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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A94756	A designe about disposing the Bible into an harmony. Or, An essay, concerning the transposing the order of books and chapters of the holy Scriptures for the reducing of all into a continued history. The [brace] benefits. Difficultie. Helpes. / By Samuel Torshel.	Torshell, Samuel, 1604-1650.	1647 (1647)	Wing T1936; Thomason E377_9; ESTC R201360	14,721	35

we shall not know where to finde any thing That may be easily helpt by marginall Columnes all along throughout with the Context and a Table or Index at the end of the whole In most places there will need but two Columnes for a great part none at all where the History or Book runs along without dislocation or insertion and in no place above four as in the Evangelists unlesse haply a fifth Columne somewhere there if it be judged fit to insert Judes Epistle into the History of the Evangelists concerning which for the present I Quaerie At the end may be an Index of two Columns In the first the Books Chapters and verses in the order as they lye now in the Bible And in the other the Books and Chapters of the Harmony it being divided into so many Books and Chapters as may be most for ease Whereby may presently be found in what part of the Harmony any Chapter Verse or Sentence of the whole Bible lies As for example Genesis Harmony ch ver lib. ch 1. 1. to 27. 1. 1. The Harmony being thus framed throughout there may be some marginall directions where they are necessary to give the reasons of the Transitions Insertions Transpositions and of the whole order The Benefits THe benefit of such an Harmony will be greater then we can fully comprehend till we have the use of it It will help much toward the making up an exacter Scripture-Chronologie It will serve abundantly to the clearing of the genuine and historicall meaning of the Text every where As for instance The Sermons of the Prophets though as they were laid up and preserved by the Sanhedrim are delivered unto us in a body as the learned Elders digested them yet they were applied at severall times in the severall emergencies of affairs of the two Kingdoms of Judah and Israel and upon severall occasions which being found out will make us as it were present auditours of those Prophets and in the quality of those to whom they were directed So the Psalms were written by severall men at severall times and those of David not all at once We shall know the temper of their spirits upon what motives upon what rejoycings upon what fears or distresses or accidents they were composed Take one example Psal 90.10 The anthour of that Psalm passionately complains of the shortnesse and misery of mans years The dayes of our years are threescore years and ten c. But it concerns not all men and times Only Moses who seems to have been the authour of that Psalm complains upon an occasion peculiar to that time and that people whom he governed It was the word of the Lord concerning that generation when they provoked him in the wildernesse that none of them should enter into his rest nor see the good land but that all their carcasses should fall in the desert that occasioned this complaint A strange and and unusuall thing that of 600000. souls men of able constitutions and lying under no epidemicall disease none except two persons Caleb and Iosuah should out-live threescore and ten years or at utmost but fourscore that were twenty years of age at their coming forth of Egypt We may take another example Psal 27.13 I had fainted unlesse I had beleeved to see the goodnesse of the Lord in the land of the living What was that land of the living that David speaks of When he made this Psalm he was forced from Ierusalem where he was wont to live in society with men and now shifted up and down among grott's and caves and solitary holes as if his dwelling had been among the Sepulchers of the dead The occasion then enlightens the Psalm if we insert it into that part of Davids story The literall historicall sense of Scripture we must first build upon else in mysteries and Allegories we may sooner be fine and witty then sound Hierome confesseth his own youthly vanity in interpreting Obadiah's Prophecie When I was young saith he I interpreted the Prophet allegorically because I was ignorant of the History I thought then I could read a sealed book No man can write so ill but some will like it Such an one praised it but I blush't I now freely professe that was the work of my childish wit this of my mature age Many undertake Scripture as if they could reade a sealed book and perhaps many praise them for lofty and raised notions but where is their Authority when they lose the genuine and litterall meaning of the holy Pen-man Isidore Pelusiota hath observed That wheras the Manichees thought that no part of the old Testament spake of Christ some in his time went to the other extream thinking all to be spoken of him and so brought a discredit upon the true testimonies when wrong ones were wrested Weaknesse of proof brings the greatest prejudice against the truth Divines have given out some observations for the understanding how Scripture is fulfilled either 1. When the thing is done or comes to passe which was meant by the Prophet in his litterall and proper sense Or 2. When that comes to passe which was fore-shadowed by the proper and immediate subject of the Prophets speech Or 3. When the thing that happens was not litterally and properly pointed at nor fore-shadowed but aptly and handsomely applied to and compared with somewhat like it Or 4. When that which was fore-told or fore-shadowed though it have been already done in part or have been begun to be done is afterwards done more fully or else more constantly It being possible that the same Scripture may be fulfilled often yea in the same litterall sense Now an Harmonious historizing of the Psalms and the Prophets and the like will lead us more clearly to know the immediate subject of what was spoken give us hints to discern what was higher and further meant yea possibly more then what themselves understood in the words that themselves spake For the Scriptures being given for the instruction and use of all succeeding ages It may be that the Prophets knew not all that they delivered and which the sense of their words might be afterwards improved unto Daniel was a man full of the Spirit of God and much travelled in Revelations yet he knew not the then approaching time of the Jews liberty till that in the first of Darius he learned more then was immediately inspired unto him by Books that had been written by Prophets before him Dan. 9.2 In the first year of Darius raign I Daniel understood by books the number of the years whereof the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah the Prophet No doubt he diligently satisfied himself unto what year of Jeremies publique Ministery those predictions Chap. 25.11 12. and chap. 29.10 were made Some Prophets knew more and some lesse They saw for after times but often themselves saw but what concerned the present times places and affairs It was said to Daniel himself Chap. 12.4 O Daniel shut up the words and seal the

A Designe About Disposing the BIBLE INTO AN HARMONY OR AN ESSAY Concerning the transposing the order of Books and Chapters of the holy Scriptures for the reducing of all into a continued History The Benefits Difficultie Helpes By SAMUEL TORSHEL LONDON Printed by A. Miller for John Bellamy at the three Golden-Lyons near the Royall-Exchange M.DC.XLVII TO THE RIGHT HONOVRABLE The LORDS and COMMONS assembled in PARLIAMENT THis that I now humbly offer to your hands hath been long in my thoughts but much more since in my attendance on his Majesties Children I have under the incouragements and particular favours of the Right Honourable my Lord the Earl of Northumberland to whose care You have intrusted those Royall pledges read thorow the whole Bible in an expository way I have high thoughts of the sacred authority of Scripture I admire the wisedom of the whole and the admirable concent of all the parts of it and doe firmly believe that the majesty of it will triumph over the attempts of all Anti-Scripturists to the contrary till the time of our Lords coming again 'T is the glory of Christian States to maintain and advance it which was the meaning of those learned men who have lately enriched the world with that treasury of the King of France his Bible in 10. Volumes where in one Frontispiece they have represented a Table of the Portraicture of Cardinal Mazarine supported and mounted by Angels as being a great Patron of that renowned labour May your Names also be great unto posterity whilst you promote the glory of God and the saving knowledge of men by works of this nature The learned Licenser intimates the difficulty of this I also acknowledge it but withall I nothing doubt but under such an influence as yours it may grow to a full maturity Your Honours most humble and most devoted servant SAM TORSHEL A Designe TO HARMONIZE THE BIBLE The authority of the Canon of Scripture The liberty of Interpreting it A complaint against the abuse of it The Remedy IT is a received principle even among the Turkes themselves That Gods testimony sufficeth so the Alcoran speaketh cap. de Aranea Sufficit Dei testificatio and That God hath made known his will in Books The Alcoran gives witnesse to both the Testaments as we call them And Philip Guadagnoli the Arabick Professor at Rome in his Apologie for Christian Religion against Ahmed the Persian hath produced clear instances of some passages almost out of every particular Book in the whole Bible expresly quoted or manifestly alluded unto in many Chapters of the Alcoran Much more therefore in the entrance of this discourse or essay which I have now undertaken I will suppose it among Christians to be a principle that needs not proof and a thing constantly granted that the whole Scripture contained in the Canon or number of Books which we call Canonicall is the Word of God divinely inspired and left unto us to be the Rule of Faith and manners Under that Title or Right the Law and the Prophets were delivered over from the Jews the old and faithfull keepers of them to the Christians by whom both those and the Evangelicall or Apostolicall writings and declarations have been held in possession under the same Title in the severall ages since even down to these dayes There was never among the Ancients any publike quarrell about that Only which addes also to the weight and strength of the Scriptures Title there have been not a few quarrels about the sense The Arts that have been used by the Romanists for the setling and establishing the Right of Interpretation upon the Bishop of Rome have been well known whereby they have laboured to make him the Oracle to the world as the Turkish Mufti is by the relation of Busbequius in those parts finding it to be the most expedite way to gain the opinion of the publike and autorized Interpreter But upon the experience of his own and his fervants readinesse to make advantage of every thing that hath any likelihood to advance them and to wrest and abuse Scriptures to the maintenance of their usurpations therefore so long as there are at least reasonable men in the world it will alwayes prove a broken and entangled Title unto him Who then must be Judge There are many that would give it to the Fathers and that we must receive their Sense But that were to make them not Expounders but in a manner Law-givers I have spoken somewhat to this in my Exercitation upon Malachy and in my Historicall Preface before Mr Stocks Commentary upon that Prophet from whence I shall transcribe a little That we regard the Fathers highly but yeeld them not the Royaltie of a Mint as Morney speaks In the very Councel of Trent a saying of Cardinall Cajetan's That a new sense of Scripture is not to be rejected though it be against the old Doctors seeing power is left now also to interpret was by some much commended who thought it a Tyranny to forbid the faithfull the use of their own proper Ingenie Others indeed opposed that saying accounting License worse then Tyrannie Among others Richard of Mans a Franciscan Fryer went so farre as to say That the doctrine of Faith is now so cleared that we ought to learn it no more out of the Scriptures which were heretofore read in the Church for instruction but now only are read to pray by not to study There were not many that adhered to him the better part delivered themselves as Dominicke a Soto did That it was fit to keep every wit within limits for matters of faith and manners but else to leave them to their liberty for the sense Others of them yet more plainly That it was not fit to restrain the understanding of the Scriptures to the Fathers only whose expositions were most part allegoricall seldome literall and those fitted to their own times Seeing then the more learned and sober party even among the Romanists themselves have been tender of taking away the liberty of the faithfull to judge of what is written farre be it from us to be worse then they or to erect a tyranny by putting the key of knowledge into the hands of any particular order of men But what way may be taken to prevent that this liberty prove not a mischief Of late we have had too sad an experience of the boldnesse of such as pretend to the knowledge of Scriptures Besides what we hear of delivered here and there in corners there is too much witnesse in those weak senselesse and triobolarie Pamphlets which have wasted so much paper and have unmannerly intruded upon the leisures yea the necessary businesse of all sorts of men of late years in which what childish and impertinent allegations of texts have we found what raw and indigested collections from them what bandying up and down of incoherent Scripture-words and sentences many thorow a proud forwardnesse venture unripe and unexperienced upon the expounding of the Scriptures

book even to the time of the end These mysteries were to be shut up till these later times concerning which it follows in the same verse Many shall run to and fro and knowledge shall be encreased Namely by reading thy book when the time of fulfilling comes There is a Manuscript that offers a pleasant Interpretation of these words That the opening of the world by trade and navigation and the encrease of knowledge should meet in one age The Lord Verulam embraced this sense if himself invented the Frontispiece to his Instauratio magna where in a quiet sea a ship is pictured with full spread sails and under it this same sentence out of Daniel Multipertransibunt augebitur scientia Alittle before Luther when Columbus found out the Indies there was also a generall reviving of all parts of learning And surely as our age hath much advanced above what Antiquity knew so the Ages after us are likely to know more even out of the Scriptures concerning themselves and their times Had Moses Abraham of whom Christ said He saw his day and rejoyced David Isaiah Micah Malachy c. lived and had they been ear-witnesses of Christs words and spectatours of his doings they would better have understood one anothers words yea and their own too But this is the benefit which the designed Harmony doth promise that it will bring them nearer together in fellowship with themselves nearer unto Christ and to his Apostles writings whereby much that we knew not what to think of will be easie to us But I will not undertake a further commendation of the Benefit which I doe not yet my self so fully understand nor can apprehend as when according to the Designe the thing it self shall be done They talk much of the glasses of those curious and excellent men Galileus and Gassendus c. that will rectifie many of our errours about the Planets but thorow this glasse we shall see into the heavens of the Scriptures and every day enrich our selves with new discoveries and observations The Difficultie AS I have commended the Benefit so I may not deny or conceal the Difficulty of the work They that have laboured in the lesser Harmony namely that of the four Evangelists have found it to be no mean labour nor could they soon put it out of their hands The Attempts of many upon it give testimony of this difficulty Iacob D' Ausoles a Lapeyre in anno 1610. reckoned up twenty known Authours this way Renhard Lutz omitted in Lapeyres Catalogue who compiled his Harmony 1560. confesseth he was often at a stand in it Calvin who compiled it 1555. made his way the easier by treading after Bucer but yet sometime was forced to part and go another Tract Indeed Andrew Osiander was willing to perswade himself he had overcome the difficulties of it he saith That Iohn Schopper an Abbot had shew'd him two Compilers of it one an Anonymus the other was Zacharias Chrysopolitanus but they stuck where Ammonius of Alexandria and after him St Augustine had namely at the cure of Peters wives mother whether it were before or after the Sermon on the Mount And there he had stuck and staid too but that our Cranmer being at his house as he was on his way being Embassadour from King Henry 8. to the Emperour desired him to goe on He did so and saith he saw his scarecrows removed but some judge of it that he had better have stuck then plunged over All that did it met with censure Vincentius Regius findes fault with Iansenius others with him Iohn de la Haye at Doway and Francis de Roia at Toledo finde defects in all before them though some have professed more then ordinary diligence as particularly Tho Beaux-amis a Carmelite professeth it was the substance of twenty six years labour 'T is done at length indeed to good satisfaction but not by one hand but begun by Chemnitius continued by Polycarp Lyserus and again continued by D. Gerhard It cannot then be expected that this work now designed should on a sudden be done or done by one hand being so much more large and abundantly more difficult for in many things there will be need of an Elias as the Iews are wont to speak concerning knots that they cannot unty As for example Not to speak of the two Psalms which Amadeus saith it was revealed to him that they were composed by Adam which are in the King of Spains Library of Manuscripts in the Escuriall It may notwithstanding perhaps deservedly be put to the Question whether the 92. Psalm be to be inserted into Adams History seeing many of the Iews thought it was his and in the Chaldee it hath this title The praise and song which the first man spake for the Sabbath day Then as for the 90. Psalm I have spoken to it as composed by Moses and so the Chaldee Title speaks The prayer which Moses the Prophet of the Lord prated when the people of the house of Israel sinned in the desert But if we should follow Hierom's rule That all the Psalms which are without Title are to be ascribed to the same Authour that is mentioned in the next fore-going then the 91. Psalm and nine more that follow should be inserted into Moses his History But that rule will justly deserve to come under Question Then Whereas the Vatican Septuagint doe insert the Proverbs of Agur and Lemuel Prov. 30. and 31. between Chap. 24. and 25. It will require an examination 1. Whether Agur were some wise and godly man in Solomons time or before or rather whether he were not Solomon himself called Agur The Collectour the sonne of Iakeh that is David The vomiter because as it was said of the later Poets That they licked up Homers vomit so Solomon gathered up what David had let fall in many occasionall sentences or else The sonne of vomit an Hebraisme i. so full that he could not hold but must needs vent and utter what he had to say according to that Psal 45.1 My heart is enditing or boyleth and bubleth up a good matter Or Agur i. Solomon the Satyre so the phrase is also used among the Latines Evomere aliquid in aliquem The Character of a great part of that 30. Chapter being Satyricall may rather strengthen that conjecture But it is left to the Question 2. Whether Lemuel Chap. 31. be Solomon who they said had eight names or else King Hezekiah as it might seem because the Proverbs of this Chapter are brought in after and in order to those which his servants copied out as is noted chap. 25.1 But these and an hundred more Queries will require solution to the framing of such a work The Professour of any faculty besides Divinity may without much skill in any profession but his own truly understand the genuine rules or precepts of it all his learning else is but ornament to him As a Physitian needs not History Mathematicks c. as necessarily to inable him to his