debauchery as drawing its extract from Heaven might counter-ballance all the most artificial perswasions to Virtue August de civitat 2. 10. Those Gods saith St. Austin Ibid c. 6. Not only permitted men to be overwhelm'd in their minds with loose opinions and to grow to the height of Villany without their interposing any terrible threatnings for they are not able to name the place or time when any of them perswaded to virtuous actions or disswaded by menacies from avarice ambition fraud cruelty luxury c. But they spurr'd them forward to all manner of licentiousness by their own Example 2. Nor prest with such Motives of eternal retribution as the Gospel propounds 3. Nor seconded with that aid of Divine Grace which attends the Preaching of the Word of Life rightly administred Hence all Philosophical Instructions became so ineffectual as it became a question Whether it was possible to discipline men to Virtue de virtute disputamus docerine possit Plutarch ethic tom 2. and though Plutarch affirms it may yet the best proof he brings of his Assertion is the absurdity of the contrary that men should learn all other Arts and Sciences and be incapable of learning the Art of right living seems to him highly absurd but he either labours with such penury of Examples or thinks those that were commonly alleadged so inconcludent as he doth not produce one for an Essay to the Probat of his Opinion but leaves the Virtuous Man for all the Culture of the Schools in the rank of black Swans even where his Antagonists had placed him Viri boni nominantur tantùm eo pacto quo hippocentauri Good men are entià rationis fancied only not really existing And â—ully after the perusal of both Greek and Latin Authors was as far to seek for a good man of the Philosophers making as Plutarch what one of the Philosophers saith Tully is so well manner'd so disposed in mind and life as reason requires which of them look upon their own Discipline not as an ostentation of science but the law of life who listens to himself or observes his own decrees you may see some of them to be persons of that light and yet supercilious carriage that they would have been better if they had never gone to school Some so coveting mony others praise and many such slaves to lust that their speech and life are at greatest enmity And his Nephew Cornelius beats upon the same string I am so far saith he from thinking Philosophy to be the Mistress of Life and that which perfects virtue as I rather incline to this Opinion that no men stand in more need of an instructor how to live than the most of them who spend their lives in discussing the rules of living well For I see the greatest part of them who in the Schools do most subtilly give Precepts 〈…〉 ing Modesty and Continency to wallow in the Mire of all nâ—thy Lusts. To this Seneca gives his suffrage in his exhortations Most Philosophers saith he are such kind of men as they are eloquent in reproaching themselves whom if you heard declaiming against Avarice Lust and Ambition you would think they had receiv'd a â—ee to plead thâ—ir own Condemnation so do their revilings of Vice which they send abroad recoile upon themselves as you cannot conceive any otherwise of them but as Physicians whose Boxes have on the outside the Titles of healthful Druggs but are within full of Poyson Yea so palpable was the inefficacy of their own Rules to make the best of them throughly honest as Seneca is forc'd to cast over them and himself for company the Cloak of this Excuse Omnia quae luxuriosi faciunt quaeque imperiti facit sapiens sed non eodem modo eodemque proposito That the wise man may do the same things which fools and the luxurious do but after another manner and to another end as if the goodness of the Intention could either rectifie the pravity of an Action in it self vitious or remove the scandal seeing the badness of the example is apparent but the drift of the mind out of sight Thus Aristippus defended his Familiarity with the Strumpet Lais by saying there was a great difference betwixt him and the rest of Lais servants for Lais had them but he had Lais. Oh brave Wisdom cries Laciantius and deserving to be imitated by good men who would not send his Children to this Philosophers School to learn to have a Whore who can assign no other difference betwixt himself and persons of profligated honesty but this That they wasted their Fortunes in that Luxury which he enjoy'd gratis In which point yet the strumpet overwitted him who so held the Philosopher for her Pandar that all the Youth being corrupted by the Example and Authority of their Master might flock unto her without any shame And yet this is he whom the Censors of Manners the Satyrists prefer before the rest of the Gown'd Crew Such an empty sound of words were all Philosophical Precepts as the Teachers of them could not hear themselves speak with an obediential Ear whom therefore Cicero affirmeth not to have sought the bettering but delighting of themselves in the study of Morals In good sooth saith he I fear that all their disquisition though it contain most plentiful Fountains of Virtue and Science yet if we compare it with their actions and things that are brought to perfection may seem only to have been a pleasant diversion from business The Emperour Antoninus Philosophus his Sanctity grew almost into a Proverb for its perfection but Julius Capitolâ—nus suspects it to be counterfeit dederunt ei vitio quod fictus fuisset nec tum simplex quod videretur and for all the oftentation of virtue which that Royal Philosopher made makes this the main point of difference betwixt him and Verus that Verus could not dissemble as he did à cujus sectâ lasciviâ morum vitae licentioris nimietate dissensit Erat enim morum simplicium qui adumbrare nihil posset Jul. Cap. verus And Lampridius hath this Note upon Commodus Sed tot disciplinarum magistri nihil ei profuerunt But Evangelical Precepts do not only gingle in the Ear but ring in the Conscience and come not in word only but in power being accompanied into the hearts of such as do not resist the holy Ghost with such a Majesty as commands Obedience like that Word whereby God called things that were not into being by vertue of that Spirit which in the Old Testament-prophecies God promiseth shall never be separated from his Word and which in the New Testament and subsequent Ecclesiastical History we find always moving upon the Face