is in it self directly opposite to the whole Corporation of Debauched and Evil men destructive to all corrupt Doctrines and Practices whatever and perfectly ruinous to the Interest of the Devil in this World of which there needs no other proof but an appeal to the Judgments of all sober minded men Never was there any Doctrine brought to light so Holy and so excellent A Doctrine that has visibly the highest tendency to those two great ends of all Religion the Honour of God and Mans present and future happiness No Instance can be given of any particular Duty enjoyned Destructive to mans true happiness but all perfective of it The strictest self-denial has a Recompence proposed to us of a hundred fold in things of a far more Noble and excellent Nature and most suitable in all such cases to a Rational choice The result of the whole is this Whenever Miracles are wrought to establish such a Doctrine as in the judgment of right Reason is likely to come from God we are upon the highest and most unquestâ—onable ground of Assurance that we can be Whenever a Miracle is wrought to establish a contrary Doctrine 't is the highest Trial But still God is pleased to order it so that we have ground sufficient to oppose and will sâ—â—nd it and â—â—â—kon in onely as such Whâ—â—â—ver consults thâ— writings of the Primiâ—iâ—e Châ—â—sâ—â—â—â— will and there were two things upon which they â—hâ—â—â—lâ— inâ—â—â—â—d and by the strâ—nâ—th whereâ—f the Châ—â—stian Religion made its sâ—â—st Enâ—â—aâ—ce and â—avelled thorough a great part of the Heathen world The Excelâ—â—ncy of its Doctrine and the Miracles wrought â—o confirm it And these two conjoined give â—s the mâ—st inâ—aâ—â—ible Assuâ—ance of Religion we are capable of in this World The Miraâ—â—es justify the Doctrine and the Doctrine reflects a Testimony back to the Miracles and in that Conjunction the proof is Invincible And so 't is in this case of the Bible For we can have no more then what we find here The Best Doctrine with the Highest Attestation Whoever warily considers our Saviours Reasonings with the Jews shall find him going upon this Ground For as he frequently justifies his Doctrine from his Miracles so he likewise often justifies his Doctrine to be in it self Divine Corresponding to the Scriptures of the Old Testament and in direct pursuance of what Moses and the Prophets had taught And so makes the testimony of his Miracles unquestionable thereby For such a Doctrine accompanied with such miraculous Evidence must needs be from God and can admit of no Rational Opposition And therefore in discoursing this matter in hand neither ought to be insisted on neither the Doctrine nor the Miracles Distinctly and Separately from the other but Both urged in that excellent Conjunction in which they are handed down to us Thirdly If we look upon this Book in the Success and Effects of it since its Conneyance We have from thence still further evidences of its Divinity and more Rational perswasions to derive it from God as a Book of his own Composing and about which he has exercised a peculiar Care And that upon these two Grounds First That this Book though written at several times all so long since past and some of it before any other Books were extant has yet in its passage through so many Ages escaped all the dangers to which it has been exposed and is preserved intire to us to this day Secondly That this Rock and the Religion contained in it has made its Entrance into the world and gain'd an Acceptance amongst Mankind in such a way and by such Means as are Peculiar to it self and no other Religion can make a Pretence to In such a Way as when we rightly consider it 't will seem Absord and Ridiculous to all common Reason to suppose that the wickedest Counterâ—eit and the â—â—andest piece of Imposture about God and Religion should ever be able so to do Or indeâ—d that any Book of Religion should upon such Permes arrive at such a Reception but one that contain'd the Highest and most Evident Truths and had the great God for its Author For the first 'T is true that other Books very Ancient and written long ago as we have good ground to believe have descended Intire to this very Age. But herein the passage of the Bible through the chanel of so many Ages is Distinguished from all other Writings not only that 't is some of it much Elder then they and upon that account more liable to Loss and Decay but that no Book or Writing the world was ever possessed of has had that violent Opposition made against it nor such Designs formed for its Ruine and Extirpation as this has had Others have met with a quiet and peaceable passage This has been often beset with most Keen and Inveterate Enemies Besides that great hazard so much of the Bible was in as then was Extant in the days of Josiah when for ought appears by the Story there was but one Copy and that had been lost for sixty eight or sixty nine years and was hid either in the Rubbish or else in some secret part of the Walls of the Temple for it was found when the Temple came to be Repaired and in all probability was there hid during the wicked Reign of Manasseh by some malicious Idolaters with an intention utterly to extinguish it Which might easily have been done in a way that had made it Irrecoverable had not a Divine hand over ruled and secured it Besides this and some other Hazzards the Bible has scap'd of a like nature we read of two famous and most Implacable Enemies furnish'd with all Humane power that with all their might and skill have beset it Antiochus Epiphanes under the Old Testament and the Empâ—rour Dioclesian under the Nâ—w This Antiochus Epiphanes called likewise and much moâ—â— truely Epiâ—â—aâ—â—â— the Mad and the Furious was prophefied of and plainly foretolâ— by the Prophet David in the eighth and eleventh chapters of his prophecy He there calls him a King of fierce countâ—â—â—â—ce and says His heart should be against the hâ—ly Câ—venant and that he should have indignaâ—ion against the holy Covenant Which was the Law of God the Scriptures then Extant This Antiochus came in the times of the Maccaâ—ees and most cruelly destroyed and wasted Jerusalem and made it his grand business to ruine the Jews and utterly extinguish their whole Religion and Worship Dedicated their Temple to Jupiter Olympius Erected an Altar therein for the Worship of that â—â—â—l and in contempt of the Jews caused many Swine to be slain and offered up in sacâ—â—fiâ—e to him and as the surest way to pat a pâ—rfect â—â—nd to the Religion of that Place and People with utmost diligence made search after their Law and wheresoever he sound it iâ—â—â— diâ—tâ—ly Burnt and destroyed it and thâ—eatned â—â—st exquisite torments and Death to any that should dare to Conceal or Retain it Of which Josephas gives us the Relation
all the certain notions we have of another and a farther World and the great account of all invisible things and Secondly because 't is the highest Motive we have to all good living 't is from hence from the authority of this Book that we are chiefly obliged to all that is holy and good and engaged against all the corrupt prastises of humane Life when we consider with what difficulty we attain in the first Case to a fixed and unshaken belief of such things as we do not actually see and how apt we are in the latter to decline from the strict Rules of a good life nothing can seem more necessary then a rational insurance about the great Foundation of all Belief and Practice in both That with a perfect security to our present and future welfare we may rely upon this Book as that great and only Revelation by which God will inform rule and judge the world I have hereby attempted to make evident not only from its own excellent nature and composure and such visible and open effects of a supreme and almighty power as accompanyed its first Publication and lasted till the Church was so far built that the Scaffolding might be safely taken down but also from many other considerations from whence an abundant testimony to its Divinity will appear to result And this task if sufficiently perform'd as 't will give answer to all reasonable doubts and cast a just contempt upon all prophane reproaches so it will also reflect much upon those who though they acknowledge this Book to come from God yet not acquiessing singly in the conduct thereof declare it thereby insufficient to those great ends for which it appears to be intended and such are those of the Roman Church on the one hand and all sorts of Enthusiasts on the other who by a twofold superfoetation that of endless Traditions and that of new and continued Revelations have rendred the whole Scriptures if not useless Yet as to their great end and design altogether deficient and imperfect My Lord I seek not by this Dedication to countenance a defence of the Bible nor any way to secure my self against the just reproach of an ill performance the first would engage me in an open affront to a Christian State and the other oblige me to be too injurious to You and that Candor and love to Truth you possess 'T is alone that great Honour and that entire affection I have for Your Lordship that Interests Your Name in this matter though there is nothing less needed by You than discourses of this nature Yet there is nothing more due from me then an open and publick profession that my self and what ever I do is devoted to Your Service I know my Lord into what hands I commit these Papers when I present them to You that great hazard to which they are exposed by your first view will sufficiently inure them to all future dangers I consider that Judgement with which they are put to encounter and want not a due sense what the success must needs be I know also your remedying kindness and am enough secur'd thereby am in this case upon the same terms of relief that he was that discoursed before Caesar who thus address'd to him Qui apud te Caesar audent dicere magnitudinem tuam ignorant qui non audent humanitatem My Lord as You were pleased before to allow that Method I used in discovering the Unreasonableness of Atheism So I promise my self some acceptance in the account I now give You of the Reasonableness of Scripture Belief as I know no better Property can be convey'd to the World then a Rational Possession of God and his Word So I am also much pleased that I have spent some part of my time in doing what You required To whom I owe all that is due to the most Generous and most lasting Friendship and shall ever be as much as I can be which is but what I ought to be My Lord Your Lordships most true Friend And most Humble Faithful Servant CHARLES WOLSELEY THE REASONABLENESS OF Scripture-Belief THat the being of the Christian Religion depends much upon the Credit and Authority of that Book we call the BIBLE there needs little to be said to prove it The instance were as hard to find as 't is unreasonable in it self to suppose that any man should at the same time reject the Bible as Fictitious and yet embrace the Christian Religion as True For it must either be granted there are No Laws any where extant that do formally constitute this Religion which is absurd to suppose of any Religion or they must needs be admitted here No man can be a Jew and renounce the Olâ— Testament nor he a Mahumetan that disclaimâ— the Alchoran Because to deny the Authority of those Books is visibly to rase the great foundation of all profession and practice in those two Religions Although the fact of Christs being in the World and many other things relating to the Christian Religion be attested to by other writings yet the Scriptures are the onely means by which we come to a sufficient knowledge of a Religion established upon that foundation and which alone contain the Laws and Constitutions of such Religion No considerable attempt has been at any time made to set the Christian Religion upon any other Bottom then the Bible to promulge any other edition of Christian Laws to write any Counter-Story of Christ and the Apostles or is there extant in the World any different account of their Doctrines from whence might be deduced a Contrary or other systeme of the Christian Profession from what is recorded in this Book Nor is it reasonable to believe there can be any foundation lay'd whereon to erect Christianity where the Bible is excluded For whatsoever has otherwise then by the Bible by writing or tradition descended down to the World touching the Christian Religion has been either by its Friends or its Enemies For the Latter no mention is made in any Heathen Writer of any Christian Laws nor indeed of any considerable matter at all relating to the Christian Religion farther then what we find in the Bible it self And so amounts to no more then a Cumulative help to its Credibility And 't is evident those of the Heathen who have at any time opposed the Christian Profession and disputed most against it have opposed it as contained there That Book being granted on all hands to comprise its Doctrine and to be the stated rule of that Religion For the former whatever has been by the writings or Traditions of such who embraced the Christian Religion and gave their Assent to it conveyed down to us can never induce any other Rule of that Religion then the Bible For besides that all such Collateral traditions are in their own nature relative to the Bible dependant upon it and such as must necessarily stand and fall together with it they have also come from the hands
furnish mankind with all those necessary Requisites to their own present and future happiness they stand in need of and which they cannot otherwise obtain Adaquate therefore to our Natural Defects ought our expectancy to be in this matter When a Book proposeth it self to us as a Law Supernatural and containg Gods mind Revealed and make known to the World 't is a most reasonable way of Trial to examine whether This Book contain all those things I may justly expect from such a Revelation and be rationally accommodated to All those wants I expect a Revelation should supply and for which a Revelation from God my own Reason tells me must needs be Designed Now the Bible stands Single in this respect likewise No one Book nor all the Books that now do or at any time have pretended to Revelation can answer all the Ends of a Revelation besides it self or endure such a rational Test but are visibly Defective and Insufficient for those ends they must needs pretend to be Designed What Book besides the Bible ever gave us so full a discovery of God as our own rational Nature looks after tends to and capacitate's us to receive What Book besides This ever gave to mankind a clear and distinct account of the First Existence of things and the Origine of the Vniverse What Book besides This ever gave the least tolerable account of the Origine of Evil the first Rise and Inlet with the after Progress of it the Punishment inflicted for it and the certain Means to Remove and Obliterate it Never any Book so answered that great End of Revelation as to make a full discovery to us of the whole business of mans Apostacy and of his Recovery In short What Book but the Bible gives us an account of Gods proceedings with Men from the first Foundations of the Earth and has plainly and punctually told us what he will do to the end of the world and for ever has to the utmost discovered and supplied all our natural Defects made known to us all that was necessary and fit for us to know pointed us to the furthest bounds of our duty to God and one towards another and revealed to us plain and direct ways and means to attain the highest happiness here and the most excellent Rewards hereafter our Beings are capable of No other Book can so much as make a pretence to it nor with the least colour be produced upon this account in competition with the Bible Did the world afford any Other Book with an equal Pretence that more fully answered all those Ends to which we may rationally expect a Divine Revelation should be Designed I grant we had good Reason to preferr it before the Bible and receive it as such But if This Book alone and no other be found to answer all the Rational ends of a Revelation and to exceed all the Attainments of Mankind both Moral and Divine and whatever has made Pretence to Revelation besides There can be then no Reason at all to doubt but that This Book ought to have the Precedence of all others And really and truly is what it self claims to be Thirdly All Revelation must needs be supposed to be corresponding to and perfective of the true and genuine Issues of our Natural Light There must be nothing in it relating to God to our selves or to any part of the world that any way contradicts the Law Natural For that being the Primary Law God gave to the world and which is originally annexed to our Beings and inseperable from our selves 'T were absurd to conceive and indeed upon many accounts impossible to be that God should ever Repeal either the Whole or any Part of it but still proceed to Rectify and Compleat it and Superstruct all future Revelation upon it Two things upon this account we may reasonably expect from any pretence to Revelation First So farr as it relates simply to things Natural it ought to be justified to us by the dictates of right Reason and to be a Re-inforcement of the Law truly Natural Secondly Whatever it proposeth to our Belief as Supernatural ought to be no way unsuitable to a Rational reception as such For though I may well suppose God to reveale things to me that were Above and Beyond me and which my Reason could not Discover and cannot refuse so to do without a Negative upon the great End of Revelation yet I cannot reasonably suppose him to reveal any thing to me that is in it self directly Contradictory to my Reason to believe when 't is so discovered or uncapable of a rational assent to its verity when in such a way proposed Because the design of all Revelation must needs be in a Reasonable though Supernatural way to Instruct and Inform mankind The Bible upon this account will be found to justify it self against all exception and to prevail against all competition First Not a Syllable in it Destructive to the Rational nature some things indeed above the full reach and comprehension of it but no way Destructive to it And those such and in such a way proposed to our belief as ought to Enhance and no way to Lessen our value and esteem of it Because 't is a thing proper and suitable to the Majesty and Greatness of God and that which we ought to expect from him to bring such things about and to make such Sublime discoveries of himself to us as may provoke us to Reverence and Adore as well as to Believe When God discourseth to us of his own Infinite Being and tells us how the Deity it self does Exist 'T is a most rational thing to suppose from the nature of the Subject he should tell us many things that we cannot now Grasp in our minds nor fully Comprehend Indeed whenever God reveals himself to the world every mans Reason will tell him 't is a thing fit to be That many things should be Received and Believed barely upon the Credit of Gods Authority and justified to us from their Author when they exceed the bounds of our Comprehension What respect and Reverence do we otherwise pay to the Great God more then we should do to the Meanest humane Pretender to whom we cannot deny an Assent to whatever he can Demonstrate either to Sense or to Reason And 't is no way Contradictious to Reason to bell us any thing is that is in it self possible to be and no way Unsuitable to God to bring about when we are told God is the Author of it but highly agreeable to it Things Naturally and Humanely Impossible are as Easy and as Proper for God to do and as fuitable to our Reason to conceive he that first made all things should do as the ordinary actions of men are for them to do Nothing is a Barr to my reasonable Belief about God and his Operations but either what is against that notion I have of his Excellent Nature or what to my reason implies a perfect Contradiction in its Existence
cannot be admitted as such are all 〈◊〉 them found peculiarly appurtenant to the â—iblâ— and cannot belong to any other Books or Writings or to any other Pretences to Revelation whatsoever Having thus established these two general points First that 't is a thing in it self reasonable and fit to believe that there should be some Revelation made from God to the world some Supernatural Laws promulged as the great Rule of mens lives here and Gods Judgment hereafter And that these Laws should be somewhere or other extant upon Record that Mankind might be fully assured and ascertained about them and that they might be visible to all that there should be some such Book as the Bible pretends to be and that 't is greatly unreasonable to believe the contrary And Secondly that in the Judgment of right Reason there are many general qualifications that must necessarily be appurtenant to such a Revelation wheresoever 't is extant and by which 't is but reasonable that Mankind should make a Judgment of every pretence to it and that all those qualifications are found punctually and peculiarly belonging to the Bible and cannot be applied to any other extant pretences to Revelation whatsoever I shall now proceed to the second thing proposed which was a more distinct and particular proof and endeavour to make it appear that this Book is indeed sent us from Heaven and is in truth that Revelation we have good cause to expect from above and that we have all those Reasons concurring to make us acquiesce in it as such from whence a Judgment in such a case ought finally to result That there is so much Evidence to be given in to prove its Divinity as no man ought to desire nor can reasonably expect more in a matter of such a Nature And so much that where mens corrupt Interests and prejudices are not Predominant will appear sufficient to every impartial enquiry And this shall be prosecuted in this Method I will these several ways consider this Book First In the time of its conveyance to the World Secondly In the way and manner of its conveyance Thirdly In the success and effects of it since its conveyance And lastly In it self in the matter of it as we now find it And from each of these considerations will a signal Testimony be given in to its Divinity and when we have taken a view of the whole we shall find that the Book both in the Matter of it and in all the Circumstances that have at any time attended it does eminently relate it self to God as its Author and cannot be reasonably judged the product of any Humane contrivement whatsoever For the first When we reslâ—ct upon the â—â—me of this Books conveyance we shall find two things of very great weight offering themselves to our consideration First the Antiquity of those things it relates to us and informs us of And Secondly the Antiquity of this 〈◊〉 iâ—â—â—lâ— since composed and delivered to us with such a relation The Contents of this Book â—â—ch aâ— far as the first foundations of the Earth and the Heavens and give us an account of Gods Revelations to Man since his first mâ—â—â— and Original and of an Orall and â—erâ—all intâ—â—â—â—â—â—se between God and the World for two thousand four hundred and old years before it was any where extant upon Râ—â—â—â—d or any part of it written Which no other Bâ—â—â— since the World began so much as makes 〈◊〉 â—â—â—â—â—â—ce to If we consider the Revelation Histoâ—â—cally contained in this Book 't is what was 〈◊〉 the beginning and of the same 〈…〉 the World it self If we consider the Edition of it in this Book and the time 〈◊〉 this Books aâ—â—ual Publication with all the aâ—â—â—tional Revelations contained in it we shall find this Book to be the first born in its kind to pâ—ecede all other Writings whatsoever and in truth to be extant while Thales Mileâ—â—us Hamer Hâ—rmes and the most primative writers the world had were unborn and unthought of Moses wrote of the God of Abraham long before any of the Heathen Gods had a written mention made of them God pleasing so to order it that although the Revelations he made to the World were not written from the beginning yet they were written long before any other Writings were extant And his own Laws were first recorded and all other Writings are of a subsequent Date to this Holy Book First I will evidence this in point of fact and shew that it is so that to this Book is indeed due the right of Primogeniture and that all other Books are of a much after-edition And becondly examine what reasonably results from thence toward that proof of the Bible we are about To all which this must be premised that when we speak of the Bible as thus Ancient we intend actually no more of it then the Writings of Moses the whole Contents of the Bible being above four thousand years in a gradual publication and the Bible it self above a thousand and six hundred years in writing for so long it was from the time that Moses writ to St. John the revealer nor need we intend more to justifie the Antiquity of the whole because 't is all there virtually contained all the rest is superstructed upon that as its â—oâ—ndation and every several part of the Bible after Moses till the Top-stone was laid appears evidently to be writ in direct pursuance of what Moses at first delivered and so much St. Paul affirmed before Foelix that he taught nothing but what was long before extant in Moses and the Prophets For the first That the Books of Moses are in fact the most Ancient I find both Jews and Christians have been greatly concerned to make it manifest as judging it a point that did greatly credit their profession and highly justifie that Religion they adhered to Josephus and others of the Jewish writers have much insisted upon it and amongst the Christian Writers Justin Marter Tertullian Clemens Alexandrinus Eusebius Cyrill of Alexandria in his Books against Julian St. Austin and others But most especially Justin Martyr and Eusebius Justin Martyr in his Parenaetick to the Graecians because they used with great Arrogance to boast of the Antiquity of their own Learning and Religion and upon that account to look with great contempt upon others proves against them out of Pagan Authors and those chiefly their own beyond all reasonable denial that the Books of Moses were of much greater Antiquity then the most Ancient Writers they could make a pretence to And that the Christian Religion being the natural issue of those Writings founded upon them and derived from them was no new or upstart invention but indeed the first and most Antient written and unwritten Truth the World was possessed of and the same thing is afterwards more largely and distinctly proved and made good by Eusebius in his Evangelical Preparation Who thus concludes Quare omnibus Diis ac Heroibus Graecorum multo Vetustior
has and in its own Antiquity answering that antiquity we may justly expect to accompany Gods First Revelations the Bible I say upon this account has a singular evidence given in to its Credibility and its antiquity does strongly affirm its Divine Authority Secondly The Antiquity of the Bible does point us to its Divinity because 't is not reasonable to believe that the First Writen account the world had of Religion should be a Cheat that the First eminent Record of Religion should be a Lye and not only a Lye but the Worst of Lies and the most Pernicious and Destructive falshood for so it must needs be to impose a Law upon the world in Gods name without his Authority that ever was published amongst mankind 'T is not in the judgment of right Reason consisting with the Wisdom and Goodness of God to suffer the world to be Originally Cheated in point of Religion to suffer a publick open Counterfeit of his Name and Authority to the highest degree First to possess the world and take the Precedence of all truth to permit the Devil to publish a Systeme of Lies and erect a Monument of Falshood Before there was any written Record of Truth We must needs suppose Gods care of Men and the concern's of his own honour to engage him to the contrary and that God should First establish his own Truth to which mankind might still have a recourse and by which as a Standard all Delusions and False Pretensions might be Tried 'T were as one says well very absurd to think God should permit the Devil to set up a Chappel before he had built a Church If the Bible were originally composed by Impostors and be not a Divine Book 't will then undeniably follow that the most Primitive and Ancient account we have of Religion is connterfeit And that in the Earliest notices we have of God of the worlds Original Mans fall and the way of his Recovery for we have none so early as what the Bible gives us of any of these and of some of them no other the world is Deceived and Abused and that God suffer'd the Devil in the first place and before any thing was publiquely extant from him to contradict it in his name and with pretence of his Authority to abuse and deceive Mankind with a false and delusive account of all those things they are most concern'd to know and upon the right Knowledge of which their present and future happyness does unavoidably depend This very one consideration will prevail much upon every impartial judgment Who can believe the first Religion should be the worst when True Religion must needs be as old as the World And the Earliest notions of God the falsest when we must needs think it reasonable that God should reveal himself to the World from the beginning Or that the first book we sind writ should contain the Highest imposture in point of Religion and more dishonour God and abuse the World then any or all the Books written since 'T is a thing beyond all compass of credit That God should suffer false informations to be given in his own Name of himself and his own Revelations from the first beginning of the World for about 4043 years for about so long a time it was from that first intercourse between God and Man the Scripture gives us Historically an account of till the last Revelation of St. John And that this account should begin with the first book that the world had and be gradually carried on into such a complete Systeme as now we see it is in a Written way by several hands in several Ages for a thousand and six hundred years together for about so long a time it was from Moses his first Writing to St. Johns Closing the Bible Nor is it supposable that the vilest falshood for such is the Bible if it be not from God a Religion whereby if it be false God would be more dishonoured and men more deluded then by any that ever was yet extant should have this to say in its justisication That 't is of all others the most Ancient and has been longest lasting amongst Mankind The consideration therefore of this Book in the Time of its conveyance the Antiquity of it in respect of the matter it contains and the Antiquity of it self as a Book written long before all others and of so early a Date in the World does with great Evidence point us to its Divine Original and very strongly tends to perswade us that God himself was the Author of it Secondly The way and manner of this Books conveyance to us The Method of Gods thus Recording his pleasure has been such that we shall find we have all those reasonable inducements and in some respects more to credit it upon which we receive any Humane Authors and acquiesce in them as true And all such farther Evidence as we can well expect to insure us of the truth of a Book that pretends to come from God and be Divint And this will appear to be so if we consider first the Instruments God imploied in the writing of it and such humane Circumstances as attended their doing it And Secondly The Divine witness God himself has in the most eminent way given to this Book in its conveyance to ascertain us of the truth of it and of the sincerity of those that wrote it First If we consider the Pen-men of this Book those Amanuenses God made use of for the writing of it and such Circumstances as attended their doing it How unlikely a thing is it that they either did or could abuse the world in this matter if we reflect upon these several things First the unblemished Credit and Reputation of these Writers Secondly the several Qualifications and Qualities of them Thirdly their Interests as moral and reasonable men Fourthly their Number and that great distance of Time in which many of them wrote one from another For the first Nothing we know does more credit Ancient Authors then the good Report of those Ages wherein they lived transferred to posterity Not one of those Holy Pen-men God imploied in writing the Bible was that ever we find upon any good grounds tainted in Reputation or convicted of any sort of Impostor in their own or future ages but were men of acknowledged Integrity and Sanctity in those times wherein they lived and very many of them gave the highest Testimony to their integrity in becoming Martyrs in justification of what themselves writ For the Second the various Qualities and Conditions of these Writers seems much to secure us against so vile a design as this book must needs be composed with if it be not from God Some of them were Kings and men of the greatest quality before they writ and not very likely to be guilty of so much baseness and meanness to carry on such a work and also men of deepest Learning and Knowledge Others of them many of the Prophets and most of the
such a way that to the best exercise of my Senses and Reason it seems supernatural and miraculous t is all one to me as if it really were so and to my Judgment must needs be of the same prevalency with a miracle it self nor have I the least way to help my self if I am bound simply to subscribe to whatever is attested to by a Miracle and look no further For that must needs go for a Miracle with me which to my senses and reason seems so to be And t is evident such who make those Distinctions do themselves thereby subject the witness of a Miracle to the Doctrine t is brought to confirm For if those they call Miranda and Mirabâ—lia be in all outward appearance as true miracles as they are acknowledged to be they would then have been so called and that distâ—nction had never been made had not the Doctrâ—nâ—s they are severally brought to confirm been â—â—judged a ground â—uâ—licient to Create the â—istâ—nctiâ—n He that tells me 't is not sit to suppose as not consistent with the Justice of God that in a way Supernatural and â—iraâ—uâ—â—us any wâ—â—ness should be given to a Docâ—â—â—â—â— saâ—se anâ— corrupt and yet tells me the Dâ—vâ—l and â—â— men are often permitted with nâ— any mâ—ans left of conviction by power meeâ—ly natural to â—â—ect such a counterfâ—â— of it that to the best Senâ—es and Reasonâ—â— Mankâ—nâ— is not discoverable fiâ—st must neeâ—â— barely â—uppose the counteâ—cit and next say nothing at all to salve the Justice oâ— God about that matter Secondly 'T is against plain Texts of Scripturâ— What the Magicians did in Egypt in opposition to Moses seems to be plainly and undeniably miraculous turning Rods into Serpents waters into Blood and bringing forth multitudes of Frogs out of the Waters by stretching out the Band with a Rod in it cannot beâ—eckoned otherwise And Pharaoh and the Egyptiaus were satisfied they did the same thing in those kinds that Moses did having the same exercise of their Senses and Reason about both and were hardened thereupon And that what Moses did in those particulars was miraculous is plain for God sayes to him in the 7th of Exodus when he first sent him to Pharaoh When Pharaoh shall speak unto thee saying Shew a miracle for you then thou shalt say unto Aaron take thy Rod c. And in the 105 Psalm those things done by Moses are spoken of as miraculous and in the 27 Verse called The â—igns and wonders which God shewed in the Land of Ham of which t is expresly said in Exodus The Magicians did the same In the 13 of Deut. we find there by Gods direction a Caution given If a Prophet arise or a dreamer of dreams that is one pretending to see Visions or one that spake only from dreams which were an inseriour sort of Prophets that saw things more obsemâ—ly of which kind soever it was and shall give thee a Sign or a wonder any Miraculous or Supeâ—natural thing the word signifies and the Sigâ— or the Wonder come to pass if he say let us follow strange gods which thou hast not known Thou shalt not hearken to him for the Lord your God proveth you c. In the new Testament our Saviour tells us in the 24 of Matthew of false Prophets that should arise and shew 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 great Wonders and miracles even such as if it were possible would deceive the very Elect. And in the 13 of the Revelation we read of another Beast rising up that doth great Wonders so that he maketh firâ— come down from Heaven on the Earth in the sigh of men and dâ—ceiveth them that dwell on the Earth â—y Reason of those miracles which he hath power to do in the sight â—f the Beast And in the 19 Chapter we are tolâ— of the taking of the false Prophet who wrougâ—t miracles 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And in the same Book we read of The Spirits of Dâ—vils woâ—king miracles Thirdâ—y 'T is against great Evidence of History for though I doubt not but that for the most part the World has been abuâ—ed and deluded with pretensions this way which we have good Reason to think when we consider what a superiour power to what is amongst men the Devils have by their Angelical Natuâ—e and what sâ—â—ange and secret operations there are in Nature it self of which we can give yet no better account in many things for ought I see then Arislotle did long since when he derived them from invisible Causes that he called Occulâ— qualities and also when we consideâ— how the Woâ—ld in all Ages has generally doted upon the Art and Practice of Magick the Reason of which Pliny sayes was not only because such stâ—ange things were brought to pass by it but because there was also a concurrence in it of three such eminent Sciences as Physick Mathematicks and Religion yet 't is no way reasonable to reject all the account we have in Story of Supernatural and Miraculous things that were brought to pass in the Heathen World Nothing more frequent in History then relations of such things it seems an unreasonable resistance of Historical Evidence to think there was noâ—hing real of that kind that there was nothing supernatural in all the business of Esculapius of Iarchas so famous amongst indian Brachmanâ—s in the times of the Apostles Tespesion amongst the Gymnosophists of Ethiopia Simon Magus of whom we have such strange Stories and most especially Apollonius Tyenaeus who liv'd in the time of Domitian though leasily grant much of what they all pretended to was visibly but a Counterfâ—it of it nor can I wholly disbelieve what I find in the Roman Story about Clauda Vestalis Tucia and other of the Vestal Virginâ— nor many other reports I find in credible Authors about such things especially that Story of Vespasians curing a lame and withered I high by treading upon it and a Blind man in Egypt by spitting upon his Eyes of which latter Cure Tacitas and Suetonius Historians of great Credit both gives us a very full and perfect account and very exactly agree in the Circumstances of it and as Dr. Jackson says in his Book upon the Creed both those Cures were well known to the most Judicious Roman writers of those times and so constantly avouched by them as can leave no place sayes he for suspition in Ages following Fourthly The admission of the contrary is no way destinctive to those natural notions we have of Gods Attributes and his providential Rule over the World because God never puts men under any rational necessity by it to credit a falshood He never permits men to be exercised with any such Trial but when there is Evidence sufficient accompanying it to assure us 't is but a Trial of our stability and so intended 'T is no way unreasonable to suppose that God who is infinitely wise and above us in the ways and Methods of his Supreme Rule should for Holy and excellent Ends we cannot
at large in the 12th Book of his Jewish Antiquities Some will needs imagine that Antiochus so far prevailed in this undertaking that the Scriptures then Extant were wholly Destroyed But the contrary is most evident and a special providence in their preservation sufficiently visible For no sooner was that storme over but the Bible was every where publickly extant having been particularly preserved by Matthias the Son of Asmonaeus and his sons who as Josephus says resolutely ventured their Lives in the doing it and also by other good men and was universally known in that Age amongst the Jews to be so Calvin in the first book of his Institutes observes That though the Jews had undergone the malice of manifold Enemies on all hands yet neither the Loss nor the Change nor the Corruption of their Law was ever by their worst Enemies objected against them And indeed how great soever their enmity was against their Religion yet they never denied but that Moses was the Author of it and that the Law they had was the Same He deliâ—cred at first Under the New Testament since the closure and completion of the Whole What a fâ—â—ious Persecution did the Bible esâ—ape in the time of Dioclesian Who after the grievous sufferings of the Christians in Mine fore Persecutions assaults them about the year 302 with the sorest and most cruel of all and with a full purpose to root Christianity utterly out of the world and destroy its very Name from the face of the Earth Euselius tells us that in the Nineteenth year of his Reign He publisht an Edict against the Christians and Christianity it self In which he so much Gloried that he caused a Pillar to be erected as his Memorial to all posterity with this Inscription Dioclesiano Casari Augusto superstitione Christi ubique deleta To Dioclesian the Emperour having abolished the superstition of Christ all the world over By that Edict he commands that the Christian-Churches should every where be demolished the Christians all Seized and Imprisoned Et quibuâ—cunque adhiâ—itis Machinis victimas Idolis immolare cogerentur That by all sorts of means fair and foul they should be brought to sacrifice unto his Idoâ—s And that the Scriptures should be every where sought for burnt and destroyed And whoever Retained them should be most sharply Tormented Dioclesian at this time had the command of the greatest part of the Habitable world For as one of the Roman Writers said Romanâ— spatium est Vrbis Orbis idem The Scriptures were then but in Written hand Men generally Quak'd with the fear of that Raging Tyrant Very many Apostatized and delivered up the Bible to his wrath and were thereupon branded with the name of Traditores of which and of the whole business we might perhaps have had a larger account had not The Life of Deoclesian written by Eusthenius his Secretary been since lost For As Baronius has rightly observed in his Annalls We have now no Writer who did at that time Historically set down the Actions of that Emperour Yet God by his Providence delivered this Book out of his hand Disappointed his fury and suffered him not to quench the Light of these Divine Laws The Christians at that time Tired out the Inventions of their Enemies in finding out ways to torment them and by their constant and patient suffering the utmost of humane misery even wearied out their Executioners One remarkable passage we have in Euseblus that happened upon this occasion A noble man in Nicomedia of eminent Quality hearing this Edict against the Christians and the Bible published at Nicemedâ—a After it was Read and openly fixed to a publick Pillar in the presence of Dioclesian himself Maximinius Galerius Constantius and other the Chiefest persons in the Empire for 't was usual with the Emperors to come themselves in Person with their chiefest Attendanâ—s to hear their own Edicts against the Christians proclaimed to see the Christians tormented and to make themselves sport with their miseries this Noble man had such a zeal for the Bible and the Christian Religion that before the Emperors face he took down that prophane and impious Edict and with a Holy indignation openly tore it to pieces and and thereby willingly exposed himself to the utmost suffering the fury and rage of the Emperour could any way make him the subject of Two things are usually urged in diminution of the â—â—ble and its Authority upon a quite contrary account We are told by some The Bible has been so far from being preserved intire in the whole or in its parts that first all that part of the Bible that was then extant when the people of Israel were carryed into Babylon periâ—â—ed in the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple and that Esdras wrote it himself all over again upon their return and that we have now so much of the Bible only from Him and as he Re-pâ—â—ned it In this Mr. Hobs in the 33 Chapter of his Leviathan where he has not failed to insinuate all such things as might gratifie men of Sceptical notions about the Bible is very positive and tells us The Books of the Old Testament are derived to us from no other time then that of Esdras and were retrived by him when they were lost And Secondly we are told that many particular Books and Writings penned by Divine inspiration and once part of the Bible have been since consumed by Time and are now wholly lost out of the World The first That so much of the Old Testament as was then extant which was the whole as we have it save some part of the Psalms the Prophecies of Ezeâ—iel Daniel Haggai Zachary and Masachai and the Books of Esther Ezra and Nehemiah was totally lost and all the Copies destroyed in the ruine of Jerusalem and the Temple is an assertion very weakly grounded And there are very sufficient Reasons to perswade us to believe the contrary First Weakly grounded for there is no other ground for it but that in an Apocryphal Book that goes under the Title of the fourth Book of Esdras a Book every where stuffed with Childish and fabulous Stoties There we find this absurd fiction that Esdras should speak unto God and tell him Thy Law is burnt and no man knoweth the things that thou hast done and therefore desired to be inspired to write it all over again and to wrire all that had been done in the World from the beginning And that after he had been forty days and nights with God in an apish foolish imitation of Moses and had taken a Potion God had prepared for him he dictated all the Bible over again to five men Now of how little credit this Relation being no where found but in this Book ought to be with any considering man will appear if we consider that this Book was not only constantly rejected as Apocryphal by the Jewish Church as a counterfeit under Esdras his name and none of his but has been so by all
bring us to the best way of Living we are capable of in this World both in respect of God of our selves and all others The Doctrines and Precepts of this Holy Book are so justified to us from the Light of our own Reason and do so directly tend to the perfection of our Nature and so guide us to what we our selves judge to be best that 't were extream unreasonable to judge it an Effect of the vilest and worst sort of Imposture Never any Doctrine taught men to live so dutifully to God so comfortably to themselves and so usefully one to another so tuneably in all Holiness and Righteousness as this of the Bible does The Doctrines of this Book are most transparent Beams of Divine Perfection They are a Rule given according to what is eternally existing in the Holy Nature of God so far as we are capable of a conformity to it And that in the judgement of right Reason is the Highest and Noblest account of all good Living For we cannot do better than in our Measure to correspond to Divine Perfection No Law can with greater Reason and less Arbitrariness nor more indispensably oblige us than that which appears to be grounded upon the Eternal and Unchangeable Nature of God And such are the Laws of the Gospel The great Design of which is to assimilate men so far as their Faculties will bear it to the excellent Nature of God and that rational Idea of it we are all born withal What crooked and imperfect Lines have men drawn in their best Documents both Moral and Divine compared with this compleat and excellent Rule of Holy Living What Pure and Spiritual Worship is here How suitable to the Holy Nature of God! What undefiled Religion without the least mixture of Idolatry or Superstition What Superlative Piety and Vertue without any one spot of Vice Yea forbidding Evil in the very Thoughts What punctual and perpetual Truth and Honesty is here required upon no other grounds but pleasing God doing good to Others and hopes of a Reward hereafter There 's not the least taint upon any one Duty the Scripture requires from us by proposing any base mean or sordid Ends. No vain Glory No esteem from Men No corrupt Advantages are made the ultimate End of our Obedience The best way of living and upon the noblest account is here proposed to us An exact Scripture-Life has as much of Heaven as can well descend upon Earth Makes the World as quiet an Habitation as it can be and Man-kind as happy in themselves and as easie one to another in all Converse and Society as they themselves can wish to be Where is there a Man not degenerated below his own Reason but approves the Scripture-Precepts as Excellent and justifies Him in his own Breast that conforms most to them No well-disciplin'd Heathen can refuse so to do What Charity is here required Still we are bid to hope the best To look upon all Men with a kind eye and to interpret them into the best sense they are capable of What commands Not to offend weak Ones What mutual Forgivenesses What provocations to Love What strict injunctions to do good to all men upon all occasions With what patience and meekness are we taught to behave our selves Indeed 't is such a Doctrine as makes a Man perfect throughly furnished to every good Work Brings men to the best way of Living the noblesâ— Principles of Suffering and the comfortablest way of Dying Now How can we better-judge of a Law that pretends to come from God and to be of Divine Mission than by its Nature the great Tendency of it and the influence it has upon Humane Life And when we find so holy and excellent a Design as appears throughout this whole Book for the honouring of God and compleating the Happiness of Men and in a way so corresponding to the judgement of right Reason and that Divinity we are Born with What can we otherwise judge but that such a Book must needs be from God Such pure and untainted Streams of Prety and Vertue must needs slow from the Fountain of all Perfection 'T is not possible to imagine that the Devil or any Ill Men should be ever either able or willing to compose a Book of such a Nature that should reduce the World to such a posture as This does To make men the best Subjects to God the best Friends to themselves and the most useful Citizens one to another Nothing less than an Infinite Wisdom could have contrived so great a Happiness for the World And nothing less than Infinite Goodness it self can be reasonably thought to be the Dispenser of it 'T is extreamly absurd to think that That Doctrine which in the judgment of the best Reason is the most Pure and Excellent and most useful to the World of any we find in it should be the product of the Devil or the worst sort of Impostors and that â—t must be if it be not from God for there 's no middle way 'T is to suppose that such should out-do Divine-Goodness in that wherein my Reason bids me expect the highest expression of it And in truth That the World should stand more indebted to such Benefactors for the best things than to God himself Fourthly We find in this Book a full and most comprehensive account of the Revolution of this whole World in all its changeable Vicissitudes and of God's visible Providence in the disposal of all Humane Affairs Indeed We find this Book a compleat Map of the Whole Affair of the World and God's Government of it There evidently appears an exact Conformity between the course of the World and what we are here told of it Nothing comes at any time to pass contradictive of but according to what is here revealed to us And this we shall sind if we consider the course of things either in a Natural way a Moral way or a Spiritual way First In a Natural way The natural course of the World has continued to this time according to what Moses at first as from the Mouth of God declared about it That there should be Seed-time and Harvest cold and heat Summer and Winter and that Day and Night should not cease but succeed each other Secondly In a Moral way The Scripture has given us a Summary yet satisfactory and full account of what-ever we have seen acted amongst Man-kind to this day and told us in general of all those Principles Designs and Practices by which the Wheel of this World has been turn'd about by the restless minds of Men in all Ages So that we see nothing under the Sun of which we are not some way inform'd in this Book Thirdly In a Spiritually way Here we have an exact account of all that Divine Intercourse which has been or at any time is between God and Men The manner of it set down and the general method of God's proceedings in his convincing enlightning sanctifying satisfying and comforting the
minds of men No man can well judge this an effect of any Humane Design nor can reasonably think that the private observation or experience of any particular men could have reached so far Providential Occurrences would soon have confuted any counterfeit pretence to such an universal account of the whole Affair of the World Nor could any but God himself be secure not to mistake in such a matter The more we contemplate this World in its various motions the more we consider the many intricacies and changes of it the more is the Bible still justified to us because we perceive the whole transaction of this World to be there strangely Epitomized We are not only told in the general what shall fall out that bad men shall often Prosper and good men Suffer that there is one even to the Righteous and the Wicked that no man shall be able to make a certain judgment of Gods Loving or Hating by the course of things here below but we are so far pointed to the Reasons and Ends of these things as much justifies Providence to us and greatly informs us about those Grounds upon which God proceeds in his Supream Rule here in order to his future judgment hereafter Nothing can befall a good man or an ill man or happen in any kind of which we are not told in the Bible and of the reason whereof we have not some general and satisfying account 'T is extreamly unreasonable to think that any other but God himself especially not the worst deceivers could have made such a compleat Model of his own Government and 't is no little justification of this Book that God visibly governs the World according to what is here delivered And those Laws must needs have all the rational probability to be Divine and come from the Supream Ruler above sutably to which all things evidently come about here below and to which the whole Revolution of this World in all times and ages and in all respects appears exactly corresponding Fifthly We find in this Book a full and ample provision for all the ills that have accompanied mans first Apostacy and adequate and proper Cures for all the Maladies of humane life And therefore 't is very likely to be a Divine preseription sent from above to heal and relieve the World Who but God himself can be reasonably supposed safely to disengage Man-kind from all the entanglements of their Lapsed and Apostate condition I appeal to every unprejudiced man whether this Book be not a general Store-house a Divine Treasury far beyond what the World besides can afford to supply all the wants of Humane Nature Not only more clearly and fully than was ever before revealing to us the greatest good pointing us to that true Summum bonum of a rational Being which Mankind in all Ages with so much ignorance and disagreement with themselves had been groping after and conducting us to the greatest happiness but applying suitable Remedies to every Distemper Where can any man under the sense of sin and the displeasure of God or under any other dejection of mind poverty or disgrace in the World sickness of body loss of friends or any sort of affliction comfort himself as he may here What a Sacrifice are we here told of for Sin We find all men in all Religions have still harped upon a Sacrifice The Sacrifices of living men were most Inhumane detested by the best of Heathens The sacrificing of Beasts though generally practis'd the wisest knew not what to make of and thought it strange that God should be Atoned by the fat of a Bruit How infinitely does the Sacrifice we are acquainted withal by the Gospel exceed all the World has thought of in that kind Of how amazing and yet of how satisfying a nature is it What Divine Antidotes are there provided in this Book from suitable Examples comforting Promises wise Directions heavenly Counsels to keep up a sinking Mind 'T is like that Wood where Jonathan came in his extremity and found Honey every where dropping and a taste of it revived his Spirits and renewed his Vigour And herein lies the strength of this Consideration The reality the excellent and proper nature of that relief and those Satisfactions that upon al occasions are here proposed to us They are no such deluding Trifles as men are cheated into by education and acquiess in only because they are bred up with a good Opinion of this Book But they are such things as are of intrinsick value such as are in themselves and in their own Nature most real most suitable to a rational Being in all such cases and justified to us from the Light of our own Reason and that innate Notion we have of a Deity The Voice of the Bible is If thou do well they own Conscience being judge thou shalt be accepted If not Sin lies at the door We find no resemblance here of the Heathen Superstitions nor of those Vanities wherewith other Religions through mens ignorance and the track of Education have besotted the World The terms of our Reconciliation with God and our happiness in this World and the next are such and so propounded to us as every mans own reason must needs acquiesce in and there is a self-evident satisfaction results from the performance of them It prevails much upon me this general provision I find here made to suite all mens conditions in all Times and Ages and the great worth and transcendent excellency of it And 't is a great account to us of that wonderful variety we find in this Book both for matter and expression What Depths and Shallows in both respects Sometimes the sublimest Notions clothed with the highest Expressions Sometimes the easiest plainest Truths imaginable Sometimes Divinity deck't with the richest Expressions of Oratory to delight and instruct the noblest and largest mind Sometimes brought down to the meanest Similitudes and expressed by things of the most common use amongst Man-kind to be grasped by the poorest understanding And yet a decency and majesty in all No part of Man-kind but find here a plentiful and suitable provision for every Condition Not an impotent impoverished mind but is here relieved nor a condition so mean but is cared for And this tells us much of the vanity of those who are apt to sit in judgment upon this Holy Book To find fault with some things as too Mysterious and with others as too mean To think many Stories Examples Directions Superfluous and others wholly Impertinent When such men can fathom the deep and large design of this Book are able fully to comprehend the sizes of all mens Capacities and the variety of all mens Conditions and can assure me that what one contemns or not understands may not prove of excellent and proper use to another I then will acknowledge They are every way fit to correct the Bible and leave them free to fit the World with a better Model Sixthly This Book appears so composed that all
Moses I mean the true antient Berosus and not the latter Counterfeit of him sets down the Story of it in the very same way that Moses does Begins his History Ante Aquarum cladem Famosam quâ universus perut orbis And sayes There was only eight Persons saved Cyril in his first Book against Julian shews that Alexander Polybistor and Abidene under the feigned names of Saturn and Xyfuthrus have writ for the most part the same Story that Moses has done of the Flood and of the Ark and the Place of its Resting And in very many other antient Authors have we particular Narratives of it And 't is evident that many Poetical Fictions and Fabulous Stories that we find amongst the Antient Heathen-Writers had their derivations from thence So that to doubt about the Fact of what Moses has written in this particular were extreamly unreasonable For 't were to deny what is eminently witnessed unto by several Historians of several Countreys and to withstand the Stream of an Universal Tradition The Story of Building the Babylontan Tower is particularly set down by the same Alexander Polyhistor and Abidene as we find them quoted at large by Eusebius They tell us That Men would needs in despite of the Godds build up a Tower to the Sun in the place where Babylon now is And when they had built it very high the Godds overthrew it And that at that time began the diversity of Languages And 't is obvious to the commonest understanding That all that Fiction of the Poets about the Gyants warring against Heaven is but a corruption of this Story The Burning of Sodom is mentioned by many of the best credited Authors by Diodorus Saculus Strabo Tacitus Pliny and Solinus And 't were easie to produce the like Testimonies to the most eminent Passages that Moses has set down That the People of Israel conquered the Land of Canaan dispossest the Inhabitants and setled themselves in Palestine is a thing so notorious from the Effects that 't is capable of no denyal And we have a large account of many particulars of it in Procopius Eupolemus and other Authors who wrote of Joshua Samuel Saul David in whom according to the Prediction of Moses the Government of that People came into the Tribe of Judah and others mentioned in the Sacred Story That there was such a King as Solomon that built a Temple at Jerusalem Josephus in his first Book against Appion proves from the antient Chronicles of the Tyrians which sayes he they have kept with great diligence And therein mention is made of Solomons League with the King of Tyre and of his building the Temple at Jerusalem and the exact time of it A hundred forty three years and eight months before the building of Carthage The same account we have in Eupolemus Alexander Polyhistor Haecateus Dius a Phenician and many others who have written so largely about that Temple that as some have observed There was not a Vessel nor any Tool or Instrument in it which they have not particularly mentioned which exactness we find not in any Heathen Story in the Descriptions of any Temples of their own The Captivity of the Jews in Babylon Cyrus his obtaining the Persian Empire and his Conquest of Babylon is all punctually set down by prophane Writers Alexander Polyhistor writes an exact Story of Jeremiah's Prophesie and of the Captivity And Diocles and Berosus both give an account of the Jews deliverance by Cyrus and that they were Captives in Babylon 70 years And Alexander Polyhistor and Haecateus both write of Cyrus his re-building the Temple of Jerusalem Daniels Predictions about the four Monarchies and other things have been visibly fulfilled beyond all denyal Porphiry so raged heretofore at that Prophetical Instance of the Truth of the Bible that he seeks by all means to evade it spends his whole twelfth Book which he wrote against the Christians to that purpose and finds no other way at last to do it but by an absurd pretence That those Prophesies about the four Monarchies were written long after Daniels death by some other in the times of Antiochas Which is sufficiently confuted Not only by the credible relation we have in History that Daniels Prophesie was shewed by Iaddus the High-Priest of the Jews to Alexander who lived many years before Antiochus when he was marching toward Jerusalem with an intention to destroy it who finding himself so particularly in that Prophesie prophesied of spared the City thereupon But because the 70 Interpreteâ—â— who tranâ—tated the Old Testament for Ptolomy about a hundred years before Antiochus tranâ—â—â—ated the Book of Daniel which was then extant and part of the Bible After the Captivity t is clear from all Story that the Jews that returned out of Babylon continued under a National establishment though not under a succession of Kingly Government from the Posterity of David for God had declared by Jeremiah that none of the Seed of Jeconaih should any more sit upon the Throne of David had Sovereign Jurisdiction among them which the ten Tribes had wholly lost and long before were totally deprived of Nay were still govern'd by some of themselves till the Romans imposed Herod and Idumaean upon them in whose time our Saviour was born So that the Scepter did not depart from Judah nor a Law-giver from between his feet till Shiloe came For the Matters of Fact relating to the New Testament 'T is not possible for any reasonable Man to dis-believe there was such a Man in Fact as our Saviour and such Men as the Apostles that lived in those times that erected the Christian Religion because of the succession of it in multitudes of Professors ever since and the written Account we have of it Not only from Christians themselves but from Jews and Heathens in those times Tacitus and Suetonius both make mention of Christ Tacitus in the 15th Book of his Annals speaking of Nero's cruelty to the Christians sayes The Author of them was one Christ who in the Reign of Tiberius was punished with death by Pontius Pilate Procurator of Judea Josephus speaks of him Pliny Suetonius and others write of the Christians extant in those times of their Principles their manner of Living and of their Sufferings Suetonius sayes in the Life of Nero Christianos genus hominum maleficae superstitionis suppliciis affixit That he pumshed the Christians a sort of men of a magical superstition Many Historical Passages in the Gospels are attested to us by Heathen and Jewish-Writters though 't is most certain the Roman Historians of that Age knew not much of the Affairs of Palestine as appears by what they have writ concerning the Jews especially Tacitus who appears very grosly ignorant both about them and their Religion The Star that appeared at our Saviours Birth is mentioned by Pliny lib. 2. chap. 5. And by the Philosopher Chalcidius largely in his Comment upon Platoes Timaeas Herodi killing the Children in Bethlehem by Macrobius The Eclipse of
us as appear evidently sitted and suited to supply all the defects of our natural Knowledge and after an admirable manner harmonize with the rational Nature in which things from Above are so interwoven with things below and every way so proportioned to them as that Truths Supernatural which we cannot fully comprehend appear justified to us by Truths natural that we are perfectly judges of and between both there appears a wonderful concord If we find a Book written in God's own Name commanding the World upon that single account to bow before it and in a way peculiarly proper to his own Soveraignty and Greatness with a positive claim to his immediate Authority and the truth of this claim established to the World by a multitude of the greatest and most eminent Miracles at several times openly wrought that ever were extant and the Fact of which was never by any deny'd A Book the Doctrine whereof by the power and reputation of those Miracles it s own innate Worth and the Divine Assistance that accompanyed it without the least humane help nay against all Humane-Opposition all earthly Policy and Force withstanding it has gain'd so great an acceptance as we see â—his to have done subdued in its first enâ—rance that great Empire of Rome subâ—erted the whole Judaical Fabrick and â—as made both Heathenism and Judaism â—inaly fall before it If we find a Book that gives us the â—est and most satisfying account of the â—hole affair of this World and all the Vicissitudes of it and of God's providential Rule and Dispose of all Humane Affairs A Book in which the whole business of the World is fully and strangely epitomized and we see nothing happen or come to pass contradictive of but according to what is there written and of which we find there some general notice If we find a Book the Doctrine whereof totally subverts the whole interest of the Devil and all the corrupt interests of Men in a way far superior to what ever was or can rationally be supposed ever could be attempted in that kind by the wisest and best of men and introduces much nobler and elevated Notions oâ— Piety and Vertâ—e than the World werâ— any other way ever possessed of If we find a Book that has plainly anâ— directly foretold most of the great thing that have come to pass in all Ages thaâ— has many hundreds of years beforâ— some of them happened pronounced with an absolute prophetick certainty about thâ—m and has never been found tâ— mistake in a tittle though it has somâ—times descended so to Particulars as 〈◊〉 name even the Persons of men long before they were born cannot once be impeached for giving a wrong Divination about the least Circumstance relating either to Persons or Things If we find a Book that has been signally preserved from the greatest rage of many powerful Adversaries and from the most Violent and Potent Attempts for its total Suppression and Ruine of such who were in highest Authority and furnished with greatest advantages to effect it A Book that has scap'd all sorts of Contrivance against it and safely descended through the Channel of so many Ages and been to this day providentially secured and unmaimed and intirely delivered over to us If we find a Book that evidently in the judgment of all right Reason improves Mankind to the highest pitch in all worthy and excellent Attainments boâ—h Moral and Divine Brings the World into the best posture 't is capable of Makes men Wiser Better and Happier than they ever were or could themselves find out how to be If we find a Book that by means utterly unthought of and far out of all humane-reach and yet of a most holy and excellent Nature sweetly and safely even to our greatest admiration reconciles us to God Fills up that vast Gulph that was between Heaven and Earth and makes way for a free and perpetual intercourse between God and Man Exposes to the view of the World thereby a Beatitude infinitely transcending whatever the Wisdom of Man could contrive or invent which the rational Soul the more it considers still the more it adores and admires and in which to the utmost 't is delighted and satisfied In short If we find a Book that has all those things if we respect both the Matter of it and the Manner of its conveyance to us appurtenant to it that we can rationally expect should accompany a Revelation from Heaven and such a supernatural Law by which we may suppose God would enlighten and rule the World A Book that every way answers all the great ends of Revelation proposeth most suitable Remedies to all our natural Defects leaves not a Disease in Humane Nature uncured nor a Breach that mans fall hath occasioned un-made up If there be not one thing we can imagine God should reveal to us in order to our present or future Welfare about things visible or invisible about This World or the Next that we are not here told of If we have here such discoveries made of things supernatural and unseen as have evidently set bounds to the restless and inquisitive minds of Men about those Matters And such as we cannot reasonably judge could be the product of any humane thoughts nor of any thing lesse than the infinite and boundless Wisdom and Knowledge of GOD himself If we have found such a Book If the Bible be thus qualified What can be otherwise judged upon such Premises but that this Book is indeed that sacred Instrument wherein God has recorded his Sovereign Pleasure This is in truth that Revelation from Heaven the World in all Ages have so much expected and to which so many false pretensions have in all Ages been made Here is indeed contained that System of Laws supernatural by the publication whereof God has abounded in all the effects of his Bounty and even out-done the furthest Conceptions the World has at any time had of his Goodness How strangely unreasonable were it to derive such a Book from the highest degree of imposture How heterodox is it to all good sense to suppose that the worst and most pernitious delusion by which the World has been ever abused which we must needs reckon this Book to be if it be not from God should have in point of time the precedency of all true Religion and be of an antienter date than any divine Truth the World can pretend to Who that believes the supream Existence of God can imagine that the best documents in the judgment of all unprejudiced reason that ever mankind were disciplin'd by should have the Devil or the vilest of men for their Authors That such should contrive and publish a Doctrine that brings men to the best method of living That such should reduce mankind to the happyest and best condition and out do the Divine goodness in that particular Who can imagine that the Devil or any ill men in promoting the highest Treason against God counterfeting his Name and Authority and
the greatest ruine to mankind deluding them with false informations about their chiefest concerns should be able to produce in their justification the most eminent Miracles and all the greatst Evidences that rationally can be expected to ascertain the World in the publication of the highest supernatural Truths In a word who can beleive a Book so circumstanced as we find the Bible to be should be composed by the worst Instruments and with the worst of designs No such thing can ever be credited while we suppose there is a God ruling above and men live in the exercise of Reason below 'T were most absurd to suppose that any Book falsely pretending to Gods Name and Authority designing his dishonour and mans destruction should be capable of such a proof as has been brought in defence of the Bible And yet so must the Tables be turn'd the whole proof must so be inverted of all that hath been said a contrary application must of necessity be made if this Book comes not from God and be not in truth what it self openly claims to be The Divine Authority of this Book we call the Bible being thus upon the forementioned grounds established I come in the last place to a Consideration of such Doubts and Objections as are usually made about it All the Material Difficulties that can be proposed will be reduceable to these four Questions I. First How could men come to be assured in those times wherein the several parts of the Bible were first writen that they were written by an Infallible Spirit and upon sure grounds distinguish them from all other Writings II. Secondly How come we certainly to know the true Compass and Extent of Holy Writ How can we know that we have now contained in our Bibles all that was writen by a Divine Inspiration and intended as a standing Rule to the Church and no more That is How can we be now safely assured about the Canon of the Scripture And be able upon good grounds to say What is Canonical and what is Not III. Thirdly How can we that have not the Originals of the Scripture not the Autographa's of those that wrote it but onely the Copies of them and most but the Translations of those Copies rest assured we have God's Mind as it was first delivered IV. Fourthly How can we believe this Book say some to be from God when we find contained in it divers Contradictions several strange and incredible Stories and other things greatly lyable to exception In answering the first Question This ought to be previously considered That there were Advantages peculiar to the belief of those who first received the Bible or any parts of it and lived in those Times wherein it was first delivered that we have not And we have likewise some Advantages and those very considerable to our belief which they had not They conversed with the Pen-Men themselves the Names of many of whom are to us wholly unknown the Holy Ghost not judging it necessary to record them foreseeing the Scriptures would descend to us upon other sufficient Evidence They were able to judge of their personal Integrity and the account they gave of their Divine Commission were Eye-witnesses of the Miracles saw the Original Writings And in the Apostles times many knew some of their Hands These we have not but we see the progress and success of this Book which they saw not We see this Book translated into all Languages whole Nations converted by it The Gospel spread all the World over and the fulfilling of many Predictions since which they could not then be Witnesses of With many other great Effects of it We see the Whole conjoyn'd and the excellent Harmony of it and the relation each part has to compleat the Design of the Whole Are in divers respects upon different terms of judging now upon the Whole from what men were in judging at first upon any particular parts But to come to a direct Answer to this Question There could be but two wayes to ascertain men in their reception of any part of the Bible when it first became publick First By some outward visible Justification of the Persons imployed in that Service to assure us that they were sent and commissionated from God Or secondly From the Matter and the Nature of such Writings themselves And herein a due consideration of those Times and Seasons in which the several parts of the Bible were written and the then present state of things and the order of writing it will much inform us Moses who layed the first and great Foundation of the whole Fabrick in the five Books that he wrote He had a justification Personal beyond all question His Commission and Authority to do what he did was sufficiently evident to all that conversed with him There was all that could be expected to assure those that then lived that God had imployed him For God admitted him openly to a personal converse with himself We read in the nineteenth of Exodus that the Lord said unto Moses Loe I come to thee in a thick Cloud that the People may bear when I speak with thee and believe thee for ever c. He impowered him upon many occasions to work the greatest Miracles that since the World had a being had ever been wrought and openly to shame and out-doe all his Opposers and all Pretenders that way And whensoever there was a doubt made about this Divine Authority or any contest with him upon that account as in the case of Korah and at other times God plainly and openly from Heaven in the sight of all the People decided the Matter to assure them and all Generations to come that Moses was no Impostor but acted by a Divine Commission in what he then did And indeed It being the first time that God revealed himself to the World in a written way and published those Laws which were to be a Standard to all that succeeded and the great Corner-stone of all that Revelation that he would at any time after make to Man-kind 't was but necessary it should be fixed and established upon certain and unquestionable grounds So that such who lived in Moses his time could have no good reason at all to doubt in the least of his sincerity for all was done that could be done to put that matter out of question And God visibly shewed himself as we find in the four and twentieth of Exodus and his own glory amongst them For 't is said They saw the Lord God of Israel and there was under his feet as it were a paved work of a Saphire-stone and as it were the Body of Heaven in its clearness Nor could there be any doubt raised Whether the Laws and Precepts of Moses were rightly recorded and as he intended they should For before his Death he himself by God's special command in a publick Assembly delivered over his Five Books to the Levites to be layed up in the sides of the Ark. After Moses his time
we have now contained in our Bables all that was written by a Divine Inspiration and intended as a Rule to the Church and no more That is How can we now be safely assured about the Canon of the Scripture and be able upon good grounds to say what is Canonical and what is not 'T is too apparent a Truth that nothing by the power of its own worth and excellency has ever been able to scape contempt and reproach from the unruly wills and debauched minds of corrupt and unreasonable men The Bible has met with its share in this kind Some upon Fanatical Pretences have despised and rejected the Whole Others have mangled and severed it as themselves thought good receiving some part only as Divine and rejecting the rest as they pleased Of this Iraeneus Tertullian Epiphanius St. Austin and many of the Christian Writers have given us a large account The Manichees rejected the whole body of the Old Testament as coming from an Evil God The Ptolemaites as Epiphamus tells us rejected all the Books of Moses The Gnosticks with some other Hereticks rejected the whole Book of Psalms Cerdon and after him Marcion rejected all the Gospels but that of St. Luke the Acts of the Apostles and divers other parts of the New Testament as we find by Tertullian The Valentimans rejected all the Gospels but that of St. John as we see in Irenaeus Others rejected all that St. John wrote The Ebionites received no Gospel but that of St. Matthen and rejected in gross all the Epistles of St. Paul In a word There is not one Part of the Bible from the first to the last that has scap'd the reprobation of some bad Men. But all such attempts were soon blown away expired in the Birth bore about them their own shame and reproach made no considerable battery upon the Truth in any Age Nor did they reach further than the vitiated Minds and corrupt Breasts of such Profligate Hereticks as were the first Authors of them In answering to this Question How we come to be well assured about the Canon of the Bible and that those Books now received by the Church of England and other Protestant Churches as such are all Canonical and no other Two things only will occur that are of any seeming moment In the due consideration of which all will be said that is needful about this Matter First How we come to reject out of our Canon those Books commonly called Apocryphal which were written at least all but one of them during the times of the Old Testament And secondly Upon what grounds we now receive some particular parts of the New Testament which have sometimes layen under question If we mistake in the first we have less in our Bibles than we ought If in the latter we have much more than we should About the first concerning the several parts of the Old Testament there is amongst Christians themselves a present Disagreement But concerning the other the whole Christian World is at this day of the same opinion For the First That there is good Reason to reject those Books commonly called the Apocrypha that they were not written by any Divine Inspiration nor sent us from GOD as any part of those Supream Laws by which he intended to rule and judge the World and so ought not to be reckoned within the Canon will be made very evident to any reasonable Judge upon these Considerations following First After the time of Esdras and the erection of the second Temple 't is universally agreed by all the most Antient Jews and Christians that the Jews had no Prophet amongst them Nor did GOD raise up any Man with an Extraordinary Spirit from the time of Malachi who is agreed to be the last Prophet till John the Baptist Which was for the space of four hundred and odde years Now 't is sufficiently evident that these Apocryphal Books were all written after the time of Malachi and so can be of no extraordinary Mission And if any of them had been written before and had been extant in Ezra's time which they were not it had been an unanswerable Reason for their Rejection now Because they were not received then For 't is well known that none of these Books now in question were by Him incorporated with the rest of the Bible nor were within the Canon at that time setled That the Jews had no Prophets by whom all parts of the Old-Testament were written For the Church is built upon the Foundation of the Prophets and Apostles And the whole of the Old-Testament is called Prophecy nor any Men of an Extraordinary Spirit amongst them after the Captivity both Jews and Christians generally agree Josephus is express in it in his first Book against Appion he tells us that from the time of Artaxerxes though certain Books had been written yet they deserved not the same Credit and Belief that the Sacred Scriptures did because there was no succession of Prophers amongst them Saint Austine in the 45th Chapter of his 18th Book De Civitate Dei sheweth at large that the Jews had no Prophecy after Ezra's time And the same Eusebius affirmeth in his Demonstrationes Evangelicae Post Zachartam Malachiam non fuâ—sse amplius apud Judaeos Prophetam Et a reditu ex Captivitate ad tempora Servatoris nullum babucrint Judaei sacrum Volumen The Jews had no Prophets after Zachary and Malachi nor any Sacred Writings after the Captivity till our Saviour's time And some of these very Books tell us as much themselves For in the first Book of the Maccabees Chap. 9. 't is there said That there was then great Tribulation in Israel such as had not been since the dayes that there had been no Prophet in Israel relating to Ezra's time And indeed it appears very plain from the Scripture it self that there were no Divine Writings published between the Prophecy of Malachi and the writing of the Gospels For the Evangelists take things up just where he left them and begin the Gospel from the end of Malachi's Prophecy For he ending his Prophecy at John the Baptist under the Type and Title of Elias and the Evangelists beginning the Gospel with Him for St. Mark expresly declares the ending of that Prophecy to be the beginning of the Gospel There is a visible combination from thence from that period of Prophesie of the Old and New Testament together Secondly All the Writers of the Old Testament were Prophets to the House of Israel and to the Church of the Jews and their Writings and Prophesies were directed chiefly to them And so they were all writ except some Passages in Daniel and Ezra that were written in the Chaldee Dialect to which the Jews had in their Captivity been much accustomed in their own Native Language the Language of Canaan which was the Hebrew But these Books were confessedly most of them first written in Greek and could be of no use at all to the Jews at Jerusalem and
ERRATA'S PAge 8. Line 1. dele â— p. 13. l. 14. for their r. the. p. 20. l. 10. for his r. it s p. 22. l. 26. for or r. and p. 47. l. 18. for product r. conduct p. 47. l. 27 in the beginning add the word when p. 56. l. 2. for whole r. upheld p 66. l. 14. dele Common Sentiment p. 144. l. 14. in the beginning add the World p. 170 l. 11. for when r. where p. 174 l. 11. after expectancy add off p. 189. l. 19. for may r. many p. 205. l. 10. after thirty add years p. 206. l. 1â— for Elizean r Elisiniaâ— p 207. l. 12. for mend sius r. men disius p. 224. l. 16. for affords r. afforded p. 258. l. 12. for words r word p. 259. l. 6. r. an after in p. 390. l. 24. for saniores r. seniores p. 419. l. 26. for a r aâ— p. 494. l. 21. for providential r. prudential p. 407. It 6. for by r. be S. ScrÃpturam Divinitùs esse revelatam 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 exploratò firmat iste Elenchus Prodeat è Typographiâ Humph. London THE REASONABLENES OF Scripture-Beleif A DISCOURSE Giving some account of those RATIONAL GROUNDS upon which the BIBLE is received as the WORD of GOD. Written by Sir CHARLES WOLSELEY Bar t. LONDON Printed by T.R. N.T. for Nathaniel Ponder at the Peacock in Chancery lane near Fleet-street 1672. To the Earl of ANGLESEY My Lord BEsides the common enemies to all these Paperadventures Those who suppose they can do much better and such who are not pleased they have not done so well from a twofold sort of Men I expect a severe reflection upon this undertaking chiefly from those who make it their business to reject all Religion in gross as a thing no where Existing but in the Minds of sequacious and fearful Men and deride all attempts made towards its rational justification And also from them who suppose things of this nature priviledged from all dispute or debate things not to be proved but admitted that all endeavours of this kind are but an open arraignment of such Fundamentals as ought not to be question'd a disservice done to the cause of Religion thereby and at best in themselves but useless and impertinent The following discourse My Lord as it is in its nature no way condited to the gust of any such men on either hand so I must needs acknowledge my self to be best pleased with whatever is least so The first are an absurd Generation that by an empty prophane sort of discourse which themselves call Wit would fain Hector us out of the wisest and best part of the world make that the scorn of this Age which hath been the most valu'd and most reverene'd in all others And whenever reduced to any sober and rational contest have no other relief from the shame of their own folly then what they find in those naked shelters of ignorance and confidence Irreligion 't is true in its practice hath been still the companion of every Age but its open and publick defence seems the peculiar of this 'T is but of late that men come to defend ill living and secure themselves against their own guilt by an open defyance to all the great maxims of Piety and Virtue 'T is but of late the world hath been told That the notion of a Spirit implies a contradiction That the Bible is no where in force as a Law Divine but where by Laws civil and municipal 't is made so to be That Religion is nothing else but a fear of invisible powers feign'd in the Mind and fancyed from tales publickly allowed These and most of the bad Principles of this Age are of no earlier a date then one very ill Book are indeed but the spawn of the Leviathan The other are a sort of easie and credulous men that derive their Religion no higher then Education Custom have taken up their greatest concerns upon trust and whensoever encounter'd but by any small artificer in the Scepticks are sure to be sufficiently baffled Themselves and Religion exposed to the utmost contempt And upon all such attack's they either go off wounded with a secret dislike of their own Profession or oblige themselves to a stubborn and bruitish sort of drudgery to believe that for which they find they are able to give no good reason Would such dull men once be at leisure from doing nothing would they once be persuaded to make but a salley into the exercise of their own Reason 't were no hard task to convince them that nothing proves more fatal to the publick good of Religion then this stupid sort of credulity 'T is from hence and from that weak impotent defense of the most eminent Truths that results naturally from it that Mens prophane Triumphs have been chiefly erected 'T is from hence that we hear of so many so easily and so often seduced And 't is those Ages when Men fell off and retir'd from the rational proof of Religion and sunk into implicite Belief and ignorant Devotion from whence we may date most of the great ills of Idolatry and Superstition and from whence all those devout fooleries which have since so cumber'd the world had their chiefest and first rise As the whole of Religion is declared to be a reasonable Service and can be no other so all the Principles of it in order to it s so being must upon rational grounds necessarily be establish'd what ever Belief is built upon the credit of any Revelation ought to be ultimately resolved into a rational proof of that Revelation as such and what ever appears to us upon those terms so to be whatever can be sufficiently proved to be revealed to us from God from the Soveraign Power of its Author puts in but a reasonable claim to our assent though the matter of it in some things exceed the bounds of a humane capacity And herein it is the Socinians who had they confin'd themselves to a rational proof that all we believe is revealed had been of very good use to the Church have greatly miscarryed and when they would need subject all the mattâ—r of Revelation to a rational comprehension fell much short of that credâ—t ought to be given to all that God reveals fell foul upon those two Fundamentals of our Religion the Union of the two Natures and that of the Trinity and indeed have come much short of that Reverence all Nations have paid to their Gods who by all their Mysteries still have professed to believe some things upon the score of Divine Credit which by their own Reason they could not fully comprehend Were not the loose Principles My Lord of this degenerate Age about the most Essential parts of Religion somewhat more than a sufficient Apology for whatever is done this way yet me thinks we can never inculcate too much even unto the best men upon this Subject and that upon these two Grounds First because 't is from this Book we derive
can now be urged in proof of the Bible that will come under any sensible demonstration The proposal of this Book to the World to be received as a Law Divine is not so made as by Mathematical Evidence or gross visible absurdities in its denial to introduce it self irresistably at the first sight But this book is so proposed to our belief as that all men by a serious and impartial consideration of the matter of it and a due enquity into all the Circumstances attending it may have ground sufficient to acquiesce in it as Divine and judge it to be such as it self claims to be And that the Bible should be upon such terms and no other proposed to the belief of the World seems highly reasonable when we consider that God intends this book as the great SHIBBOLETH by which he will try the World that from the believing or not believing of it shall arise the great discrimination between Virtuous and Good Men and such who free from the prevailing influence of corrupt and sensual Interests pursue the Genuine dictates of right Reason and improve those notions of Divinity they are born with and others who either choose to be Sottishly Ignorant or else wilfully to oppose what God had made in it self most suitable and corresponding to the Reason and Conscience of every unprejudiced Man The truth is our Assent or not to the Bible is made a matter of Reward and Punishment And therefore 't is so proposed to our belief that there may be a sufficient ground for both The way to this Discourse in hand being thus far cleared I shall now prosecute the design of it in this method First I will indeavour to render it a thing reasonable to be believed that there should be some supernatural Law revealed from God and given to mankind in order to their present and future happiness as the great Guide and Rule of all their actions towards God and towards each other And that 't is not a reasonable supposal that the world in the posture we find it should be left singly to the conduct of Nature Secondly That 't is most rationally credible upon all such grounds by which a judgment in this case ought to be established That this Book we call the Bible is this Revealed Law superadded to our natural Light and contains in it self that compleat Systeme of Divine Truth by which God will Informe Rule and Judge the World And this I shall endeavour a proof of from the matter of this Book it self and from such external concomitants of it as highly concur to create a belief of its Divine Authority And lastly propose all such considerable Doubts Queries and Difficulties as the minds of men are usually busied withall about this Matter And attempt their Satisfaction therein To make the first thing proposed evident that 't is Reasonable to believe in the general that God should give us some further direction then what our Natural Light will afford us That he should promulge some Supernatural Law to the world Let these several things following be duely considered First What wretched and dismal Ignorance has the world been in yea the wisest and best parts of it and in what disagreement with it self about all parts of Religion where this supernatural Law hath been either not known or not received How sadly hath that inbred principle of Religion wherewith all men are born been seduced and mislead where there has been nothing supernatural to guide and direct it The natural notion of a Deity has corrupted into all folly and vanity and men have formed Religions not only hateful to God but at last nauseous to themselves Devotion men still had to somewhat above them but they knew not well how to express it The Wisest saw reason enough to scorn their own Religion but knew not how to compose a better Some went farr in the Negative in saying what ought not to be that then was amongst themselves but none ever attained to a certain directory of what should be When we view over the utmost products of all humane abilities and the greatest discoveries at any time made by natural light we shall find the world without Revelation to have been greatly defective in these three things First in their Divinity in their conceptions of the Deity and their Worship of him Secondly In the account they gave to themselves of the worlds first Production and of the Origine of things Thirdly In their Morality and in their Ethical Institutes of humane life and the converse of mankind together First In their Divinity Varro ranks all the Heathen Theology under three heads Their Fabulous and Historical Theologie Their Natural and Mystical Theology Their Civil and Political Theology which he also calls Mythical Physical and Civil The first came from their Poets and contains such a Rapsody of Nonsense and Folly as the like to it hath not upon any occasion nor upon any subject been collected since the world began That one God was born from a Mans Head another from a Mans Thigh a third from some drops of Blood That some Gods were Thieves others Adulterers others Servants to Men with multitudes of such absurd and ridiculous fictions The Second sort came from their Wise men and from their Philosophers They dispute what the Gods are Where they are And whence they are And amongst them we find an endless diversity and most stupendious folly some making the gods to consist of Fire some of Numbers others of Atoms and by their Mystical Divinity interpreting Jupiter to Fire Juno to Earth Pluto to Air Nestis to Water and others of their Gods to the several parts of the World with many other so gross and notorious absurdities that Justin Martyr tells the Graecians that the Divinity of their Philosophers Multo sit quam Poctarum Theologia atque de Diis doctrina ridiculosior is much more absurd then that of their Poet. The third sort relates it self to the Laws and Customes of particular Cities and Countreys by which they ordered their Priests what Gods they should worship at what Times and Seasons and upon what occasions what Sacrifices and Services and all things relating to the exercise of their Religion both upon the Stages in their Theatres and also in their Temples For in the one they represented their Gods and had Plaies acted in honour to them as a part of Religion and in the other they Worshipped them In all which we find them shedding the blood one of another and offering most inhumane sacrifices and a numberless multitude not only of childish and foolish but profane and impious obscene and lascivious rites and ceremonies If we look back as farr as any Heathen Records will carry us and view over the Barbarous Nations of the world for so the Graecians were pleased to call all but themselves according to that of Varro Barbarae sunt omnes nationes praeter Graecos the Phaenicians the Caldaeans the Egyptians and such others as we have
the World Thales Miletius the founder of the Ionick School who was Antiquissimus Sapientum in Graece and the first Author amongst them of that Science they afterwards called Natural Philosophy and came nearest to the Story of Moses he derived all things from Water Rerum omnium principium dixit esse Aquam ex Aqua namque omnia existere in Aquam resolvi omnia Following therein Homer the great Prophet of Graece whose Books were indeed the great Pagan-Bible and from whom not only most of the Gracian Religion but most of all the Heethen Theology was after derived for he makes the Sea the common Parent of all things 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Occanum rerum genuit qui cuncta parentem Year of the Gods themselves for he derives their Pedigree no higher 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Oceanumque DeuÌ„m patrem Tethymque parentem Anaximander his Successor he thought the World came from no one particular thing but that all things had their proper and singular beginnings which he held to be Infinite and that Infinite Worlds were thereby begotten all which had their successive Original Continuance and End Anaximenes he thought all things came from Air Ex Aere omnia fieri in hunc desinere omnia Heraclitus ascribed all to Fire thought all things came first from Fire and would revert to Fire again Pythagoras the Author of the Italick Philosophy and the first introducer of the Name of Philosophy according to Laertius And as Clemens Alex. tells us the first that took the Name of a Philosopher upon himself which St. Austin sayes he did out of modesty refusing to be called a Wise man which every Philosopher was before but chose rather to stile himself a lover of Wisdom he ascribed all things to Numbers 'T were endless to mention all the absurd and contradictory speculations the Philosophers had about this matter The three best of all the Philosophers who successively instructed each other and attained to the top of the Graecian Literature Socrates Plato and Aristotle What a Cloud did those elevated understandings set in about these matters Socrates so far as we can judg of him by what his Scholars have collected of his for he wrote nothing himself saw so great vanity in the Sentiments of all the Philosophers about these things withall was so convinc'd of his own inability to come to a right comprehension of them that he applied himself chiefly to Morality waved all disputings about them as uncertain and no way satisfying and made his business to instruct men in the Rules of good living and to withdraw them from such speculations wherein he found they had been ever benighted and lost which doubtless was the wisest resolve by far that any of them ever came to it being a singular part of prudence to be silent in that about which we are Ignorant And in this particular happily he made good what the Oracle said of him Mortalium unus Socrates vere sapit Plato asserts three first Principles of all things Deum Materiam Idaeam Deum Conditorem omnium Materiam autem primariae rerum genitarum generationi subjacentem Causam occasionemque Deo creationis praebentem Ideam porro Creaturae cujusque exemplar And sometimes adds a fourth Animam universalem Aristotle makes but two Principles Deum Materiam And indeed so contradicted the former Hypothesis of Plato and so little agreement was there in those things between them though he had been his Scholer from fifteen that Plato complains He kicked at him as Foals use to do at their Dames that have bred them up Some thought the World Eternal without a Deity Aristotle he thought it Eternal with a Deity and that the World flowed naturally from the Divine Being as light does from the Sun Nor indeed was there any one Philosopher amongst them all but held that the matter of the World in some posture or other about which they much differed was Eternal as well as the Deity it self And therefore one of the Ancients sayes Omnes Philosophi in his consenserunt semper prater Deum ab omni Eter nitate aliquid fuisse In this all Philosophers have agreed that there was somewhat else besides God from all Eternity They never admitted the matter of the World could possibly come originally from Divine Potentiality and so from nothing if you respect matter that Maxim Fieri é nihilo nihil in nihilum nil posse reverti was universal amongst them and still confined by them all to the notion of matter For Divinity no parts of the world before or since ever produced a farther Corruption therein then Greece and Rome in their greatest splendor They made Gods of all parts of the World and of themselves living and dead Idolatry was then in its Meridian That natural notion men have of a Deity has been in no Age of the World more notoriously debauched to the very dregs of all false worship then in those knowing times Whatever they generally loved or feared fancied and not understood that they were sure to Adore Their backs were bowed down with an ignorant implicite reverence to what they knew not and so their Devotions proved as ruinous to them as their Vices 'T was their Religion in Graece that made men turn Atheists and made that learned Countrey the first Soyl that ever Atheisme grew in 'T was so grosly absurd and their Poets had made it so ridiculous that it became lothsome to the most intelligent part of themselves At Athens so blind were they in their Devotion and withall so confused with the multiplicity of their own Deities not sometimes knowing which to apply to that they inscribed Altars to the unknown God by which they fell accidentally into the worship of the true God before they were aware for the unknown God amongst them 〈◊〉 indeed the true God The occasion of 〈◊〉 â—uch we find in Laertius in the life of Epimenides who he sayes in the time of the great Plague that was at Athens Oves allas nigras in Areopagum adduxit ac dimissis deinde quo ire vellent auctor suit ut ubi illi recubuissent ibi Sacrificarent 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 These Altars are likewise mentioned by Pausanias Lib. 1. and by Phylostratus Lib. 6. Such Altars so inscribed also they had in Rome upon the occasion of an Earthquake there when they knew not which of their Gods to apply to as appears by Agelli Lib. 11. Chap. 28. In Rome their Religion was growen to that height of absurdity that one tels us in Cicero the Roman Priests themselves did to such a degree contemn their own Devotions and Ceremonies that they could scarce forbear smiling at each other when they met in the Streets 'T were strange to believe God should be pleased with what Men mockt at themselves Cotta in Cicero's Books de Nat. Deor. sayes plainly Religions must be continued as they were first instituted for the safety of Common-Wealths but that otherwise all
wise people laughed at those Mysteries Never any man scorn'd any thing more than Caesar himself did his own gods and as Tertullian observes pleased himself often in that he was able to make his gods feel the power of his anger What a Childish folly 't was then to believe that a Roman Consul lost his whole Army because he slighted the feeding of some young Chickens or that Marcus Crassus was therefore slain by the Parthians because he despised some fopperies of Atteius If we look off from their publick Religion and the general practice of their Divinity and take a view of what the Wisest and Best thought what a poor product were all their Notions compared with the Bible What a Midnight were men in in respect of Religion in that clear Sunshine of Humane Knowledge Socrates who saw the furthest of any man in the Age wherein he lived into the vanity of the Heathen Theology and died for a pretended Contempt of it for the Charge that Melius one of his Accusers brought against him at Athens as Laertius sayes was Jura violat Socrates quos ex majorum instituto suscepit Civitas Deos esse negans alia vero nova Demonia inducens The first Philosophical Martyr that we read of has yet left but little better Divinity behind him Nor can I perceive he had any design or ability to reform the World that way for he Answers his Charge by a flat denial as appears by his Apology in Plato and his whole carriage sufficiently assures us 't was out of choyce and not out of fear that he did so Sometimes also before he advised others to content themselves with the Religion of the Countrey they lived in And we find likewise in Plato how uncertain and doubtful he was about that great point of the Soul's Immortality and a future state of Men after this life and could determine nothing with himself positively about it though he seems to incline that way and to think it the more probable opinion that the Soul is Immortal Much in the same way that Cicero speaks of it in his Tusculane Questions who gives it but a probability And as Plato does in his Phaed who sayes in the Conclusion of his discourse that he is not certain about it nor will not be confident of it 'T was doubtless a high degree of uncertainty in his thoughts about those matters that made him say He knew not whether 't were better to dye or to live and that 't was a foolish thing to be troubled about that of which we have no certain Knowâ—edge whether it be to be desired or feared And when he came near to his end he expressed great contentment in the hopes of being with Hercules and Palamedes in the next World but still qualified those Hopes with this doubtfull Parenthesis In case the Soul be not extinguished with the Body He chose indeed to be rather a good Moralist and to deal in those Notions wherein he found some certainty then to attempt much in the speculative part of Divinity being wholly unable to frame any satisfactory Notions to himself about the Being of God and Divine Worship He often plainly declares that of the Nature of God and the business of another World he was wholly ignorant and many of the wisest Philosophers acknowledged as much and thought those things utterly beyond the reach of all Humane Knowledge all Notions about them to be full of uncertainty and therefore chose to submit to the Vulgar Sentiments rather then perplex themselves with doubtful and unsatisfying Speculations and run the hazard of contradicting the publick Religion of those Countreys where they lived Plato the famous Divine Philosopher who exceeded all the Graecian Philosophers as much in the Speculative part of Religion as Socrates did in the Practick though there was more true Divinity uttered by him then by any of the Philosophers where he first had it is not hard to determine yet attended with marvellous vanities and intollerable Errours ' T is not easie to forbear smiling in reading over the account he gives of the Creation of the World the matter of which he makes to be Eternal the fabulous conceits he has about that and many other things of that Nature 't would tire out any ordinary patience to read A great promoter he was of that gross Idolatry of Damon-Worship for he sayes That when men die their Souls become Daemons and if their merits be good they are Lares if Evil Lemures if different Manes Of which St. Austin gives a large account De Civ Dei lib. 9. Ch. 11. Though he speak much of one God yet himself then as all the Platonists since held that many gods are to be Worshiped and in his Timaeus he calls Saturn Ops Juno and others Gods and sayes the Daemons and Heroe's are to be Sacrificed to and the good Estate of the City commended to them Cicero observes likewise out of his Timaeus that he spake with great obscurity and uncertainty about this one God Sometimes calling him an Eternal Mind And sometimes calling the Sun Moon and Stars all parts of the World the Souls of men and whatever the Heathens worshipped Gods And at last concludes that the whole of his Principles per se sunt falsa sibi invicem repugnantia Are in themselves false and self contradictious Aristotle that great Luminary of the Rational World a man of a most sagacious wit who travelled with such unparallel'd success through all the Theorems of Nature and all parts of Humane Knowledge what Mushrom-Divinity has he left behind him With what obscurity uncertainty and confusion with himself has he spoke of those two great fundamentals of all Religion the Being of God and the Immortality of the Soul to such a degree that many of his Disciples since have avowed that he denied the latter If out of Aristotles Books we should but extract a Model of his Religion it might be for a Monument of wonder that such a Giant in all Natural Knowleage should die such a Child in Divinity Cicero who carried the Top-Sail of Learning in the Age wherein he lived to whom the elder Pliny gave this Testimony That he only had a Wit equal to the greatness of the Roman Empire why did not he compose a right Systeme of Divinity and leave a good account of those things to posterity behind him from whom might we with more Reason have expected it he designing the Nature of the Gods and Divinity for his Subject In the beginning of his Book he tells us with what unequal Sentiments men had debated those matters Some of the Philosophers doubted whether there were any Gods as Protagoras Some possitively affirmed there were none as Diagoras and Theodorus Cyrenaicus â—â—â—i vero Deos esse dixerunt tanta sunt in varietate ac dissentione constituti ut corum molestum sit annumerare Sententias Nam de siguris Deorum de locis atque sedibus Actione vitae multadicuntur Deque
considered in order to the satisfaction of such an enquiry First the Internal Cause of it And secondly the External Means by which it hath been brought about The Internal Cause of it hath layn in two things First An Insussiciency in our Natural Abilities since the Fall to ascertain us fully about Divine things and to give a satisfying answer to all those enquiries we naturally make about them Secondly the general ill improvement the world has made of those abilites it had and the universal Declension and Apostacy of mankind from that knowledg they might have arrived at For the first Though the Being of God and the existence of a Supreme Power be witnessed to by every mans Reason and every man be born with a relation to somewhat Above him and there be many Maximes of Natural Divinty connate to the true exercise of our rational faculties yet there be two things can never be attained by any Natural search First A certain knowledg What God is And Secondly a certain knowledg How he is to be Served Neither a Satisfying account of the Nature of his Being nor of a Worship acceptable to him is to be compassed without Revelation About these two things when men have had nothing told them from Heaven to fix them their Opinions have been as various as their Inventions The grosser part of the world God being onely an Intellectual Object whom they could not see generally fell to conceive of him by what they did see Cicero himself confessing that when we come to consider Qualis sit Deorum Natura Nihil est dificilius quam a consuctudine oculorum aciem mentis abducere Lib. 2. de Nat. Dear And the more Refined part lost themselves in a Wilderness of Abstracted Speculations about what they could never distinctly comprehend For the Second 'T is plain a great part of the Heathen Idolatry arose not only from their Mistakes in what they could not know but from a corrupt defection from what they might know Those Notices their own natural abilities gave them of God thwarting their Sensual Inclinations they delighted not to retain such a knowledg of God in their minds but willingly turned aside to Delusion left the guide of their Reason and chose the conduct of Appetite The Stupendious folly of their Religions is as a Thousand witnesses to this Truth That they lived not only below the true Knowledg of the one God but farr beneath the exercise of Right Reason For though I am apt to believe that a Supernatural knowledg does much instruct us in the true extent of what is meerly Natural and does much inkindle our natural Light and we see many things now to be attainable by Nature which the world so farr as I can discerne never found out without Revelation Yet 't is not credible that a Rational Being without some way extinguishing the dictates of his own faculty should make a God of that which he himself knew to be but a Perishing Creature or should think to please a being of such perfections as every mans Reason must needs ascribe to God by debasing himself before the Meanest parts of the World Secondly If we consider the External means by which these Internal Causes have operated and how all that Rubbish of Pagan Theology hath been visibly induced to defile and cumber the world from five things chiefly we may derive it First From a corrupt Tradition of the Worlds first original and the History of the Creation and the Flood and many passages both before and after the Flood which Noah and his family first conveyed down to the world in its Repeopling and the Jews from Moses afterward inform'd them off This appears to have been a great rise to many of the Heathen Superstions and Vanities and most especially amongst the Phaenicians much of whose Religion seems to be a plain corruption of those original Truths and an apparent Mythology upon the True History of things before and after the Flood as appears by Diodorus Sicubus and more anciently by their own famous Antiquary Sanconiathon in the Version of Philo Biblius The occasion of which corruption in the Tradition of those things was probably the Confusion of Tongues at first the great increase of Barbarisme after the proud desire every Nation had to apply all Traditional Stories of famous persons to some of themselves with many other Reasons which Scaliger Bochart and other Learned men give for it Secondly From the Fictions of the Poets who 't is clear were the first beginners of all the Graecian Learning and were therefore anciently called in Graece 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Teachers and as Strabo says and I thinks upon very good grounds were also the first beginners of all the ancientest Learning every where All other Speech whether Historical or Rhetorical being but the progeny of Poetry the Ancients knowing no other artificial or set form of speech but what was in Verse and therefore as the same Author saies Poetry was anciently called Prima quaedam Philosophia These fill'd the World with innumerable Fables Mythologized upon every thing and did greatly promote their Theological Vanities and the Corruption of all true Story Thirdly From the wild Speculations and multiplied Theories of the Philosophers of whom there were some hundreds of Sects which served greatly to Puzzle and Mis-lead men There being as Cicero saies no Absurdity but had some Philosopher for its Patron Fourthly From their Oracles by which the world lay subjected to all Diabolical delusions And fifthly from their corrupt Legislators such as Numa in Rome and others who finding the World Sequacious in point of Religion and Mankind apt to adore every fiction imposed upon their belief whatever they thought most conducing to their own Politick Ends. Nor has the World without Revelation been free from defects in its Morals though Men attained far therein and their Morality much outwent their Divinity Cicero wrought with much better success de Officiis then he he did de Nat. Deorum yet the Bible has greatly improved the world herein Let any man extract the most exact Scheme he can of Morality out of the best Philosophers and the acutest Moralists and compare it with the Doctrine the Bible proposeth to us about those things and the defects of it will be visible Amiraldus observes in his Treatise of Religions That scarce can there be found any Common-Wealth amongst those which have been esteemed the best policyed in which some Grand and Signal Vice has not been excused or permitted or even sometimes recommended by publick Laws Plato makes a Community of Women one of the fundamental Constitutions of his Republick Socrates and Cato I think are agreed to be two as famous Moralists as ever were in Graece or in Rome Cato the great exemplar for Virtue and Justice amongst the Romans and Socrates the Phoenix of Graece for Virtue and Piety of whom Xenophon gives this admirable account in his Book De Socratis memorabilibus dictis Nemo autem unquam Socratem
Methods by which Mankind came since to be saved things beyond all natural kenn and which only served to reproch the wisest thoughts and to tell men how little they could discover of what they were most concerned to know Moses having told us more in two Pages then the whole World ever discovered by the utmost of all Humane search Nor has the world any way improved it self in this kind of Sience to this day However men by experience and industry have meliorated the condition of Humane Affairs in other things whatever advance they have made in Natural Theories or in any Mechanick contrivance whatever Rust of Errour or Ignorance that stuck to former Ages may be worne off by an improvement of Natural Speculation in this yet where the Scriptures are either not Known or Rejected they are at the same Loss in point of Divinity they are as Ignorant of the True God as ever And the Result of all Natural Theology without the help of some Revelation has been and still is no other then this That while men have been most busily contemplating the nature of an Infinite Being and contriving Ways to gain Acceptance with him they have Lost themselves in the Crowd of their own vain Imaginations Secondly Such have been the Principles and Practices of all Nations in all ages that it evidently appears The world men themselves have generally found and acknowledged a Necessity of Revelation and out of an experimental sense of their own Impotency without it have still lived in expectation of somewhat Supernatural to be Revealed from Above Mankind since the Fall have been still listening after some further discovery of God then what the Work of his hands does afford them and some more perspicuous Notices of his pleasure then what their own Natural Abilities could dictate to them as that which Gods goodness and his own excellent Nature seemed to promise to the World and mans natural Tendency to some Supernatural happiness as the great end of his being continually call'd for The Genius of the World has been so suited to the notion of Revelation and mens thoughts have been so constantly taken up with an Expectancy of some Divine Instruction that they have been still in danger to fall into all the extreams of deluding Enthusiasme Not only their Religion but whatever else they thought well off they were ready to Father it still upon Revelation Scarce was there a Mechanick Invention but they ascribed it to a Discovery made by the Gods Pythagoras when he had found out an excellent Demonstration in Geometry sacrificed a hundred Oxen in gratitude to the Gods who had favoured him with such a Discovery Whatever was in it self difficult or Excellent they imputed the Accomplishment of it to a Supernatural Power Homer the great Oracle of the Heathen Divinity not only ascribes to the gods the Invention of all abstruse matters and all the Heroical motions of the mind but referrs our Ordinary Cogitations to Divine Impulses 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Talis nempe mens est Terram incolentium hominum Qualem in dies indit pater hominumque Deumque And his Book is filled throughout with Enthusiastick Advertisements directed to Men from the Gods Cicero in the end of his 2. Book De Nat. Deor. is large in his expression this way Nec unquam Magnus vir sine aliquo Afflatu Divino Never was there any great Man sayes he without some Inspiration Not only were the Poets who seem to be the Divines of the Pagans and the Priests of their Mysteries all Inspired Men but not an eminent Physician or a Souldier was there among them nor a Man any way excellent but they derived his Abilities from some Supernatural Gift and thought his Qualities from Above Socrates that excellent person often says That virtue and Religion are not things to be learnt as Arts and Sciences are but to be had by inspiration being Divine and Heavenly gifts He avowed himself raised up by God to Philosophize and by his Precepts to Reforme the Athenian manners And when condemned to dye and sentenced to the Poisonous Cup Resolutely protested Though the Prison-dores should be opened to him with an injunction never more to Philosophize he would wholly refuse his Liberty upon those Termes and would chose to obey God rather then Men. We read not of an eminent Legislator in a Commonwealth but pretended he received his Laws from the gods Solon's Laws were said to come from Minerva Lycurgus derived his Laws from Jupiter And much more was their Religion and the Rites thereof still fathered upon some Deitie or other and handed down to the world with a Supernatural Stamp Numa Pompilius the first founder of the Romane Ceremonies declared he received them from the Goddess Egeria No Religion in any Nation but has made some pretence to Revelation That absurd Imposter Mahomet was wise enough to father his Medley Divinity and all the confused trash of his Alchoran upon Revelation Nothing else could have cheated so many into a belief of such a Religion but that they were first perswaded it came from Above and that Mahomet had it Revealed to him from Heaven The Heathen world were in Truth without any Revelation in Religious affairs that is They had no Divine Laws given them from Heaven to direct their Religious obedience Whether it pleased God to Reveal any particular matters at any time to any of them I dispute not But He gave his Statutes his Divine Laws to Israel and he did not deal so wit◠any Nation besides And yet nothing more general then the expectation of it and nothing more common then Pretensions to it This seems to have been a Catholick Maxime that the true knowledge of the Deity and the right way of serving him must be revealed from Above All the Nations of the Earth seem to have concenter'd in this belief that Divine Revelation and a Supernatural intercourse between God and Man was necessary for the present and future good of Mankind 'T is well expressed by the Learned Camero Omnium Gentium etiam Barbararum consensu receptum est ut homini bene sit praeter eam Rationem quam nimis magnifico superbo Titulo vitae Ducem vocant requiri Coelestem quandam Sapientiam inde Nata est Religio Ritus Cerimoniae quae sola Sanctitate se commendant Praelect de Verb. Dei 'T is a thing says he agreed to by the consent of all Nations yea the most Barbarous that in order to mans well being there should be a heavenly Wisdome to direct him besides the guide of his own Reason and from thence comes Religion c. 'T was from this General apprehension that the World came to be so often and so easily imposed upon by deluding pretensions to inspiration and the many gross Cheats of Enthusiasme the greatest Impostors still setting up for Enthusiasts 'T was upon this account that the Heathen parts of the World were so enslaved to their Oracles
perfect Attributes the terms of our pardon must come from God 'T is not in man to find out how God shall forgive him or to to Chalk out the Tracks of Divine Justice and Mercy toward himself nor will his guilt be removed nor his thoughts be at rest till he know Gods mind about it Nothing can assure us of Reconciliation with God but what is from Heaven appointed as the means of it No natural knowledg can give us any certain direction about it nor is it reasonable to believe it should If Humane Nature had no absolute security in it self of its first state how can we expect it should restore it self when once degenerated What did not remain perfect when it was so is much more unlikely to recover again out of Imperfection to be so Every man may know he is degenerated from what he ought to be and so may reasonably collect from what he once was but no man can reason himself into a ceâ—taâ—n way of Recovery The whole world have subscribed to their own Apostacy but could never agree upon any certain remedy How miserably have Mankind tired themselves and to how little purpose in finding out what would appease Divine Anger and compensate for their disobedience No man ever yet worsâ— ipped any God but he made some Offering to him in hopes that might indemnisie him and be taken in Lieu of his own punishment Men have at a Venture offered up all parts of the world in Sacrifice have tried all experiments victimis lavacris and by all other means their best guesses could suggest to them to obliterate their own Guilt and to procure D vâ—â—e favour but never were upon any suâ—er gâ—ound then their own vain fancies for acceptance Agaâ—hias tells us in his second Book of the Peâ—sian war that the Persians were wont to solemnize a great Holy-day once a year which they called The death of Vices in which as an eminent piece of Devotion they slew multitudes of Serpents all other sorts of wild Beasts and thereby thought they should Execute all their Corruptions safely bury their sins The Philosophers abounded with remedies foâ— this Epidemical Disease Some thought to cure the evil of the world in a Moral way some in a way Mathematical and some by Religious Ceremonies But alas The right way of doing it has lain hid from Ages and Generations till God himself made it known and revealed it from Heaven VVhat a trifle is the Blood of a Sheep or an Oxe to satisfie for an Offence against an Infinite Justice At how easie and cheap a rate might men Sin and God be satisfied And what a publick tolleration of evil were it if the Blood of Bulls and Goats might take away sin and the lives of unreasonable Creatures Commute for the sins of Men The consideration of all these things does directly Steer us upward and point us to a dependance upon Revelation to give us a clear distinct and satisfying Knowledge of God of our selves and of this whole World How man came to Rebel and Sin first to enter By what ways and means Indemnity may be obtained And upon what terms we may be again reconciled to God and accepted This precious discourse the design of which is to render it a reasonable supposal that there should be in the general some Divine Revelation some Laws Supernatural promulged to the world and that Mankind should not be wholly left to the conduct of Nature can be no way ungrateful to those who are already possessed with a due esteem of the Scriptures and do assent to their verity because 't is to re-inforce one of the greatâ—st supports to all Scripture-belief Nor will it seem impertinent to those who are any way ingenious in their doubts and enquiries about this matter because 't is naturally necessarily the first step that is to be taken in order to their satisfaction But may be very well offensive to such who shall design to themselves a disbelief of the Scriptures and make it their Province to weaken their Authority and render all proofs brought for them insufficient because it goes far towards an evident and apparent determination of the whole cause against them Does indeed petere jugulum of their chiefest pretences and virtuâ—lly breaks the very Back-bone of all Antiscriptural opposition for if there be such a thing as a Revelation mâ—de to the World as that which the goodness of God and the wants of men seem necessarily to call for If God have given to Mankind a Law supernatural Where is this Divine Law to be found 'T is but reasonable to suppose it somewhere or other upon Record This Book we call the Bible must needs be it and will certainly carry it against all Pretenders the natural dictates o right Reason being Judge What Book or Writing is there extant under Heaven that can with any tollerable colour counter plead the Bible upon this account A man must be horribly Hood-winkt in his inteâ—lectuals that does not evidently see 't is impar coâ—gressus between the Bible and all other Pretenders From what paâ—ts of the world will you fetch such a Supernatural Lâ—w by which we may suppose God to Govern Mankind one either fit for him to Give or for us to Receive according to that Natural Knowledge we have of him and of our selves and that Rational Judgment to which all Supernatural pretences ought to be subjected Where wâ—ll you find a Systeme of Divinity that makes known to us in a way suitable to our natural conceptions of him the most of God and of his Nature we are able to comprehend delivers us from all the intanglements of Humane Nature by ways and Methods so pâ—opoâ—tioned thereunto and discoveâ—s to us ceâ—taâ—n tracks to the highest happiness here and hereafter we are capable to enjoy Shall we go to the Laws of Lycurgus and Solon because they pretended to Revelation Can any man be so stupid Those Laws were chiefly Municipal and made no pretence to what we enquire after Shall we imagine the Books of the Sybills because they were thought to be filled with many Divine secrets contained such Revelation The greatest part if not the whole of them is long since perished out of the world which is proof sufficient they were none of those standing Laws by which God designed to Rule and Judge Mankind Some excellent Greek Verses there are indeed extant at this day which go under their Names but they are upon good grounds by the most learned supposed to be none of theirs And iâ— they were the Christian Religion and the Truths contained in the Bible are so clearly described and the Pagan Religion so directly and strongly confuted therein that the Scriptures can scarce have a greater Testimony given to their Divinity Shall we go to the inspired Entâ—usiasticâ—l Poâ—ts for this Revelation What a ridiculous foppery would that seem to one that has once conversed with the Bible And what a wild extravagant Religion should we
to him as his rational being calls for and he himself is capable of And to arrive at this there is no possibility without Revelation Natural Divinity if duely pursued points men directly to Supernatural from a sense of its own deficiency And our Natural light shews us the necessity of Revelation from its own imperfect discoveries and by directing us to many Daties in general which without Revelation we know not well how to perform My natural light tells me of a Sapreme and Perfect Being that made me but gives me no distinct or satisfying information about him My natural light enjoyns me to Worship him but cannot sufficienly direct me in the way of it My Natural light tells me I am upon Ill terms with God and bids me is my nearest concern indeavour a Reconciliation with him and assures me of the possiâ—ilit of it from the general notion I have of his Goodness but can give me no sure and certain Directions for the obtaining of it In short My natural light tells me Man is a Creature made for Supernatural enjoyments for Rewards and Punishments from God Superiour to this World but discovers not unto me sufficient and infallible means which in this case is of absolute necessity to my welfare for the obtaining the one or avoiding the other but bids me look upward and expect to be further taught from above So that to say there is no Revelation at all That God has left Mankind wholly to the conduct of Nature is plainly to say God has left Man under that unhappiness which no Creature is under besides himself that is not fully informed about those things he is most concerned to know nor sufficiently enabled to obtain the great End of his Being 'T is to say God has made a reasonable Creature with a direct tendency towards himself and the highest Supernatural good with great Hopes and sears of Rewards and Punishments from him and with inherent Obligations in his own Nature relating to both and vet hath left him with great uncertainty and obscurity to contemplate about these things and has given him no sufficient or to his own Reason satisfying directions about them then which no conception more vile and impious and in it self more contrary to all true notion of God can at any time infest the minds of men If it be acknowledged there is any where extant a Revelation from God to the World let it be produced Let the best â—ival to the Bible upon that account or all its Competitors together be brought foâ—th and let but the dictates of right and impartial Reason of Reason as much it self as we are able to conceive it as abstracted from all prejudice all Byass of Custom Education or any câ—llateral interest as we can suppose it be the Judge and we shall soon pat an end to the Contest Let men be but true to that Divinity they are born with and to the gennine issues of their own Reason which must be the Judge in this case and the Bible must needs be Predominant and prevail against all Competition And that will be thus made to appear There are somethings which by the Judgement of right Reason must necesiarily be appurtenant to a Revelation from God and such a Divine Law as we are in pursuit of and without which it cannot reasonably be supposed Now we find those things peculiarly to belong to the Bille and that they are no way applicable to any other Writings or Pretences to Revelation whatsoever And this being so as by the following particulars 't will undeniably appear to be where any Revelation in the general is admitted the Bible cannot with any colour of Reason be rejected And in truth its Divine Authority will against all opposition be established First There must be reasonably supposed in any Divine Laws God shall reveal to the world such a Legislative Authority expressed in Commanding in Promising in Threatning and throughout the whole of them as is by the judgement of our own Reason suitable to the Sovereignty of God and our natural subjection to him that is we must needs suppose God to give Laws in a way like himself In this respect the Bible is singular No Book under under Heaven contains such an assumption of Supremacy over the world nor speaks to us in such a manner with that Majesty and uncontrollable Authority in Gods own Name as this doth Requires indispensible obedience from from all Mankind to whatever it enjoyns as the Will and Pleasure of the Great God upon the highest Penalty That of Eternal destruction to Soul and Body How far any man could have gone in this respect in personating the Supreme Majesty of God and abusing the world with a Counterfeit of his Divine Authority needs not to be considered in this case though 't is certain the Bible has out gone all the possible contrivance of Men in such a way and none but God himself could have spoke to the world in words so becoming his own greatness and so suitable to those conceptions right Reason will give us of him because though many Books and Writings have made a claim to Revelation besides the Bible yet in fact no Book nor Writing has so much as attempted to Command the world in so Majestick a way nor indeed in any way becoming the Greatness and Sovereignty of God The Bible has a peculiarity in this respect above all other Writings that have been extant since the world began We find not an instance where any have so far usurped the Throne of God as with such an absolute superintendency to dictate to the world All pretended Revelations have in this visibly discovered their own nakedness and betrayed their own mean descent Not one of them having been clothed with such a Divine Majestick Authority as becomes a product of Infinite Wisdom and Power and most of them no way suitable to the common Prudence of men The Ancient Heathen pretences to Revelation were for the most part the meanest and most trifling part of those Ages wherein they were extant And that Alchoran which in later times Mabomet has father'd upon Revelation is a Systeme of Laws so prodigiously unsuitable to the Majesty of God that 't is much of it no way reconcileable to common Discretion or any way worthy an Edition from Wise or or Good men Secondly My Reason will tell me that a Revelation from God to the World must needs be supposed to give us an Account of all things necessary for us to know and to carry in it a Compleatness and Sufficiency of Instruction and Direction for all the great Ends of Mankind relating to this life and a future 'T is not imaginable that God should make a Revelation to the world and not make it proportionate and sufficient to all the Ends of Revelation The great End of Revelation is to supply the Desiciencies of Nature for if Nature were in it self perfect and without defect there needed then no Revelation and to
whether the Daemons that first caused them were not Mortal and Perishable Or whether they removed not their Places and changed their abode and many things of that Nature At last concludes with this excellent Philosophy That the true Cause of those Oracles was that the Earth in some places was enduâ—d with certain Prophetick Virtues which came by Exhalations to be mingled with and insinuated into Souls fitted to receive those inspirations and so cause in them Enthusiasms and predictions of future things And at last that Virtue in the Subterranean Caverns is spent and evaporates and so the Oracular Spirit ceaseth What ground had the Heathen for all that Religion they took from their Poets but their own Words that they were Inspired What other Evidence had the Romans at first for their Religion but that Numa Pompilius told them hâ— conversed with a Goddess and received it from Her What have the Turks to this day to assure them that Mahomet was a Prophet 〈◊〉 and conversed with God and the Anâ—◠〈…〉 besides his own bare â—ord He 〈…〉 claimed working of mâ—â—acles anâ— aâ—â—â—â— hâ—mself sent from Heâ—â—â—â— to conveâ—â—◠〈…〉 with his Sword A Reâ—â—â—â—tion from 〈…〉 to be accompanied and â—â—nnot 〈…〉 to be otherwâ—â—eâ— with such plan and 〈◊〉 evidence as is â—â—ed to all reasonable satisfaction though 〈◊〉 pâ—evail nâ—t to a universal câ—â—viction such as will abundantly jusâ—â—fie it 〈◊〉 to the strictest â—crutiny or all wise and good men however it be judged or by perverse and corrupt men The Biâ—le is not only sâ—â—h for the matter out as that we make appeal to the most genuine issues of every â—â—ns Reason whether the Justice Helmess and Gâ—oâ—â—s of God be not very transparent in it but in its gradual Conveyance to the World at â—â—veâ—â—al times and in dâ—stant Ages and places has been visibly accompanied with open and apparent Evidences of Gods Infinite and Almighty power such and in such a manner visible as no one thing in the world besides it self can make a pretence to And such as the fact of them its worst Enemies not a Celsus nor a Julian did ever assume impudence enough to deny And indeed is eminently and singularly justified to us as in particulars shall be shewed hereafter by a concurrence of all those Evidences from whence a rational satisfaction about a Law Supernatural and Divine ought finally to result Fifthly A Revelation from God my Reason will tell me must be without any visible defect 'T is unreasonable to father that upon God which we our selves upon good grounds are able to charge with failing and Imperfection Whatever claims from Him and speaks to us in his Name must have nothing in it unlike him or unworthy of him A pretence to Revelation must be above any just and reasonable Exception or it naturally becomes its own Executioner If in the judgment of right Reâ—son it be found guilty of Corruption in Doctrine or of any falshood in matter of fact t is but equal to reject it as a Spurious and fictitious Delusion And therefore 't was rightly said of St. Austin to St. Jerome Si mendacium aliquod in Scripturis vel levissimum admittatur Scripturâ—â— Authoritatem omnem moâ— labefactari ac convelli If we admit the least falshhod in any part of the Bible we ruine the Authority of the whole All the Counterfeits of Revelation have upon this account visibly betrayed themselves and revealed to us their own original No one but the Bible can the world produce that will not some way or other disclose its own shame and that falls not under some nay many just and reasonable exceptions 'T is this Book alone in which there is not a flaw to be found 'T is only this Divine Law that is Perfect The Bible consists of three parts the Doctrinal the Historical and the Prophetical Let the most accute Anti scripturist living produce any one Doctrine out of the Bible that to the judgment of right Reason seems corrupt and unsound Let him shew any one Prophesie relating to things past not duly fulfilled Let him upon good and sufficient Historical Authority palpably disprove any one matter of fact in the History of the Bible and wee I yield him the cause And if this be not to be done as in fact it never has been and we are well assured never can be If a Book containing so much variety of History far beyond any other Book extant for so many thousands of years It a Book pronouncing with that positive certainty about such a multitude of future events in so many several Ages and relating to so many several persons and places containing in the Doctrinal part of it Directions and Rules for the whoâ—â— business of â—ens Duty â—o God and toward each other Iâ— this Book have not a â—â—â—un to be sound in it If it be proof against all exception If there be nothing but Truth in it in all these respects what more invinâ—â—ble Evidence can there be given to its Divinity Who but God himself could have indited in hâ—a â—ock 〈◊〉 who but a man wilfull and absurd can withstand such a Conviction 'T is the Bâ—â—le and 't is that Book alone upon every Page of which that Image and Superscriptiâ—n of God is engâ—aven Truâ— it self 'T is a â—oâ—◠〈◊〉 in its â—niverâ—â—â— Triumph over all 〈◊〉 Where is 〈◊〉 a Book to be â—ound 〈◊〉 of any considerable subject much 〈…〉 a â—auâ—â—â—â— this â—â—â—t câ—â—â—â—◠〈…〉 â—â—â—â—tonâ—â— Judgment of Mankind 〈…〉 worst enemy to find 〈…〉 pâ—oâ—ucts are brought forth in 〈…〉 failing and Impeâ—â—ect Nâ—â—â—â—â—◠〈…〉 the wisest or mâ—n 〈…〉 bound Of this we are experimeâ—â—â—â—ly â—â—â—â—ed by all History Philosophy and all 〈…〉 This Holy 〈…〉 legitimate Off spring of God and thâ—t which only contains his mind Authoritaâ—â—vely revealed and made known to the world so it has singly appurtenant to it all those requisites necessary to a Divine Revelation And without which no such thing can rationally be supposed These things being so He that rejects the Bible will find he is unâ—voidably obâ—â—â—ed either to deny that there is any Revelation aâ— all and consequently to give some good answer to what has been urged for the reasonable supposal of it and some tolleâ—â—â—â—â— account hâ—w Mankind when we consider Gods goodness and our own necessities can be suppoâ—â—d to be left without it or else to proâ—â—â—ce somewhat that with more Justâ—â—â— and better Evidence can put in a claim to it is Mâ—â—â—l more becoming the greatness and goâ—dness of God and more suitable and use â—l to men The first I dare say will be found a task utterly impracticable if unprejudiced reason may be Judg and with what success the latter iâ— like 〈◊〉 pâ—â—ceed and how visibly absurd 't will renâ—eâ— its undertaker will soon be determined by every sober mind when it plaâ—nly appâ—â—â—s by what has been said that so many things which my Reason tells me must all necessarily accompany a Divine Revelation and without which it
the Jews in the time of our Saviour and the Apostles nor before and 't is certain if there had been any Books then extant in truth written by him they would have been in great esteem and veneration in the Jewish Church though they had not been within their Canon which we are sure they were not and Philo or Josephus most diligent searchers of their Antiquities would have made some eminent mention of them in whose Works we find altum silentium about any such Books and therefore 't is not to be supposed they believed there were any such real Books then extant But 't is most probable that after the Apostle Jude had in his Epistle quoted a Prophecie of Enoch which Prophecie without doubt he came to the knowledge of either purely by Revelation which I rather believe or else by a Tradition the truth of which was ascertained to him by Revelation by which means came others also of the Sacred Writers in after-times to be ascertained of what they writ about divers things that relate to the History of Moses that were not to be found in his Books for in the Psalms we find mention of some things done in Moses his time that are not recorded in his Books St. Paul in the 9 to the Hebrews sayes that when Moses had spoken every precept according to the Law he took the blood of Calves and Goats with Water and Scarlet Wool and Hyssop and sprinkled bâ—th the Book and all the People saying this is the Blood of the Testament c. In which the Apostle has added several things that are not inserted by Moses in the selation of this passage in the 24 of Exodus So Stephens Speech set down in the 7 of the Acts tells us that Moses in killing the Egyptian supposed that his brethren would have understood how that God by his Hand would deliver them but they understood not By which we have a Reason given for Moses killing the Egyptian that he himself has no where set down and by which we come to understand that before Moses went into the Land of Midian God revealed to him that he was to be the deliverer of that people which Moses himself has not any where told us I say 't is probable that some Hereticks in the Church most likely the Gnosticks who much cryed up those Spurious Writings to promote their own corrupt Opinions and Interests took occasion from thence to frame certain counterfeit Books just as some others did under the names of Jaâ—nes and Jambres after St. Pauls mention of them as written by Enoch before the Flood which Books have sufficiently betrayed themselves for those that were published under his name were stuft as St. Austin sayes with such absurd and fabulous Stories of Angels and such ridiculous relations of Gyants whose Fathers were Angels and no men that they are to be justly rejected as pâ—lpably counterfeit and fictitious Of the same mind is Jerom Chrysostom and Epiphanius and when Celsus alledged some absurd Stories out of those writings in reproch to the Christians Origen in his fifth Book answers him by shewing what a mean esteem the Jews as well as the Christians then had of them For the second those Pillars of the Sons of Seth 't is beyond all compass of credit that any such Pillars should be set up with an intention to outlast the Deluge or that they should so do or that any Engravings upon them should be visible some thousands of years after especially upon one of Brick for Josephus tells us there were two at first erected one of Brick and another of Stone and that of Stone they made on purpose to last if the other should decay how he came to such an exact account of their minds the Reader may guess and yet he sayes 't was that of Brick that then remained upon which he does not absolutely say there was any thing written in Letters but that the Sons of Seth Engraved upon them such things as they had invented which might be by many other representations and other ways then by Letters for I doubt not but that a Symbolical representation of mens thoughts one to another was extream early in the World though they wanted Alphabetical Letters Nor does Josephus say that He saw it it himself or give any punctual account what it was that was engraven upon it or any certain Place where the Pillar was to be seen but only in general that it was then in the Countrey of Syria where he left men of leisure to enquire after it The truth is there are so very many improbable and unlikely if not impossible Circumstances do attend this vain Story that 't is plain Josephus though in the general a Historian of deserved credit took it upon bare report from others some late Authors think and perhâ—ps not amiss from the fabulous relation of Manetho who sayes he took his History from some Pillars set up before the Flood and was marvailously abused in that Countenance he seems to give to it nor ought it to seem strange that he should be so for we sind many of the best Historians have taken up things upon trust and fallen thereby into very great mistakes Suetonius and Tacitus are both eminent Historians amongst the Romans yet both guilty of strange mistakes Tacitus tells us in his History That the Jews worshipped an Asses Head with the highest veneration then which nothing could be more untruly and upon less ground affirmed and Suetonius so mistook that he thought Christ lived in the time of Claudius for he sayes In the time of Claudius Judaeos impulsore Chresto assidue tumultuantes civitate expulit That Claudius expelled the Jews out of Rome who were continually making uproars being stirred up thereunto by Christ Then which there could not be an absurder mistake nor a greater falshood well uttered For the third The mention that Moses makes in the 21 of Numbers and the 14 of the book of the wars of the Lord as a Book then extant his words are wherefore it is said in the Book of the Wars of the Lord what he didin the red Sea and in the brooks of Arnon First divers probable senses are given of the place that render it no Objection in this case The Geneva Translation not much differing from some others renders it thus Wherefore it shall be spoken in the book of the Battles of the Lord c. If so then 't is Prophetical and may relate to Joshuah who is said to sight the Battles of the Lord and to the Relations in the books of Joshuah or Judges that were to be after Junius reads the words thus Idcirco dici solet in recensione bellorum Jehovae c. Wherefore it is wont to be said in the rehearsal of the Wars of the Lord c. And so understands it not of any particular book but that amongst the Wars that God disposed for the good of the Israelites there was in those times a famous mention in the
Apostles were men Illiterate and of Parts and Education so mean that they seem no way capable to write so profoundly to lay so deep a Contrivement of mischief or by the single strength of their own abilities to bid so fair to delude the World 'T were strange to Imagine men of such distant qualities and different abilities should all agree in the same Imposture and so Harmonize as we find they do in the promotion of it Thirdly If we consider the Interest of these Writers as they were Reasonable Men for so we must needs suppose them and to act upon the same inducements that Mankind do in all other things No man could reap any advantage by counterfeiting this Book nor could the Composers thereof design any Earthly or Heavenly Good to themselves as a Recompence for such an undertaking not Heavenly for 't were the highest Offence against God and meriting the highest Punishment Nor Earthly and that upon these two Grounds First because the tendency of the Book throughout is to mortifie mens Earthly ambitions and appetites and to propose a happiness of another Nature as mens great Interest and relating to another World and no man of common discretion that designed to greaten himself here would choose to become the Author of such a Doctrine in order to it because every step he advanced that way would visibly betray an Apostacy from his own Principles and render him an open Impostor meriting the scorn and contempt of all Mankind Secondly The most of those that God imploied in that work actually exposed themselves by the doing of it to all the Persecutions Hazards and Contempts imaginable And some of them as amongst the Prophets Isaiah Jeremiah Amos and Ezekiel and all the Apostles according to what our Saviour foretold them as History assures us save only the Apostle John with the loss of their own Lives published their Doctrine 'T is a thing greatly ridiculous to imagine so many men in so many Ages should agree to cheat the World to no other end but their own certain ruine both in this world and the next What end could many of the Prophets have in those unwelcome Messages they brought to those Ages wherein they lived and for which they knew beforehand they should meet with so much ill usage No man can be so sottish to think Jeremiah designed to himself any Interest in this world when he prophecied himself into the Dungeon and at last into his Grave Or that the Apostles designed greatness or happiness here when they knowingly exposed themselves to all the rage that was then upon Earth and endured the shock of all that fury which either Jews or Gentiles or the whole World together could execute upon them He that reads the Story of St. Paul must needs suppose him to act beyond the bounds of all folly and madness and not like a man either capable of instructing or abusing Mankind if he intended any thing in this world as his End The Motives of those Holy Writers in what they did cannot with any Colour of Reason be judged to be other then pure obedience to God love to truth and preferring a Reward hereafter above their own lives and all enjoyments here How highly did they preach up obedience and submission to Magistrates when all the Rulers upon Earth were their most bitter Enemies And that Doctrine could have no other effect but to bring their own Heads to the Block The Authors of the Heathen superstitions were of a very different Genius And as one sayes well of them Cute Authores superstitionis inter Gentes omnes sibi suis semper conciliarunt Dignitatem Nor is there any part of the Bible written by any of them with any the least shew of intention to greaten or advance themselves thereby But on the contrary many of the most eminent of them have themselves Recorded their own great fatlings and imperfections as well secret as open They all appear to be themselves under a subjection to the Doctrine they taught which plainly declares they were inspired from above and no way Masters of it as a Creature of their own Throughout the whole Book there is a visible Antipathy to all self-seeking flattery or compliance God alone is exalted and all mens persons Actions and reputations are openly Postponed to his honour and put in subjection to those Holy and excellent truths there delivered Moses of all the rest seems the gâ—etâ—st gainer in this world because 't was necessary at that time God should raise up a leader to his people yet 't is plain he had no design for himself for he pronounceth a grievous curse and a sore Judgment upon his own Tribe the Tribe of Levi rejects his own posterity leaves them to the condition of common Levites sets up Joshuah to succeed him and places the Kingly superiority over that people in another Tribe from his own the Tribe of Judah and himself while he lived attained to no more but to spend his days with great trouble amongst a murmuring mutinous people in a wearisome Wilderness Fouruthly The Number of those Writers and the great distances of Time may of them lived in from the other does as probably secure us against any Humane contrivement in the composure of this Book as we can reasonably expect The world affords not an instance that ever so many Men that lived in so many several and distinct Ages so exactly agreed about any one thing much less to cheat and abuse the World and carry it on in such a continued written way Never any such thing was done in any kind nor is it supposable upon the grounds of common Reason that ever any such thing should be 'T were strange it should be done in a matter of highest concernment wherein Gods Honour mans welfare are to the utmost engaged that such a number of Impostors should be at several distant times for fifteen or sixteen hundred years together in contriving and composing such a Book as the Bible is to delude and deceive the World and that in all that time there should be no palpable discovery made of them nor they themselves should so trip in the doing it as visibly to shame their own undertaking and betray those corrupt and rotten principles upon which they proceeded As 't is highly improbable that such a number of men living at such distances of time should all agree in the same design and the same way of promoting it and agree they must for 't were absurd to imagine it could happen so to be by chance because most parts of the Bible have been still written with a reference to things future and no man that writ any one part could at that time know that others in future Ages would justifie what he said and take up the design in a right nick of time just where he left it and so still carry it on and yet this must still so come to pass if the Bible were written by any Humane contrivement
Moses could not humanâ—ly foresee That so many Prophets would ariâ—â—â—n so many after Ages to justifie explain and carry on what he at the first writ nor could Moses or those Prophets know any thing of the coming of Christ and the Apostles so exactly to fulfill the whole And yet all this and all things relating to the Bible have come as punctually to pass as if all those persons that writ the Bible had lived at one time had all talked together and perfectly agreed the whole business before one word of it was written Nay Moses is so explained and justified by the Prophets and both in such a way explained and fulfilled by Christ and the Apostles Promises and Prophecies are in such a manner made good fulfilled and interpreted as seems utterly beyond the reach of all humane skill and contrivement supposing all the Writers had lived at one time had all consulted together and with their utmost abilities laboured to bring it so to pass What Humane skill can we reasonably conceive could have contrived such a gradual fulfilling throughout the whole Bible as now we see of that promise That the Seed of the Woman should bruise the Serpents head What Humane Artifice can we conceive could have contrived such a Prophetical Prayer as Gods perswading Japhet to dwell in the Tents of Sem with such a fulfilling of it as that after the World had been Canton'd in Ages then to come into Jew and Gentile from their posterity both Jews and Gentiles who were in the highest enmity each to other should incorporate into one faith and become one under the Gospel by an united subjection to one common Head and so in many others of the like Nature And indeed no man that is not bereft of his wits can Imagine that any company of Impostors could have been the Authors of such a projection as the saving men by Jesus Christ which is the main and grand design of the whole Bible or could have contrived such remote obscure promises of it at first and such gradual and stupendious fulfillings of those promises after 'T is not I say only highly improbable that such a number of men living in such distant Ages should agree to write such a Book but 't is unreasonable to Imagine that admitting they had so agreed yet that they could have produced such a book as the Bible or that a Book so consisting with it self could have been at such remote distances of time contrived by the cunningest Heads of any wicked Impostors whatsoever Nothing less then a Divine and Heavenly Wisdom could have guided so many hands as writ the Bible in so many Ages into such an admirable agreement and punctual correspondency with themselves 'T is not easie to find an agreement between men of the same sect and opinion in any one Age or to find any one man in his own writings if he write much exactly agreeing with himself But to see so many men in writing such a Book as the Bible so harmonizing together as there they do is of singular consideration Throughout the whole Book we find these Writers still proceeding and building forward till the Top-stone is layed without rejecting any thing all things compleated and fulfilled never any thing denied Contradicted or destroyed but we still see a rare use of every part relative to the whole and such a fabrick intirely reared without the least part Mis-placed or any cause seen to entertain a second thought or to Alter Of which no instance can be given in the promoting of any humane Science whatsoever The Harmony we find in this Holy Book is of great Remark upon these three accounts First 'T is a harmony that results from exceeding Different Styles and the greatest Variety of Matter 'T is not so many mens bare agreement together upon any few plain points but t is so many mens agreeing together who have writ Historically Prophetically Doctrinally with wonderful variation both for Matter and Manner of all the Sublimest notions the minds of men are capable of as well as of the plainest truths of things in Heaven in Earth in Hell of all sorts of things relating to God and Men and of the whole business of this World and the next Secondly 'T is a harmony resulting from an involved Correspondency of the parts one with another and of every part with the whole now we see it conjoyn d in such a way as could not be foreseen or contrived by any humane wisdom in the writing of any one distinct part There is in the toâ—um compositum of the Bible such a peculiar Oeconomy relating to the whole in the conjunction of all the parts and likewise such an united consent in all the parts when together relating to their conjunction in all the Doctrines Prophecies Promises Types Histories to promote the same thing and such a Dependency each upon other in order to it the whole in its connexion is so issued into one great and common end as must needs argue a further and greater design in producing the whole then what any Individual Men could possibly have at several distant Times in writing the paâ—ticular Parts Thirdly 'T is such a harmony as has been and still is dayly more and more discoâ—erable to us by the Accidents of Time And the products of Ages and Generations have shewed us much of it that lay hid and we knew not of before The more experience we have of this Book the more we find it at unity with it self and the more we search into it the deeper harmony still we discover Every Age proves a fresh Interpreter and the successive Revolutions of this whole world reveal to us more and more of its rare and admirable Concord and we come to find things that seemingly most differ'd in the highest and safest agreement Which when we consider by how many several Pens and at how many several and distant times this Book was handed down to us could not be the effect of any Humane Artifice nor is it a thing that any Writers by the strength of their own abilities could possibly in their own Times design or provide for Nor can we suppose it the effect of any other cause but an Infinite Comprehension and Foresight And that the Writers of this Book were in all times guided in what they wrote by the Supreme Wisdome of that one God who is constant to himself and the Same for ever This consideration of the Pen-men God made use of for the Writing of this book and those Humane circumstances that attended their doing it goes thus far That there is at least as much if not More Ground to believe this book upon that single account as there is to Receive any other Humane Authors we are most satisfied in Indeed as rational inducements to credit those men that wrote the Bible considering Who they were that wrote it and how and when and upon what Termes they wrote it as to credit any other Authors we least doubt
sorts of Christians under the Gospel St. Jerom calls it a Book full of Idle dreams The Papists themselves though they have admitted many other Books that we reckon Apochryphal into their Canon yet have still rejected this and Bellarmine himself in his Book de Script Eccles speaks with great contempt of this whole Book And calls the Author of it whoever he were a writer of Romances Secondly There are many very good and sufficient Reasons to induce us to believe the contrary First There is no where in any part of the Bible the least mention not by Esdras himself though he gives us a large and particular account of what he himself did of any such thing And 't is not conceiveable but so eminent a thing as God inspiring one man to write over again so great a part of the Bible which so many had been inspired to write before would have been some where or other Recorded nor is it credible but that so great a Judgment upon the Jews as the total loss of their Law would have been distinctly mentioned when the Holy Ghost is so very particular in giving us an account of all the lossâ—s the Jews underweâ—â— at that time of all the ruines made by the Babylonians at Jerusalem and of all the spoils they carryed into Babylon from thence Secondly 'T is not to be doubted but that there were multitudes of Copies in the hands of the Religious Jews especially the Priests of whom there were many hundreds who had a constant use of it And that the People also dâ—d generally possess themselves of it after that eminent danger it had undergone and the Recovery of â—â—â—n the Eighteenth year of Jâ—siah And 't is not to be supposed that all the Copiâ—s could be destroyed Those that probably were in the hands of Jeremiah Gedalich and many others who stayed behind and accepted their liberty to continue still in Judea and those in the hands of Daniel Ezekiel and those that were carryed away with them in the first Captivity to Babylon long before the City and Temple were burnt and all those which were probably kept by many of those that were carried into Babylon after especially if we consider that we no where find that the Babylonians made it any part of their business in particular to destroy and extirpate their Law And when Antiochus did afterward with all his might indeavour it by Reason of the many Copies that were extant in good mens hands he was no way able to effect it Thirdly It appears the Jews had the Scriptures with them during the time of their Captivity in Babylon both from Daniels Prophecie who Prophesied there and also from other Historical Evidence First From his Prophecie for we find him in the 9 Chapter of his Prophecie quoting several times particularly the Writings of Moses And in the beginning of that Chapter he sayes He understood by Books the number of years whereof the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah the Prophet that he would accomplish seventy years in the desolation of Jerusalem And those Books could be no other but the Prophecie of Jeremiah it self with other parts of the Scripture and the Records of the Kings of Babylon wherein were to be found the times that the Jews were brought thither which Daniel compared together and so found out the End of Jâ—remies seventy years and of the Captivity the difficulty in the doing of which arose from hence that there had been four distinct Captivities and four several Kings of Judah carryed into Babylon at four several times first Manasses then Jehojakim and with him amongst others Daniel himself Thirdly Jeconias and with him Ezekiel and Mordecai and lastly Zedekias when the City and Temple were destroyed And 't was not a thing very easie to know from which of these Captivities to reckon the seventy â—aâ—s Ezekiel seems to begin it eleven years before the City was destroyed when Jeâ—â—onias was carryed away thither for he sayes In the five and twentieth year of our being in Captivity in the bâ—ginning of the year in the tenth day of the month in the fourteenth year after that the City was smitten And the Prophet Jeremie in comforting those that were carryed away with Jecenias used these words Thus saith the Lord after seventy years be accomplished in Babel I will visit you and cause you to return to this place by which he seems to begin the seventy years from thence but in other places is very express that the seventy years were to be accounted from the destruction of the City and Temple And so it appears the Captivity mentioned by Ezekiel was not that by which the seventy â—ears were to be reckoned Nor was the Prophecie uttered by Jeremie to comfort those that were captivated with Jeconias to commence when uttered nor till the destruction of the City and the last Captivity of Zedekiah All which Daniel considered and by comparing these Prophecies together found the exact time from whence the seventy years were to be accounted Secondly From Historical Evidence for Josephus sayes the Reason why Cyrus set on foot the rebuilding of the Temple and restoring of the Jews to their Countrey was his reading the Prophecie of Isaiah which was written â—10 years before his time wherein the Prophet foretells in Gods name that Cyrus should be raised up for that very purpose upon reading of which during the Captivity he save Cyrus was ravished with admiration of God and surprized with an ardent zeal to bring about what was so long before written And t is highly probâ—ble that God made use of the sight of that Prophecie to engage Cyrus to what he did for otherwise 't was a thing in it self most absurdly impolitick and against all ordinary Rules of discretion to restore such a people and rebuild such a place that had been so famous and so terrible to all the Nations round about Especially when as Josephus sayes there went out of Babilon at their return of those two Tribes of Judah and Benjamin there captivated Four Milions six hundred twenty and eight thousand Persons that were above twelve years old besids four thousand and seventy Levites and of their Wives and Children together forty thousand seven hundred forty and two besides also some hundreds of the Tribe of Levi that were Porters Singers and other sacred Servitors Fourthly 'T is not Imaginable that Zerubbabel Joshuah Haggai and so many others of them would have so laboured as they did to return out of Babylon toâ—e-build their Temple and restore their Ancient Worship if the Law of God the great Rule and Foundatioâ— of it had been wholly lâ—st and extinguished Nay it appears evidently in the Book of â—zra that those Jews that firstâ—etâ—â—â—ed into Judaea before Esdras came out of Babylon brought the Law out of Babylon with them for in the sixth of Esdras 't is there said They set the Prâ—ests in their divisions and the Levites in their coâ—ses and setled the Worship oâ—the Temple
these latter Ages in whole streams of Blood that ran from its Primitive Martyrs God pleasing to introduce the Gospel at first without any thing Humane to befriend it that we might be for ever ascertained of its Author Who but God himself by a Power from above can we reasonably imagine could have enabled a few Mean Ignorant and Contemptible men so to confront the whole World and in the Evening of it when other Religions had so long lasted and were so fast rooted to erect a Religion destructive to all the rest and to break through all the Opposition that the Religion of the Jews and Heathens the Philosophy and Learning of all the knowing parts of the World the Laws and force of the Roman-Empire in its greatest splendor and strength could form against it And what Doctrine but one in its own Nature Diâ—â—â—â— and attended with the visible effects 〈◊〉 Almighty Power to own and juâ—â—â—â—â— can we conceive could have 〈◊〉 the World so to bow before it How ridiculous does it appear to suppose a company of mean Impostors that had neither God nor Men besides themselves to befriend them nor any other Foundadation but a Design in the highest manner to cheat and abuse the World could have effected all this and that they should finally so prevail and impose the grossest Delusion imaginable upon Mankind against all such Opposition Had I no other consideration to induce me to believe the Bible but what ariseth from hence this one seems singly sufficient to me to justifie its Divinity against all reasonable suspition of Imposture and for ever to silence all the doubts that can be at any time made about it What greater assurance can we have that a Doctrine is Divine and comes from above then when we see it has ventured it self upon its own Divine Evidence against all Humane Opposition and singly by that prevailed and spread it self all the World over Neither Arms nor Councils neither the Policy of Julian nor the Sword of Dioclesian could put a stop to its progress Had God disowned the Gospel at first Nay had he not Eminently and Visibly witnessed to it from Heaven we cannot possibly imagine how it could have taken one step forward It had doubtless as it was then circumstanced been stifled in its first birth and buried in perpetual silence We find all the Religion of the Heathens has still grown up under the shadow of Humane Power and Authority and has still decayed when Humane props have been removed I challenge any man to shew me any other Religion that ever prevailed in the World without Humane help and that ever stood out the brunt of Persecution All other Religions but what have been founded upon the Bible have still fallen before the Power of the Sword 'T is only the Religion of the Jews and the Christians founded at first upon the Bible and the Miracles wrought to confirm the Doctrine contain'd in it that has weather'd out all attempts for its eradication 'T is a marvelous evidence of that solemn and divine foundation upon which the Jewish Church and the Old Testament were at first established That notwithstanding all that the Jews have suffered and their very Being in a National way and their National Worship in which their Religion chiefly consisted be utterly extinguished yet still they retain their Profession submit to a Yoke of most burdensome Ceremonies remain dispersed in the World a Monument of Scripture-verity and so many standing Witnesses to the Truth of many eminent Predictions both in the Old and New Testament And thus from the success of this Book also since its first conveyance and all the circumstances that have attended the progress of it since its first publication have we as great an assurance as in such a Case we can well expect that God himself and no other is in truth the Author of it I come in the fourth and last place to consider this Book in it self in the Matter of it as at the present we find it and as it now lies before us In the doing of which I mean not to insist separately and abstractedly upon any Internal evidence that results from the matter of the Scripture it self but to take it as it ought to be in Conjunction with the former and all other Collateral proof 'T is neither Reasonable nor Warrantable to disjoyn the proof God has afforded us of his Word and lay the weight of its Justification upon any one single Evidence For when God commands us to believe and obey this Book as his Word and imposeth the highest penalty upon our not doing it he layes not the stress of his Command or the Penalty nor ought we upon any one particular sort of Evidence External or Internal but upon the whole intire proof he has made to us of it and all those means he has afforded for our Conviction and Satisfaction about it When we are upon a general proof of the Bible 't is not necessary to insist upon any Internal Evidence that results from the Bible it self as singly sufficient to prove it or enter into any debate whether it really be so or no because we have all the Cumulative advantage of an External justification And if all together be sufficient to prove the Bible to be what we that profess the Christian Religon take it to be 't is enough for our purpose And that the matter of the Bible it self with what ever Evidence will arise from thence is not to be abstractedly insisted on from other Collateral proof nor that any Collateral proof will prevail in this Case without there be also an Innate Evidence resulting from the matter of the Bible it self so that a Conjunction of the Evidence in both kinds is absolutely necessary to establish a general proof will be thus made to appear The Bible as hath been said consists of three parts Doctrinal Prophetical and Historical whatever Evidence we have from the Scripture it self to prove its own Divinity must needs chiefly arise from the Doctrinal part Because the Prophetical and Historical part can never be fully justified without Forraign proof we cannot know the History of the Bible to be certainly true from the Bible it self Nor can we sufficiently prove any Prophesies in any part of the Bible to have been actually fâ—llfilled because they are said in other places of that Book so to be For 't were to beg the Question and admit the Book to be true when we are debating whether it be so or no! This we may urge in proof of the Historical and Prophetical part from that Divine Evidence that comes from the Doctrinal that we find such History and such Prophesie in an admirable Conjunction with such a Doctrine subservient to it tending to the establishment of it and inviron'd with all probable Circumstances of being true both from the nature of the Prophesies and also from the excellent Manner of their fulfilling and from the rare Method of the History in
order to the great end of the whole But at last the Positive and absolute Proof to one that denies it must needs depend upon somewhat Collateral to the Book it self Secondly No External proof of the Bible would be sufficient to any reasonable enquiry were there not likewise an Internal Evidence resulting from it to its Divinity that is 'T were to no purpose to urge any Arguments from External Evidences be they Miracles or what they will to prove a Book to be Divine and sent us from God did not the Book approve it self to the judgment of right Reason likely so to be 'T were a vain attempt to endeavour to make a reasonable man upon any collateral considerations submit to the Bible as a Law Divine did not the Bible upon a due Search into the matter of it appear worthy of such a Denomination I much applaud that saying of Mr. Chillingworth upon this occasion For my part sayes he I profess if the Doctrine of the Scripture did not appear as good and as sit to come from God the Fountain of goodness as the Miracles by which it was confirmed were great I should want one main Pillar of my Faith and for want of it I fear I should be much stagger'd Nay 't is that Innate and satisfactory Testimony the Scriptures give at last of themselves and their own Divinity to our Reasons that finally determins all rational assent establishes the truth of all other Testimonies and upon which our belief of them as Sacred and Divine is ultimately founded and established So that as on the one hand we ought not to insist upon any Internal Evidence as simply sufficient to Evidence the truth of the Scriptures exclusively to the External justification God has incircled them withal and upon which the full and absolute proof of divers parts must necessarily depend and also because 't is upon all the reason God has given us to believe the Bible that be requires our assent to it So on the other hand we must not deny an Internal evidence to result from the Innate worth of the Bible it self whereby it appears to our reasons at last to be what other External Arguments perswade us to believe it is When we tast the Excellency of the Doctrine and when we perceive how all the matters of Fact stand justified to us a Divinity appears in the Whole We finde this Book to be a rare Composure of Divine Wisdom are convinced upon the whole matter 't is from above and bow to the Authority of God as the formal Reason of our Obedience whom we evidently perceive speaking to us in it This being premised I proceed to consider this Book in it self in the Matter of it as it now lies before us And herein I shall endeavour these two things First To shew that this Book so far as 't is capable of being compleatly judged of by what ariseth from it self without any Collateral Supplement so far as every Man's Reason becomes a competent Judge of it in its bare proposal appears to a reasonable enquiery most likely to come from God and to be Divine And by that internal Evidence arising from its own excellent Nature reflects back also a justification to all those External Arguments brought to prove it Secondly That in all such things as relate to Matters of Fact and wherein an External Justification is necessary to ascertain us fully about it we find this Book so witnessed unto so inviron'd with a concurrence of Humane Testimonies as leaves no room for any reasonable Doubts to be made about this Matter For the first That this Book so far as we can competently judge of it from it self appears to be Divine and that there are many Internal Reasons of great force resulting from the Matter of this Book it self to perswade us that it is from God and written by his special Command will be sufficiently manifest in the consideration of these following Particulars First We find contained in this Book some things that exceed the bounds of all Natural Abilities ever to have found out Such as could not in the judgment of right Reason be the product of any Humane Invention Not only such things as no man did think of before for that every Book contains that gives birth to a New Notion but such things as no man could ever have thought of Such as could not have been known amongst Man-kind any other way than by Revelation And therefore though written by Men must needs be revealed from Above The Instances of this shall be these two First This Book tells us such things of God of his Nature of his Eternal Counsels of the manner of his Existence as were utterly beyond the confines of all Natural Discovery and could not be minted in any Humane Brain No fimie Intellect could ever have travelled into such Depths and Heights as by this Book we are acquainted with and appear to us to be in the Counsels of God in order to the glorifying of himself by the Works that he has made No man could ever have imagined a Trinity in the Deity or such an existence of one Simple Essence as this Book acquaints us withall These are such things as could never be hammer'd out in any Humane Shop Such as without Revelation could never have enter'd into any created Mind to conceive of Secondly That contrivement we find in this Book of Saving the World and rebuilding the fallen Tabernacle of Humane Nature is evidently a reproach to the best abilities of Man-kind and an undenyable instance of this kind 'T is not onely what was unthought of before but what lay infinitely distant and wide from what could be thought either by Angels or Men and directly fathers it self upon that Supream Wisdom that is Above And that first in respect of the thing in it self considered And secondly In respect of the Manner and Method of its Accomplishment First In respect of the Thing it self and that on two accounts The height of stupendiousness that is in it and the transcendent degree of excellency that is in it First The Stupendiousness of it What a hidden and amazing Mystery how far removed from any mortal view or imagination was this That the Second Person in the Blessed Trinity should descend from Heaven and assume Humane Nature into a conjunction with the Divine and in that conjunction become the Saviour of the World That He should take upon Himself in His own Person the Sin and Guilt of Man-kind Die for the World Make thereby a Satisfaction proportionate to Infinite Justice and prepare a way for God to express himself in the utmost act of Mercy in a conjunction with the highest exercise of Justice No less than an Infinite Understanding could have shaped such a Design or been the Author of such a Projection Nor could any but God himself with whom all things are possible that are in themselves possible have found out an expedient to have reconciled those two Infinite Attributes in
his dealings with an Apostate Creature Secondly Such a strange prodigious Excellency appears in the whole business of our Redemption such a floodgate of Divine and Supernatural Truth is let open by it that not only the wisest Men but the Angels themselves look with the highest admiration upon it Indeed all the Ends of God and Men are so attained by it and in a way so sutable to the Nature of Both that nothing but the Boundless Wisdom of God could have contrived it In what a stupendious and unthought-of way is God in all his Attributes Manifested Exalted and Glorified After how excellent a manner is the Evil of the World both in respect of the Guilt and Dominion of it obliterated and expunged To how astonishing a degree is the whole Interest of Man-kind provided for And to how great a Happiness here and hereafter is the World recovered And this in a Way and by Means far out of the reach of the wisest Thoughts by the Faith and Obedience of the Gospel In which there are three things of singular remark First That a Man is brought thereby to as near a converse with God in the truest exercise of his Rational Faculties as our Nature will bear and as can be had in this World considering that infinite distance there is between the Nature of God and our present composure Secondly The greatest present and future happiness is proposed to Man-kind upon such qualified Terms and with such regard to the Impotency of Humane Nature as is admirable to consider 'T is not made ultimately to depend upon Perfection of Action but Sincerity of Intention Thirdly Provision is made for the greatest and noblest Homage that Man-kind can pay unto God Man is brought to do the Most he can in a way most sutable to his Being as a Free and Rational Agent and yet to the highest Self-resignation and God has the Glory of all his Actings Never such Sanctity and Conformity to the Divine Nature Never such willing and chosen Obedience Never such inward integrity and love to God nor such self-denyal for God as the Gospel produceth And yet men still depending upon Divine Assistance for all this The glory of the Whole redounds to God His goodness alone is magnified Man is so debased and God so exalted Man becomes so Happy in that Debasement and God so Glorious and both in a way so suitable to the Creator of all things and a Creature Indeed the Righteousness of Man is introduced in such a Subordination to the Righteousness of God as fills us with the highest Admiration and could never have been the effect of any Human Projection The manner also by which the Scriptures have introduced the full and perfect discovery of Christ from the beginning is such the design of it appears so to be laid as evidently points us to God The whole Scriptures even the difficultest parts of them seem in a wonderful way to issue and unravel themselves into Christ as their great and common End If we dissect the Bible and rip up the Entrails of both Testaments after how excellent a manner does Christ appear to be the great Soul of the Whole And how strange and prodigious a vein of Divine Wisdom do we perceive running throughout all the Parts relating to Him What a curious piece of Divine Skill to any considering Mind is the Scripture-Method of revealing our Saviour In what peculiar unthought-of yet strangely proper and agreeable Expressions is he promised In what deeply Mysterious yet fully significant Types and Shadows represented What a dark and obscure yet lively and compleat Image was drawn of him under the Law With what un-imaginable variety of Predictions and Prophesies was he foretold And with what a strange concurrence of all parts of the Old Testament was Christ brought forth in the New The New Testament is such a Counterpart of the Old and the Old such a Justification of the New and between both there appears such a harmony resulting from such a strange variety about this Matter as none but God himself could ever have tun'd them into And indeed the whole of this business both for Matter and Manner appears an eminent effect of divine Wisdom and cannot be ascribed to any other cause Secondly We find the Laws contained in this Book to be of such a nature that they reach the Inside as well as the Outside of all Man-kind Pierce into the Secrets of every Man 's own Breast govern a Man 's most retired Thoughts speak with absolute Authority to the Grounds and Principles the Design and Tendency of all mens Actions And this seems much to evidence their Divinity Who but God himself can exercise a Dominion over the Mind speak to the Heart and judge of the first and invisible risings of disobedience there Two things upon this account are very considerable from what we find in this Book First That 't is throughout equally directed to the mind and to the thoughts of men as well as their outward Actings Forbids inward coveting and lusting upon the same penalty that it does the grossest Practice of evil This as 't was never done in any Heathen Laws so 't were absurd for any Humane Authority to attempt it because things of that nature are onely connizable by an Infinite Knowledge Secondly This Book does not only pretend to an invisible dominion in that kind But it makes such a discovery to us of the inside of the World speaks so exactly to what we find within our selves does so effectually command us has such a justification from every man 's own Breast that we cannot but reasonably suppose that God himself was the Author of it Who but He that perfectly knows what is in Man could have encompassed him round with such a Law A Law that divides between the Soul and the Spirit and is a discerner of the Thoughts of the Heart Who but He could have given such an exact Rule to the manifold Thoughts and Inventions of Men There 's not a private Closet in any Man's Soul into which the force of this Law does not some way or other extend it self There 's not a Mental Case can happen that 's left undetermined but falls under some Regulation or other from this Book In short Here 's a Book that tells us the Good and Evil of all our Thoughts becomes a perfect Law to our Inward parts punctually speaks to all that 's in our Hearts Nay tells us more than we before knew of our selves and yet find to be true Is not this likely to be the Voice of God None but he that made us that sees within us and from a Supream Soveraignty over us judges upon the Whole that belongs to us can we reasonably imagine could have promulg'd such a Law Thirdly The design and tendency of this Book and the influence it hath upon Humane Life does greatly perswade us that 't is from God and can have no other Author The evident tendency of it is to
Truths are visibly concenter'd in it Here is indeed a perfect Rendesvouz of all such Truths as were any where scattered and the World imperfectly has had and all such as they were in need to have All such natural Truths both of a Moral and Divine Nature as the Reason of the World does acknowledge and a full discovery of all such supernatural Truths as the minds of men naturally pursue and are inquisitive after Whatever is written in mans heart or upon the Works that God has made is here after an excellent manner Transscribed Justified and Improved And many defects of natural Knowledge supernaturally supplyed by a most suitable Revelation So that if we'lâ— judge of this Book either by what we certainly do know or by what we need and desire to know and expect should be revealed to us concerning God our selves and this whole World We shall find great reason to derive this Book from Above and subscribe to it as Divine For the First Never any Book contained such a System of natural Truth since the World began nor ever so far interpreted to us what truly is so And of this every mans own Reason becomes a proper and competent Judge Secondly Never any Book has told us so much nor gone so far to fix the restless minds of men about all such supernatural things as they are most inquisitive after 'T is here we have a certain account of God's Nature and the manner of his Existence how and when he created the World With what Designs and to what Ends he disposes and governs it Whence all our disorder first came How 't is to be cured Sin removed and Man reconciled to God! 'T is here we are certainly assured of the Resurrection of our Bodies the Immortality of our Souls and the condition of our future being for ever 'T is here we know all we can know and all we need to know both of this World and the next From no other but God himself could such a Beam of Light have broke forth so to enlighten the World Nor will it seem any way tolerable to an unprejudiced Judgment to father such a Book upon the highest principle of Falshood and derive it from the worst design that ever the World was defiled with Secondly I shall endeavour to shew that this Book so far as it relates to matters of Fact wherein an Etxernal justification is necessary is so far witnessed unto that there can be no room left for any reasonable doubt to be made about it First That there was such a man as Moses and such a People as the Jews in Egypt in those times which the Scripture mentions That Moses was their Leader and that he led them out of Egypt wrote their Story and gave Laws to them we have attested to us by the most Ancient Records of the Egyptians the Phenicians the Caldeans and the Grecians By Sanchomathon the famous Phenician Antiquary Berosus a Caldean Ptolomeus and Manetho Writers of the Egyptian-Chronicles The latter of whom Manetho speaks very particularly both of the Jews coming into Egypt and their departure thence And amongst the Grecian Writers by Artapanus Polemo Eupolemus Diodorus Siculus with many others as is at large proved by Josephus in his first Book against Appoin And one of these Artapanus is so large in his Relation of the Story of Moses that he sets down much of the business of his whole life and many of his Miracles his contesting with the Magicians before the King of Egypt his carrying the Jewâ— thorow the Red Sea and the drowning of the Egyptians who pursued them his dwelling with the Jews after in the Wilderness Who were there says he fed with a certain Snow that God rained from Heaven And at last describes particularly the very Person of Moses and sets down his Stature his Countenance and his Complexion Many of the same things are Recorded by Eupolemus Demetrius and others Numemus a Pythogorean-Philosopher whom we find quoted in Origens's fourth Book against Celsus tells us he had read the Life of Moses in many good Histories And relates many particulars of him as his being taken out of the Water his being bred up in the Court that he wrought many Miracles and that certain Magicians called Jannes and Jambres attempted to do the like No one Story amongst the Heathen of any Nation has been so witnessed unto by Writers Forraign to that Nation as the History of the Jews has been who from their greatest enemies have received a sufficient Testimony in point of Fact to the truth of Moses and what he wrote And indeed considering how great and eminent a Common-wealth was at first first established by the Writings of Moses and what a notorious and visible conâ—mâ—â—nce and succession there was of it ' Tiâ— Morally impossible that the business of Moses and his Writing in those times in matter of Fact should be fictitious and false Of so much of the History written by Moses as relates to things transacted before the Flood we cannot expect to find any exact and punctual account in a Traditional way Because of the great disadvantage of Oral Tradition especially by the confusion of Babel And yet 't is very evident that some considerable Remainders of the Ancient Story of the first World about the Creation the long lives of men in those first times and divers other things were preserved amongst the several Nations after the dispersion at Babel And we find many things relating thereto in Hermes Orpheus Homer Hesiond and the most Primitive Writers Of which Vossius Bochartus and many others have given a very satisfying account Concerning the Flood that there was such a Deluge nothing has been more universally credited And because the Tradition of it was That it befel in the prime time of the World and men were generally ignorant of the right account of times Therefore they applyed it still to that time they thought most ancient So the Thebans to the times of Ogyges and the Thessalians to the time of Deucalion which Floods of Ogyges and Deucalion were not two other distinct Floods as some have supposed but the same Flood of Noah applyed to those times and called by those Names which they thought of greatest Antiquity One sayes well What Nation has not believed it Even amongst the remotest Indians we find the Tradition of it has remained And what Author has not spoken of it Amongst the Egyptians Phenicians Grecians and Romans nothing more common And well may we suppose it should be so For Those who attempted the rearing of that Structure at Babel had probably a particular respect in what they did to the Flood that was past resolving to prevent the danger of another which sprang from their own Infidelity For God by his Promise to Noah had secured them against all fears of that kind and therefore had sufficient occasion wheresoever they came to preserve and continue the memory of it Berosus one of the most antient Writers after
the Sun upon the Crucifixion of our Saviour which considering the Position of the Moon at that time it being the time of the Jews Passeover must needs be judged to be prodigiously supernatural was mentioned in many Heathen Writers which Eusebius sayes he himself had read Both Eusebius in his Chronology and Origen in his second Book against Celsus tell us That Phlegon Trallianus who lived in the time of Adrian in the thirteenth Book of his Chronicles wrote of this Eclipse and sayes That in the fourth year of the two hundred and tenth Olympiâ—d there was the greatest Eclipse of thâ—â—an that ever was beheld and withal a strange Earth-quake And that year was exactly the eighteenth year of Tiberius in which our Saviour suffered And 't is certain by what we find in Tertullians â—â—â—loâ—y and other of the Christian Writâ—rs in those first Ages that this and divers other Passages that relate to the Stoâ—â— of the Gospel were in those times Reâ—â—red amongst the Romans For they ofâ—en appeal to their own Records to â—â—ove the truth of this and many other particulars Justin Martyr in his Apology to the Emperor Antoninus which â—e wrote but fifty years after the death of St. John perswading the Emperor to the belief of our Saviours Miracles refers him to the Acts of Pontius Pilate then Registred at Rome 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That our Saviour says he did these things you may learn from the Registers of the Acts done under Pontius Pilate Josephus who was born about five or six years after our Saviours suffering and survived the Reigns of both the Vâ—spatians relates much of the New Testament Story of John the Baptist of his Holy Life and also of his Death Tells us of Herod and gives a large and particular account of his strange and remarkable Death of Pilate of Festus Foelix Gamaliel and others Indeed neither Jews nor Heathens did ever in those times contradict or deny any matter of Fact that relates to the New Testament Story judging it certain beyond all denial Julian himself admits the Fact of Christ and his Miracles and plainly acknowledges the Books of the New Testament were written in those Times and by those very Men whose names they bear That we have no fuller and exacter an Account of Christ and the Affairs of Judea in his time in the Roman Story is not to be much wonder'd at if we consider the peaceable Posture that Country was then in News which best pleased the Romans from any of their Provinces and wherein they were mostly concern'd Tacitus observes that Judea was most quiet in the Reign of Tâ—berius as well it might All that our Saviour and his Followers did tending highly to Peace and Subjection Now We find that the Roman-Writers chiefly applyed themselves to write of some famous Wars the suppression of some eminent Mutinies or some such Accidents as in their Issue redounded much to the Roman-glory The peaceable condition of any Province usually shortned their Relation of it and therefore neither of the Jews not of the Christians in that Age have they vouchsafed to say much Nor did the Christians at any time such was their peaceable and submissive behaviour give Historians occasion to mention much more of them than their patient sufferings But in the after-times of Vâ—spatian Trajan Adrian when the Roman-Sword was drawn against the Jews and there were great Mutinies Rebellions and Wars amongst them the Roman-Historians have left us an ample Relation of all those Affairs Two things there are of great eminency in themselves and of most publick Nature contained in the Bible the Fact of which have had such signal justification as does greatly establish the Truth of the Whole and to which a very peculiar Remark is due The one is the History of the Flood in the Old Testament and and the re-peopling of the World after it by the Posterity of Noah The other is those Prophetical Predictions of the Destruction of Jerusalem of the ruine of the Temple and the Afflictions and Sufferings of the Jews uttered by our Saviour in the New For the first That there was such a Flood Nothing I have shewed has had a more universal Belief That the Earth according to the History of Moses was again re-peopled by the Posterity of Noah and that the Nations were divided in the Earth from his three Sons and their Issue as Moses tells us we have from the Records of all Nations and the consent of all History abundant cause to believe And that upon this three-fold account First We find that in those Eastern Parts where Noah and his Family are said first to land and settle themselves after the Deluge the Grandure of the World first began of which the Greatness and Splendor of the Assyrian-Empire is a sufficient Instance Those Eastern Countries arriving to much state and pomp and to much greatness in Dominion and Government long before either in Greece Italy or any of the Western Parts any such thing was attained to or known Which evidently shews that the Inhabitants of those Countries were the First-born and Heirs of the World who had the great Court and Metropolis amongst them and that other Nations were of the Younger House and Colonies of a Latter Edition Secondly The earliness of Learning of Art Sciences and Inventions amongst â—he Assyrians Chaldaeâ—ns and Egyptians before they so much as budded forth or appeated in other Conntries does argue That those parts were first inhabited That they were the eldest Possessors oâ— the World had been longest in it werâ— of greatest Experience and that otheâ— Nations People were gradually deriveâ— and planted from those Countries anâ— the Inhabitants of that part of the World Thirdly We find that those in honour of whom the Nations received their first Names were the Posterity of Noah that Moses tells us of From Japhet most probably the Eldest Son of Noaâ— called by Hesiod and others of the most anâ—ient Writers Japitos and his Posterito Japeâ—â—onides came the Gomerians or â—ymbrians from his Son Gomer the Magogims from Magog the Medes or Madians from Madus the Jones after called Graeâ—â—ns from Javan in Greek Jovan and so from the Posterity of the other two The Canaanites from Canaan the Sabaeâ—ns from Seba which the Grecians write Saba the Philistims from Palesthim the Thracians from Thyras the Sidonâ—ans from Sidon the Egyptians from the Posterity of Cham Egypt being called Mizraim from Mizraim one of his Sons Mizraim in Hebrew being the name of Egypt and antiently even to the time of Josephus the Egyptians he sayes were called Chuseans from Cush or Chus the eldest Son of Cham And so throughout all the chiefest parts of the Earth we find the several Nations by their antient denominations to be originally descended from that Posterity of Noab set down in the tenth of Genesis Sems Posterity appear to have been the Planters of Asia Chams of Africa and Japhets of most part of Europe with Asia the Less
of Imposture Nor is it any way reasonable to think That such who designed to Personate the Holy Ghost in writing a Book should chuse to compose it in such a prophetick way and so positively and plainly deliver themselves about so many future events Indeed about most of the great things that have come to pass amongst Man-kind For the first miscarriage in that kind a palpable mistake in any one particular must needs ruine the credit of the Whole No man can believe that God can lie or that an Infinite Knowledge can ever give a wrong Divination about what is to come He therefore that personates the Holy Ghost in such a foreknowledge of things must be sure never to miss or else resolve to take the shame of his own Imposture That in the Heathen-World there have been great pretentions to a fore-knowledge of things is not to be doubted But upon very different terms to what we find of that kind in the Bible First Many things pretended to therein in a prophetical way were such as might humanely be fore-seen and were only the regular Consequents of some natural and then extant though more remote and less visible Causes The first Discoverers of many secret workings in Nature might upon that account have soon arrived to a great prophetical Credit Thales who first amongst the Heathens foresaw an Eclipse of the Sun might easily have passed for an eminent Prophet before the knowledge of its natural cause grew common 2dly The Heathen Predictions were generally clothed with Expressions so enigmatical and so unintelligible as in truth render'd them Problems rather than Prophesies They seemed to be framed more to confound and amuse than to inform or satisfie and to be chiefly calculated to abuse the weaker part of the World who are apt to adore what they least understand and to suppose some extraordinary Matter to be wrapt up in all such clouded Expressions According to that of Lucretius Omnia enim stolidi magis admirantut amantque Inversis quae sub verbis latitantia cernunt Thirdly Their oraculous Divinations of future things were for the most part so delivered that they had divers Aspects carryed in them divers intricate Senses manifold Ambiguities And to secure their Credit were made capable of divers and those contrary Interpretations Which made the Heathens themselves call their great Oracle at Delphos 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Thwarter or Crooked-speaker Fourthly Many of their plainest and most intelligible Predictions have been consequently found to be false and mistaken and others of them have had a direct tendency to a perfect subversion of their own Religion and to establish the truth of the Bible so 't was when the Oracle of Apollo which we find repeated by Porphiry declared that All other Godds were but Airy Spirits and that the God of the Hebrews was alone to be worshipped Which Direction had it been followed had put a final end to all their own Religion So 't was when the Sybills prophesied so fully of the coming of Christ which we find repeated out of their Works in the 4th Eglogue of Virgil. We deny not but that for some secret and to us unknown ends God who as the Heathens generally acknowledge could onely do it for they still ascribed it even Porphiry himself unto their Godds might and did sometimes reveal some future events which no other way could be known as he did the death of Saul and his Son at Endor to the Devil or to others which they might communicate But nothing that ever was extant in that kind can be any way put in ballance with that Prophetick Spirit we find in the Bible 'T is much in this case as 't was in the business of Miracles The Heathen-world were filled with Pretensions both wayes Some of them real and true but most generally fictitious and false And when true both the Miracles and the Prophesies from whence we derive a proof of the Bible have been so differently circumstanced and there is such a superior eminency and lustre in the one as renders the other no Objection at all in this case Here we have clear plain and positive predictions of most of the greatest things that have happened Predictions of such things as could have no dependance upon any natural cause then extant when they were made Such as must needs have their rise from the unbounded Will of God or the free choice of men A multitude of such Predictions with marvalous variety and great exactness and particularity concerning Persons and Things in all Ages and throughout a constant and un-erring Success without a Failure in a Tittle And the accomplishment and truth of the most of them recorded in the general Story of the World Who but God himself can we suppose could pronounce with such a positive certainty upon all future events Not to foretell once or a second time what shall be here or there but to speak with a positive prophetick determination about all the Great Things that were to happen and write of the future state of the World as men write Histories of Ages past And to have things alwayes rightly come to pass Never to mistake Constantly to give right Divination This is singly the property of God Nor can any other be reasonably though the Author of such a Prophetical Book but He that grasps all Ages with an Infinite Knowledge spans all Times and Seasons from whom nothing can be concealed and who with the saine Infinite Eye equally beholds all things past present and to come To conclude this Matter If the supposition of some Revelation in the general be reasonable If it be not fit to believe that God should wholly leave the World to the conduct of Nature which hath been largely made to appear If then we find a Book that is of all others the most Ancient contains the most Primitive notions of things and from which the earlyest Authors as from the great Fountain and Spring-head of all Divine Learning and Knowledge appear to have drawn out much of what they have writ That gives us the most punctual account of the Worlds Original With an exact Historical Narrative of all the great Successive Revolutions of it long before any other Writers were extant with such an adjustment of Times all along that without it no certain Knowledge can be attain'd in Chronology and the study of it would become more intricate than a Labyrinth If we find a Book written by several Men of several Qualities Conditions and Interests in several distant Ages with wonderful variety both for Matter and Manner promoting by an unparallel'd agreement with it self one and the same Design and that the most excellent in the judgment of every mans own Reason that can descend from Heaven or be embraced by men terminating all in the Glory of God and Man's utmost Happiness A Book leading us to the farthest confines of all natural Truths our own Reasons comprehend and approve and revealing such supernatural Truths to
in Palestine nor understood by any but the dispersed Hellenists And so were no way likely to be sent from the Holy Ghost to that Church who never owned any Scripture for Canonical but what was in Hebrew a Language peculiar to them And the Bibles they constantly used till our Saviours time in their Synagogues were all in Hebrew Thirdly There is in most of these Books some eminent discovery of their own Humane Extraction As in the second of Macc. 2.24 The Author of that Book whoever he were tells us that he had borrowed what he wrote out of Jason of Cyrene and contracted five Books of his into one Volumn And so what he there wrote he is so far from fathering it on the Holy Ghost or any Dictates of his that he plainly confesseth 't was none of his own but the bare Epitomy of another mans Writings and desires to be excused if he had not done it well And 't is most notoriously evident to every common Reader that many of these Books contain such ridiculous Stories and gross Absurdities that without high impiety and great contradiction to all those Natural Notions we have of God they cannot be imputed to the Holy Ghost as their Author Fourthly These Books were never received by the Church of the Jews into their Canon nor are to this day And so during the times of the Old Testament were never received by any Church for there was then no other which is most absurd to conceive of any parts of God's Written and Supream Laws As also that the Jews to whom in a most peculiar way the Oracles of God were committed and who had the custody of all God's Sacred Records and were as St. Austin calls them God's the Churches great Library-Keepers should so notoriously err as to reject for not to receive into their Canon is to reject so great a part of the Bible 'T is somewhat strange that those of the Roman Church with whom chiefly we contest in this Matter and who annex to the Church an infallible Judgement should imagine the Church of the Jews to fall into so great and gross a mistake in so fundamental a matter That the Jewish Church never heretofore received these Apocryphal Books into their Canon nor do to this day is a thing that with the least colour of Reason cannot be denyed That they do not to this day is known all the World over wheresoever the Jews are And their Bibles are to be seen That the Ancient Church of the Jews before the times of our Saviour had no other Books within their Canon than those we now have is evident from the testimony of Josephus in his first Book against Appion who there tâ—lls us what Books the Jews reckoned Canonical and sayes They are onely twenty two in number according to the number of Letters in their Alphabet and reckons those very Books we now receive as onely Canonical Other Books he sayes there were written after the Captivity but they were never numbred with the Sacred Records Origen St. Jerome and many other of the Christian Writers have largely proved the same Those of the Roman Church who have turn'd every Stone to ease themselves from the dint of this Argument have found no other countenance that ever these Books received from the Jews to make us suppose they received them into their Canon but that in some places some few of the Hellenist Jews that lived remote from Palestine had annexed some of these Books to their Septuagint Bibles But such Hellenists themselves had any esteem of them as Canonical Writings Nor can it any more be proved from thence that they had than it can That we in England receive them into our Canon because they are bound up with some of our Bibles And never were any of these Books annexed to the Hobrew-Bibles used at Jerusalem and in Palestine nor were any of them ever read or admitted into their Synagogues there In truth This matter in point of Fact is so notorious and evident that Bellarmine himself makes an ingenuous confession of it and sayes plainly Hos omnes Libros speaking of these Apocryphal Books ad unum rejici ab Hebraeis That every one of these Books were rected by the Church of the Jews Contr. 1. lib. 1. ch 10. And confirms the same out of St. Jerome And if so we have then not only the judgment of the Judaical Church in this case which is singly sufficient For 't were a ridiculous contradiction to make any Books part of the Old Testament now which were not so received then But we have also a more infallible determination For our Saviour and the Apostles fully and constantly approved the Old Testament as the Jews were then possessed of it 'T were absurd to suppose that our Saviour should with so much exactness reduce all to the Rule of the Scripture and yet tacitly approve and silently pass over so great a mistake about the Rule it self Our Saviour directs the Jews to search the Scriptures as they then had them as being perfect and compleat Appeals to their own Bibles upon all occasions in his own defence Expounded Moses the Psalms and the Prophets as those to whom he spake were acquainted with them and as they were then extant Nay he himself read and preached in their Synagogues out of the Scriptures as he there found them and as they were there publickly used And no man can soberly imagine that our Saviour would go about to instruct the People out of any false and imperfect Rule The Apostles likewise upon all occasions made use of the Old Testament as they found the Jews possessed of it Nor have we the least intimation that the Jews were either mistaken in the number of those Books they received or that the least alteration had been made in those Books since the times wherein they were first written And 't is as evident that the Old Tement as the Jews then had it and as our Saviour and the Apostles approved it descended down to the Christian Church and was constantly so received The Primitive Writers agree universally in it Cyprian Epiphanius Athanasius Nazianzen all bear witness to it Cyril Bishop of Jerusalem after he has reckoned up to his Catechumini the 22 Books of the Old Testament we now receive adds Hos lege viginti duos Cum Apocryphis nil habe negotii Catechis 4. Read these two and twenty Books But meddle not with the Apocrypha Origen quoted for it at large by Eusebius in his History reckons up the very same twenty two Books for the Canonical parts of the Old Testament And so does St. Jerome and expresly reckons the other Apocryphal The same we find in Russinus who sayes The Apocryphal Books they never antiently called Libros Canonicos but Ecclesiasticos And the first Council we read of that entred into a consideration of this Matter which was that of Laodicea about the year 364. in their 59 Canon declare the Canonical Books of the
Old Testament to be the very same and no other then those we now receive Nor were these Apocryphal Books ever otherwise reckoned either in the Jewish or Christian Church than as humane and fallible Writings till the late Assembly at Trent were pleased to declare them otherwise These things must needs seem sufficient to any reasonable man to clear up that doubt on the one hand Whether we have not less in our Bibles than we indeed ought to have Because that besides what the Roman Church hath of late done to Canonize these Apochryphal Writings no other addition to the Bible has been at any time attempted that merits the least consideration I proceed to the doubt on the other hand And that is How we may be reasonably secured that our Bibles contains in them no more then they should That is upon what ground we receive some Books in the New Testament The Epistle to the Hebrews the Epistle of St. James the second Epistle of St. Peter the Epistle of Jude the 2 and 3 Epistles of John and the Apocalyps Of all which there has formerly been some doubt made In the solution of which I shall endeavour these two things First To shew what were most probably the first and original grounds of such Doubts And secondly To shew that those doubts then ought to be of no prevalency with us now And that there is at this time no good reason to make the least doubt of any part of the New Testament as we are now in possession of it All the Doubts that have arisen about any parts of the New Testament were most probably these two wayes occasioned First 'T is obvious that the New Testament was writ in several parts at several times and not all composed together The Whole became not publick but by many steps and degrees Had several former and latter Editions That is some parts that were first writ were copyed out by those that had the Originals and con-joyn'd and so dispers'd And other parts still added as they were written and became publick Now 't is easie to conceive that some parts that were after added to such Bibles as first came out might be at first questioned and doubted of by such who had the former Editions and were not fully informed about the after Addition of other parts And so it has fallen out in the publication of most Systemes of Humane Laws that have come out gradually and by parts and not in a full and intire Body at once Secondly 'T is very probable that many Christians that lived in those first Times by reason of their distance from those places where some parts of the New Testament first became publick might be for a considerable time it may be till after the deaths of their Authors without any notice of them And upon that account some doubts about such parts might arise because they â—ad come to their knowledge no sooner especially if any such parts seemed to â—avour or countenance any particular Sect or Opinion as the Epistle to the Hebrews did that of the Novations and the Apoâ—alyps that of the Chiliasts And this is most likely to be the true reason why some of the Epistles and we know 't was about the Epistles that the doubts chiefly were were at any time questioned especially such as were more remotely and uncertainly directed to the scattered Jews as that of St. James that to the Hebrews and that of St. Peter which were no way likely to be so soon or so commonly known to the generality of Christians Nor could they be so easie to come by as those Epistles sent to Rome Corinth and Ephesus and those great and publick Cities from whence the fame of them would soon spread and Copies were upon much easier terms to be had because 't was certainly known where the Originals were Secondly There is no good Reason from any Question that was made heretofore to raise any Doubts now about any Parts of the New-Testament And that for these three Reasons First Because these Books in question were most generally received at first and doubted of only by some and those such who had least information about them And this is very evident Because we find them frequently quoted as Canonical Scripture by many of the most ancient Christian-Writers in those Ages next the Apostles Tertullian except the second Epistle of St. Peter hath in his Works quoted as Canonical Scripture every Book of the New-Testament we now receive And St. Ierome speaking in his Epistle ad Dardanâ—m of the Epistle to the Hebâ—ews and some other of those Books about which we now discourse sayes We receive them not from the Custom of this Time but from the Authority of the most Primitive Writers Secondly They contain nothing in them but what does plainly harmonize with the rest of the Bible and is generally witnessed unto by other Books about which no question hath been at any time made And of this there can be no doubt unless it be concerning the Revelation which yet contains a most Admirable though Mysterious Agreement with the Books of Moses the Prophecies of Ezekiel and Daniel and divers other parts of the Bible And to this Book besides that the suitableness of Events thereunto and the notorious fulfilling of many Prophetical passages in it has put its Divine Authority out of all question we have as great a Testimony from Antiquity as can in such a case well be expected Justin Martyr who lived very near the Apostle John himself in his Dialogue with Tryphon cites it as the Writing of St. Iohn and without the least question ascribes it to him Irenaeus who lived some small time after Justin and was the Scholar of Polycarp who was the Scholar of St. Iohn sayes positively 'T was written by St. Iohn the Apostle And that he was well assured thereof from some most probably Polycarp that had seen the Apostle Iohn himself and personally conversed with him Lib. 4. cap. 37. and Lib. 5. And â—ertullian in his 4th Book against Marcion sayes Though Marcion did reject the Apocalyps as none of St. John 's yet sayes he the succession of Bishops tracod to the beginning will establish Him as the certain and undoubted Author of it Thirdly God has in a providential way determined this matter For those that at first questioned those Books when the heat of primitive Persecutions were somewhat abated the Church had free intercourse and communication together and came to be better informed received them All doubts about them are now vanished Luthur and some with him in Germany who were the last that revived any doubts of that kind upon second and more deliberate thoughts recanted their Error All Christians are now at an Agreement about them the Supreamest Establishment that can be of Canonical-Authority even the Roman Church themselves receive the Apocalyps into their Canon although many passages in it seem very particularly directed against them Indeed the heavenly lustre of these Books is
in such a Succession Established upon the Authority of this Book ought ever to be admitted without very positive Proof Especially when we have such apparent Reasons to believe the contrary By Whom is it I ask that the Bible could be corrupted It must have been either by Jews Pagans or Hereticks 'T is plain the Jews have not done it for we find multitudes of Texts that give in a daily witness against them which doubtless had they attempted the Bible in such a way they would never have suffered so to remain upon Record against them No part of the Pagan World can be reasonably thought to have done it for the Scriptures contain such an eminent Revelation of the One true God and his Worship as puts an end to all Heathenish vanities and at once dispatches all False gods out of the world Nor have Hereticks done it for 't is this Sword of the Spirit the Written Word of God that upon all occasions mortally wounds them the Scriptures have slain their thousands and their ten thousands in this kind 'T is the purity of the Scriptures in asserting the Orthodox Truths of Religion that has in all Ages kept up the Christian Verity and still brought all sorts of Hereticks to an open shame It has been the Wresting or Perverting not the Corrupting of Scripture from whence all Heresies have chiefly arisen and the native and genuine Sense of the Bible has still proved their Ruine Nor is there upon the whole of this matter any tolerable Reason to Doubt but that as God was pleased by his special Providence to Secure the Old Testament which we are sure he did and preserve it intire till the time of our Saviour so by the same Providence he has secured the Old and the New since and delivered them over to the Church in these latter Ages without any considerable variation from what they were when they were first written And this ought to be duely considered as an eminent help towards a rational Satisfaction in this point That the very same Objections which some men now please themselves with against the New Testament the Old Testament was equally lyable to in the times of our Saviour and the Apostles For after Esdras's time the Old Testament came into no Infallible bands till the times of the Gospel was conveyed by fallible means through many Ages down to those times had the same possibilities of Alteration then that the New Testament has now Various Lections also in the Hebrew copies were then extant And yet for all this the Scriptures of the Old Testament were then pure and intire Nor does our Saviour or the Apostoles mention the least defect that was then in them Nor was there in those eminent times of Reformation the least Question or doubt ever raised upon any such account One grand Objection is usually made upon the whole of this matter and 't is thus framed All these Arguments brought either to prove the Bible in general or to answer such particolar doubts as arise about it are built say some upon no better foundation then Huâ—anâ— and in themselves fallible grounds And if so we still embrace our Religion but upon uncertain terms can never from chance arrive at any positive and absolute assurance nor come to such a Divine and Infallible faith as we ought to have in this case In answering to this Objection this must be acknowledged that although the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament were at first Penned by the infallible guidance of the Holy Ghost yet the manner of their Conveyance to future Ages has been by Humane and in themselves fallible means The Grounds and Reasons of which disposal of God though we cannot pretend fully to reach yet we are thus far informed First the Scriptures could not have been by means in themselves absolutely infallible handed down to all Places and Ages without the visible continuance and constant exertion of such a supernatural and extraordinary Power as would have wholly inverted that course we find God most generally takes in his Rule and dispose of the World Secondly it would have prevented all that case and industry God intended to exercise his Church withall to their great advantage in the exact preservation of these sacred Records Thirdly there had been no room for a belief of not occasion for a dependance upon that Wisdom and Power God has expressed and wherein he has greatly honoured himself in an over-ruling disposal of ordinary means to such extraordinary Ends who has providentially secured this Book through all the several Channels of Humane conveyance This Objection is much urged First by those of the Roman Church on the one hand to convince us of the great uncertainty of our own profession and the stability of theirs And Secondly by men of Sceptical Principles on the other hand either to fright or perswade us or both out of all Religion by telling us There is no positive or absolute certainty in the grounds of any How serviceable this Objection though it has filled the World with great noise and clamour as it has been pressed both ways will prove to either of these designs and indeed with how great absurdity t is managed in order to both will be soon made to appear All belief of things Divine in an ordinary way I speak not of such Divine illumination as God may particularly vouchsafe to any â—ust of necessity be ultimately resolved into that we call Rational and Moral assurance for when we speak most properly of Divine faith we mean such a faith as is built upon a Divine Testimony not denominating it from the Object of it nor from the Effect of it which is less proper but from the Foundation and Ground of it Now Divine faith in that best and truest sense of it will be reduced into no more then a Moral a ssurance at last for if I say my faith is Divine because built upon a Divine Testimony 't is in some sense true But if I am asked by what means I came to know that Testimony to be Divine That question must needs bring me back to a Moral assurance as the ground of all my previous belief about that Divine Testimony it self that it really is so Whatsoever Revelation God makes of his mind to me I must needs without Divine assistance receive it upon Humane and in themselves fallible terms and so judge of it as I judg of all other things No man can receive my Revelation from God with a faith a Divine and infallible as the Revelation is in it self unless there be an equal inspiration in both cases and God make men as infallible in Judging of Revelation when proposed as he made the Instruments of it in the Act of its Conveyance The plain Question in this Case is how I come to receive all other things into my belief that are Objects of belief It must be confessed upon the grounds of Rational credibility and Moral assurance and therefore upon the
may serve in some measure to manifest the vanity of all pretensions to an Infalible belief without a Divine and Infalible assistance of revealed and supernatural Truths and the Mistakes of such who suppose we can never be settled in any Points of Religion without it And may sufficiently justify an indeavour to make a Rational proof of the Scriptures without a pretence to any such Divine and Infalible Judgment about them If so much be urged for the Proof of the Bible in general and in Answer to particular Doubts relating to the manner of its conveyance as will amount to a rational assurance and satisfaction 'T is all we can have without Inspiration and all we ought to Expect in this case All we pretend to from attempts of this nature is but a Moral assurance that this Book was at first written by Gods direction and that those Copies we now have of it are without any designed corruption or other variation from the first Originals then what humane frailty in the Transcribing of them has occasioned descended down to us and that in all such places where we find various readings the true Sense of the place and the original Dictates of the Holy Ghost are amongst them all safely preserved and by a diligent search may be discovered And upon the same Grounds of Moral Assurance are men in point of Translations and all such who are Illiterate For as we can be without extraordinary assistance but Morally certain that the Bible was Originally Written by a divine direction and that those Copies we now have of it in the Original Languages were at first Rightly transcribed and have not been since corrupted or changed so men may be also Morally Certain about a Translation For 't is in it self a thing very possible to be that the Scriptures may out of their own Languages be truely and rightly translated and being so are of the same Divine Authority that they were before and upon circumstantial considerations men may come rationally and safety to conclude that they are so And indeed unless all men in an Age that understand the Original tongues should agree which is absurd to conceive and morally impossible to be to deceive and abuse those that do not no Designed abuse nor any palpable falshood can be imposed upon men that way And in like manner persons Illiterate may be Morally Certain that they are no way deceived when the Scriptures are Preached or Read to them The Ground of Assurance in all these cases is still the same the Difference is onely Gradual Those who understand the Original Languages are upon easier and nearer terms of Moral Assurance about them but in the other cases it may be also attained And in all cases God has providentially afforded means sufficient to secure any reasonable man about the Truth and Authority of his Word Fourthly How can we believe this Book say some to be from God when we find contained in it divers Contradictions Several strange and Incredible Stories and other things greatly liable to Exception This Objection though it looks with the most Threatning aspect has yet the least prevailing Influence is of all others the most Impotent has the least rational Vigour and when duely examined will prove least effectual to those bad Ends for which it is by any intended When men tell us in general of Contradictions they find in the Bible but come to no Distinct and positive Proof they do not in that case Object but Revile He that will give an Edge to such kind of Discourse must punctually Instance Wherein this book has asserted any One such thing as implies a direct Contradiction and is in its own Nature utterly Impossible to be or where any two things are affirmed and denyed so directly contrary to each other that they are wholly uncapable of any Reconciliation This task with some degree of Contempt we impose upon all Antiscriptural men And are very secure that all those seeming Contradictions that are to be found in the Bible do at last prove an eminent Testimony to its Divinity For first they are in their appearance so to be a great Instance that in the Writing of this Book there was no corrupt Design to Cajole or engage the opinions of men to it And Secondly upon a thorough 〈◊〉 due there appears in them all such a deep unthought of and admirable Concord without the least shew of any Designed Agreement and such a unanimous tendency towards the great End of the whole as greatly savours of Divine Council and such a Contrivance as we may reasonably expect to come from Above In the management of these kind of Weapons against the Bible we find none that have been at any time since more dexterous then heretofore were Celsus Juliâ—n Porphiry and Faustus the Manichee How mean their attempts were and how little Impression they made will appear by the Instance of some of their chiefest Objections in this kind First they Object against the Bible because we are told therein of divers Incredible things As that a Serpent should speak to Eve an Ass reprove his Master that the Sun should stand stâ—â—â— and a Woman be turned into Salt with many other things of the like nature That the Devil should speak in a Serpent or that God should open the mouth of an Ass can seem Impossible and so incredible to none that acknowledge such Superiour and Invisible Powers especially 't was absurd in Celsus and Julian and others of the Heathens so to Object because nothing was more commonly believed amongst them then Stories of this nature and 't is well known the Devil spake daily to them through Images Philostratus gives a large account how an Elm-tree spake to Apollonius Porphyrie tells us that a River saluted Pythagoras Julian himself and his Philosopher Maximus had oft heard the Devil speak with divers kinds of voices and therefore no such things could seem Impossible to them Nay Julian acknowledged a Possibility of the highest point in the Bible which is the Incarnation of the Deity and himself gave an instance of it in Esculapius whom he supposed to descend from Heaven and assume Humane Nature that he might instruct the World in the art of Physick 'T is in truth in it self a thing Childish and absurd to Object against the Bible for the relation of any such passages if the Being of God be once acknowledged 'T is true that no humane power can make the Sun stand still turn a Woman â—â—â—o Salt or effect any thing of such a nature and should the Scriptures ascribe any such things to any Humane Ability the Objection were well grounded but they are things possible and easy with God to effect and the fact of them when ascribed to Him of an easie belief Nor can any man reasonably Object against the Scriptures upon any such account that does not first deny the Actual Existence of God Secondly They tell us there are some things contained in the Scriptures
and by which were we possessed of them they would much more easily have been reconciled and understood The Jews were very curious and exact in the preservation of things of that Nature and good Reason they had so to be for amongst the Heathens want of Posterity might be supplied by Adoption but the Jews were obliged to a strict succession in Alliance and Kindred The whole of this matter is most judiciously discoursed of by the learned Grotius in his Annotatious upon these two Evangelists to which the exact disquisition of all the particulars being too large a task for this undertaking I fear not to refer any impartial Reader for a sufficient Answer to all that can be reasonably objected against the Bible from hence there being nothing contained in either of these two Genealogies that of St. Matthew and that of St. Luke that in the least implies any direct contradiction nor is there any such difference between them or between them and any other part of the Bible one of which must be punctually made good or else this Objection is of no force as appears wholly uncapable of any Reconciliation But on the contrary 'T is evident the Evangelists do after an admirable manner consist and agree with themselves Although in order to many excellent ends and to clear us all Doubts about our Saviours descent they differently account Which upon the forementioned Grounds can seem hard to none to conceive Fourthly They tell us There is much contained in the Bible that seems of too Mean and Low a nature to come from such a wise and Excellent Being as God and by no means fit to be Ascribed to Him Such are many Stories and many Similitudes and divers Expressions we find there On the one hand they reproch this Book for containing things too High to be Credited And on the other hand they object against it as containing many things too Mean to be Regarded In the one they impeach Gods Power and imply some things are too Great for him to Effect And by the other cast a contempt upon the highest effects of his Condescention and Goodness for nothing can more Savour of it then such a familiar way of conversing with Men 'T is true that the Scriptures have by divers Similitudes Resemblances and Allegories made the whole World and all we converse with some way or other Hieroglyphical to us of Divinity Have expressed somewhat of Religion to us by all Parts of the Creation and by the most common imployments of Humane life Then which nothing could make Religion look with a more Familiar aspect upon us nor render the Mysteries of it more easy to be embraced by all capacities Nor is any thing more likely to preserve the memory of things Supernatural and Divine in the minds of men then when they are expressed to them by such things with which they are sure to have a constant converse while they stay in this World Whatsoever we find in the Bible of this Kind stands sufficiently discharged from all Reasonable exception because 't is visibly but adjusting the Notions of Religion to the impotency of many capacities And of the meanest expressions either in Similitudes Allegories Metaphors or otherwise that we find in the Scriptures These two things must be acknowledged by which they are enough secured against all just and rational Contempt First That they are such as in their own nature are proper and apt to informe in all those Cases in which they are made use of And Secondly They all appear to have a direct tendency to instruct men in the Noblest and Sublimest Truths And are evidently Conducing to the Highest and most Excellent Attainments that Mankind are Capable of These and such like Objections have often faced the Bible But have given very little stop to its Progress Indeed all occasions given though by its worst Enemies for the Discussion of it have turn'd greatly to its Advantage and still made it appear less capable of any Just and Solid Exception The Bible is a Book that will endure Discourse The Deeper we search into all parts of it still the surer we are to find a Divine bottome 'T is true that the manner of its composure is suitable to its nature and end Savours altogether of the wisdome of another world 'T is evidently design'd to subvert all corrupt Interests and debase mens proud opinions of their own knowledge 'T is writ after a sort that seems peculiar to God and in no such way as Mankind use to treat one with another And therefore 't is no wonder if Some men both Object against it and Reproch it Divers things there are which in the Reading of this Book we are rationally obliged to Consider and by the due consideration whereof the Grounds of most mens exceptions would be removed First the Scriptures appear to be Designed as a General Store-house of Instruction and Satisfaction to all sorts of Capacities and Conditions to the end of the world And therefore it can be no very easie task upon good Grounds to condemn any Part either as Useless or Improper Secondly Many passages in the Scripture relate to things past and long since transacted of the circumstances of which we are not fully informed And many passages were accomodated to things then well known which we in these After-ages are ignorant of Others relate much to things future and to come The Wisdome and Excellency of which will not so fully appear till Hereafter And so we see it was in the Old Testament The use and Reason of many things then could not be so fully discern'd till explain'd and interpreted by the Gospel The Book of Ruth might then happly have been judged by some as an Impertinent Addition to the rest of the Bible But since the writing of the New we see what an excellent use there was of it to make good our Saviours natural discent in the flesh according to the promise He that saw no more then the Old Testament might have thought that Historical discourse of Melchisedâ—c that we find in Moses to be very defective mentioning so considerable a Transaction of so Great a Man in those early times of the world without giving any further account of him But now under the New we are informed how Eminent a Projection of Divine Wisdome was wrapt up in the seeming Imperfection of that Story and that the Eternal Generation of our Saviour in his Divinity in a strange and unthought off way was Represented and Figured thereby Thirdly Many parts of the Bible relate to the Customes and Laws of particular Places and Countreys Without the knowledg of which No man can be a Competent Judge of them In the Books of Esther Ezra and Nehemiah many things relate to the Customes and Laws of the Persians In the Prophets divers things are not to be understood without a reference to the Histories of several Countries to which they Relate In the New Testament many passages refer to the Laws and Customes