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
a Word that famous and venerable Senate in which the last of the Prophets were present all parts of the Old Testament being compleated and the whole Prophecy that God vouchsafed till the coming of the Messiah delivered applied themselves to the punctual Collection of the several parts together and securing the Original text against any corruption or alteration exactly setled the Canon of the Old Testament which the Jews kept punctually to till the times of our Saviour who fully approved the Scriptures as he then found the Jews in possession of them Secondly That any parts of the Bible or any Books dictated by the Holy Ghost are wholly Lost we utterly deny The affirmation of it is neither consisting with the notion of Divine providence in General nor can any particular proof be brought to make it good Those who insist upon this as Bellarmine and some of the Papists do thereby to gain an advantage to the Church when 't is put in ballance with the Bible And others with design by proving the Loss of any Part to invalidate the Authority of the Whole instance in the three thousand parables or proverbs of Solomon and a thousand and five songs spoken of 1 King 4.32 The Books of Nathan the Prophet and Gad the Seer mentioned in the second of Chronicles The Prophecy of Ahijah the Shilonite and the visions of Iddo or Addo the Seer spoken of in the 2 Chron. 9. and some others And under the New Testament an Epistle of St. Paul written as they suppose to the Laodicaeans mentioned Colos 4.16 Although very many of these Writings mentioned in the Old Testament seem to refer to other parts of Scripture contained in the Bible In particular 't is probable that Nathan and Gad wrote some parts of the Books of Samâ—â— and the Kings so much at least as concern's the Actions of David of which they were exactly knowing if they wrote not the whole Second Book of Samuel and the first of the Kings which some upon probable grounds supposes yet Admit all these were other writings then are now contained in any part of the Bible it will no way follow they were ever any part of Canonical Scripture When the Scripture mention's Books written by these or any other Men and relates historically to the matter oâ— them as St Paul sometimes quoted Heathâ— Authors Will that Infer They are parts of the Bible By no means Nay the very Writers of the Bible themselves such as David Solâ—mon and others of the Prophets might and without all doubt some of them did Write many things in an ordinary way that were True without any Divine or Infallible direction and which were never incorporated with the Bible and so says St. Austin in his 18th Book De civ Dei says be Those Prophet whom it pleased the Holy Spirit to inspire wrote some things as Men And those works we have 〈◊〉 in our Canon nor had the Jews in theirs and other things as from the mouth of God and these works are really Distinct Some being held their own as Men and some the Lords as speaking by them And therefore He that will prove from hence that any parts of the Bible are Lost must first be well assured that These are no parts of the Scriptures we are now possessed of and Secondly that admitting they are not That they were written by an Infallible Spirit and ence within the Canon Of which Latter we are well assâ—red the least proof cannot be made For the Jews were most faithful Preservers of those Oracles of God committed unto their change Nor were they ever so much as once blamed by Christ or the Apostles for any Miscarriage that way As for an Epistle supposed to be written by St. Paul under the New Testament to the Laodicaeons which is since Lost The supposition is frivolous and groundless For the words in the Greck are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And that from Laodicaea Which cannot be understood of an Epistle written by St. Paul to Laodicae but of one written from Laodicaea either to the Colossians themselves which they then had by them or else to St. Paul which he sent them and required them to read it as containing something expedient for them to know The mistaken opinion from this place of an Epistle from St. Paul to the Laodicâ—ans hath most probably arisen from the ill rendition in the Vulgar Latin where the words are rendered illa quae est Laodicentium But without any ground from the Original Catherinus confesseth that according to the opinion of Chrisostome and Oecumenius Non hic nominari Epistolam a Paulo scriptam ad Laodicenses sed ex co loco scriptam That here 's no mention of any Epistle written by St. Paul to the Laodicaeans but of some Epistle written from Laodicaea That there was anciently a Counterfeit Epistle that pretended to be written by St. Paul to the Laodicaeans which is since lost is most true But in those times wherein 't was extant it was universally Rejected as Spurious and known so to be St. Jerome speaks of it but says Abomnibus exploditur The second Councel of Nice in their sixth Canon say thus of it Inter Epistolas Pauli Apostoli quaedam fertur ad Laodicenses quam Patres nostri tanquam Alienam reprobaverunt Tertullian against Marcion and Theophilact both reject it with great contempt and say 't is Apostolico nomine planâ— indigna And Bellarmine himself though he had formerly affirmed there was such an Epistle which was certainly Lost Yet in the first Chapter of his Book which he calls his Recognition or After-view of his works Retracts it says he was mistaken and that there never was any such thing as such an Epistle written by St. Paul So that all the Insinuations of this kind that any parts of the Bible any Books written by a Divine inspiration have been at any time Lost out of the world appear to be very weakly and ill Grounded And in truth the foot steps of Divine providence have been eminently visible in Securing those Holy writings upon this threefold account From Destruction Addition and Alteration First No accidents of Time nor Designs of its worst Enemies have Totally obliterated the Whole or any Part. Secondly Though many have attempted to piece in and add to it false and counterfeit Fragments and some whole Gospels yet in defiance to all those Essays the Scriptures have remained intire and stood like a Rock Impenetrable No Spurious Writings have been able to incorporate with this holy Book Such who have gone about to forge Scripture have but made the Lustre of the Bible more Eminent and more evidently shewed us the difference of Gods reâ—ealing from Heaven and Mens counterfeiting upon Earth Mens writing by the strength of humane abilities and mens writing as they were moved thereunto by the Holy Ghost Thirdly From Alteration No man has been suffer'd notwithstanding all the attempts of Hereticks to that purpose to pollute or corrupt it All
such attempts have still been discovered and openly sham'd How many Hereticks have carryed about their own Confutation whilest they possessed this Book and yet have not been suffer'd to change or alter such passages as have been most Cogent against themselves The Bible passed through the Arian-world with all those plain Evidences it contains of the Divinity of our Saviour When Emperours Câ—uncils and indeed upon the matter the whole Christian-world wâ—â—etainted with that Heresie the Bible scapd the infection when the alteration of two or three plain texts would have done them more service then all the volumns they wrote in their own Defence And great designs were on foot that way yet they were still disappointed as is evident by what we find in St. Ambrose The Jews to this day need no other Confutation then their own Bible Moses and the Prophets in whom they trust are theiâ— greatest Accusers All sort of Hereticks to this day are possessed of the Bible as Uriaâ— was of Davids Letters to Joab which contained his own Ruine and as Goliaâ— was of hiâ— sword which served at last to cut off his own head Secondly The success and effect of this Book since its conveyance gives in a Signal and most undeniable Evidence to its Divinity If we consider the ways and means by which it has introduced it self and upon what terms the Religion contained in it has gained that reception we find it has had amongst Man-kind 'T is of admirable consideration that a Religion directly opposite to the whole corrupt interest of humane Nature and calling men to the highest Mortification and Self-denial upon the account of an Invisible World to come nakedly proposed by men upon a worldly account always inconsiderable without any the least Earthly supports A Religion perioding the Jewish Religion and totally subverting all other Religions A Religion opposed disowned to the utmost by the Jews themselves though it derived it self wholly from them and pretended to be the natural product of their Religion and the true Completion of all they believed and expected a Religion in oppostion of which the whole World besides were agreed and indeed both Jews and Heathens perfectly concurred I say 'T is of admirable consideration that such a Religion so circumstanced against all the Religion the Wisdom and the Force of the World should at first make its entrance and be embraced by so great a part of Man-kind and within the space of thirty years or thereabouts after its first Publication for so it was be spread not only throughout all parts of the Roman Empire but also amongst the Parthians and remotest Heathens To no other Cause but it s own Innate worth and the Divine evidence from Heaven attending it can it with any tolerable colour of reason be ascribed The zeal men had for all other Religions in which they were Educated sufficiently prompted them to hate abhor and persecute it The Learning and the Wisdom of the whole World was employed to render it despicable and to bring it under contempt And all the force of the Roman Empire was every where violently at work for its total Suppression and Extirpation And yet against all these seeming invincible oppositions did the Bible prevail The power of that great Empire could not withstand the naked proposal of a simple Truth And both Judaism in the main of it as a National Establismment and Heathenism finally fell before it This Book and the Religion it contains as it avows it self to be solely from God and comes to us with a commanding voice from Heaven speaks to us in God's own Name and upon that single account requires our obedience And those that wrote it neither had nor pretended to have any other Authority but what was Divine and from Above So it has introduced it self by Means suitable thereunto Never was there at first any Force used to compel men nor any Arts practised to deceive men about this matter No man can prove out of any Story that ever the Apostles or the Primitive Professors of this Religion raised Arms to introduce or promote it Or that any Humane Authority did countenance or assist it The Christian Religion has this to say for it self above all others That 't is to debtor to the Sword either in a Civil or Military way Neither the Sword of Justice nor the Sword of War can lay any claim to it as a Product of theirs The greatest part of the Roman World â—ad embraced it and were become Criâ—tians before Constantine publickly owned it It ows nothing to any violent course for its Primitive Reception nor indeed to any Humane contrivement Neither the subtilty of Philosophers nor the Eloquence of Orators assisted in this matter It never advanced one step further in its first publication than its own Innate Excellency the Divine evidence attending it procured it acceptance nor did it ever gain a Convert but where it could approve it self by Divine Evidences to the Reasons Consciences of men to be Divine I make a peremptory demand to all Antiscriptural men to grant me this as a truth not capable of any denial That for three hundred years together the Gospel by its own Divine strength withstood the most furious and violent Winds Tides of all humane opposition and by no other assistance but what was purely Divine travelled most parts of the World over It offered it self to mens reception upon no other terms but by an Appeal to the Judgment and Concience and was contenteâ— to stand and fall by the Rational determination of every mans own Breast and sâ— prevailed Such who embraced it haâ— no other way of Contest but Holiness oâ— living and Patience in suffering 〈◊〉 both which they were very Eminent To the first their very Enemies the Heathens bore testimony Pliny and others speak of the Christians harmless and holy behaviour For the latter Never was any Religion so begun and propagated by such indefatigable Sufferings How few Martyrs for Religion can the Heathen World boast of If we admit Socrates for one how few Successors had he And those few they pretend to seem by all Circumstances to be such as had no other end but to perpetuate their own names to Posterity by suffering for such things as they thought the World would highly magnifie But for Christian-Religion we find innumerable sufferings of Men and Women of all Ranks Qualities Ages and Conditions In many of which we cannot suppose any thing but Conscience and hopes of a future Reward could possibly be the Motive Being persons of such mean parts and conditions as could no way be thought to design a Name to themselves hereafter Nor indeed can we reasonably suppose an esteem upon Earth and vain-glory could be the ground upon which any of them suffer'd when we consider they suffered for a Religion the very name of which was every where Odious and Detestable and the Profession of it brought nothing but shame and contempt It swims down to