thine Altar Psal 26.6 therefore we find that during the whole force of the Ceremonial Law the outward Purifications might on an extraordinary Occasion as that of Hezekiah's Passover be dispensed with but the inward Purification of the Heart was a duty absolutely indispensible whence it was that when several of Ephraim and Manasseh and Issachar and Zabulun had not cleansed themselves Hezekiah put up that petition for them to God 2 Chron. 30.18 19 20. The good Lord pardon every one that prepareth his heart to seek God the Lord God of his fathers though he be not cleansed according to the purification of the Sanctuary and the Lord hearkened to Hezekiah and healed the people which additional Passage intimates that God inflicted some punishment on the People for participating of the Passover when legally unprepared so to teach them a Lesson of punctual Obedience but he healed them upon account of their inward and spiritual Preparation to satisfie them that he esteemed inward Holiness beyond all the ceremonial Purifications of the Sanctuary In the Law there were a great many Washings appointed and upon several occasions the Scribes and Pharisees by virtue of some Traditions of their own added more Mark 7.3 4. they would not eat except they washed their hands and when they came from their markets they wash'd and there were many other things which they had received to hold as the washing of Cups and Pots and of brazen Vessels and of Tables Now all these things might contribute to outward Purity and argued a great care of Cleanliness nor were the Jews to have been condemned for these practices if they had not laid too great a weight upon them and for the sake of such Purifications banish'd all thoughts of true inward Purity out of their minds and this our Saviour reproves them for not condemning their outward Neatness but their making void the Law of God by their Traditions and he carries the reproof yet further Matth. 23.25 Wo unto you Scribes Pharisees Hypocrites for you make clean the outside of the cup and of the platter but within they are full of extortion and excess c. But the Purity of the Soul was what God principally regarded and those outward Washings originally ordain'd in the Law were so many Types design'd to put Men in mind of that clean Hand and that pure Heart which every one was to endeavour after If we look into Circumcision it self that great initiating Ceremony in the Jewish Church it was really a preventive of natural Vncleanness yet though it were made by God the Seal of that Covenant between himself and the Seed of Abraham the Jews had a right notion of what that Ceremony was to put them in mind of given them by Moses himself Deut. 10.16 so he bids them to circumcise the fore-skin of their hearts and to be no more stiff-necked Stubbornness and Disobedience were the Vncleanness of the Heart therefore what care the Jews took to prevent that of Nature it was reasonable they should take to remove that accruing from Sin Moses therefore promises it as a great Blessing from Heaven on them in case of their sincere Repentance when under God's afflicting hand Deut. 30.6 the Lord thy God will circumcise thy heart and the heart of thy seed to love the Lord thy God with all thine heart and with all thy soul that thou mayst live where the stubborn Heart is once mollified the Love of God is easily settled in it Now that this Circumcision could effect nothing ex opere operato or that it could contribute nothing to the Obedience of the Soul we see demonstrated by the case of the Jews at present who are careful enough in performing the outward Rite of Circumcision and yet obdurate and unmalleable by all the Tendries of the Gospel therefore the Apostle has furnisht us with an easie Distinction between a Jew by Nature or one descended lineally from Abraham and a Jew by Grace or one ally'd to Abraham spiritually as he was the Father of the Faithful for says He He is not a Jew that is one outwardly Rom. 2.28 29. neither is that Circumcision which is outward in the flesh but he is a Jew which is one inwardly and Circumcision is that of the Heart in the spirit whose praise is not of men but of God We see then that these Ceremonies to instance in no more have only a Typical Nature and can have no more because though they may serve to represent to our Memories the solid Duties of sincere Religion yet it 's impossible they should operate on the inward Man or in themselves make any one that is punctual in them acceptable in the sight of God Nor was there any need they should be more than Memorials or Representations of more important Good for those Ceremonial Vsages were from their first beginning whether among Adam's universal Race or the People of Israel intended only as comfortable supports to mens Spirits otherwise ready to droop under the various pressing calamities of a mortal Life God had given Adam the promise of the blessed Seed whose heel was to be bruised by the Serpent which bruise signified Death unless we can imagine Adam so weak as to draw any comfort from a literal Interpretation of the words but that sense could really afford none more than a promise that I should break the Head of some Snake and that should bite or wound my Heel could be a matter of consolation to all Mankind but Adam's case was this He saw how his Folly and Disobedience had made way to Sin and Death to tyrannize over all his own Posterity that the Sin committed was irrevocable the wages of Sin consequently inevitable these thoughts were enough to deject the most daring Spirits and Adam without the interposition of immense Goodness must have sunk irrecoverably beneath the dreadful weight of his own Misery What could prevent his despair could only be this an Assurance that the Powers of Sin and Death should not totally prevail but there should by some sufficient means be a stop effectually put to their Tyranny This Assurance God design'd to give him in that memorable Promise which though spoken to the Serpent was only a terrible Threatning to him but a precious Promise to Adam I will put enmity between thee and the Woman Gen. 3.15 and between thy seed and her seed it shall bruise thy head and thou shalt bruise his heel The bare settling an Enmity between Him who had tempted Adam by the Serpent and the Seed of the Woman could have signified little to Adam's satisfaction he had suffered too deeply in the first engagement with Him and therefore could not wish his Posterity engaged in a perpetual Warfare with so subtle an Adversary therefore the following words the seed of the Woman shall bruise the Serpent's head contain'd the Comfort long'd for To bruise the Head is to wound a vital part to crush it is to put an
try'd He could not reasonably refuse to stand to that Tryal but neither do we find that his Enemies ever went about to shew the Discrepancy between his Doctrines and his Practice and therefore when they thought to cajole him into their snares by a most malicious Complement they gave him indeed no more than a true and proper Character Master we know that thou art true Matth. 22.16 and teachest the way of God in truth neither carest thou for any man for thou regardest not the persons of men this Character was really his due whatsoever they meant by it and they who were unwilling to acknowledge their own Hypocrisie could never fairly go off from so remarkable a Testimonial If then the Blessed Jesus were so signally innocent He was above all other the fittest to assert and vindicate the Authority of his Father's Laws and this he carefully did and made his appeal to all those Laws without exception according as occasions offer'd themselves After all then if he would really put an end to the Ceremonial Law and yet maintain to the last his Character of Truth and Justice He must of necessity be the Son of God and God himself his Authority otherwise notwithstanding the mutable Nature of those Laws not being sufficient to bear him out in so great an Alteration Our Saviour was Incarnate That the Law of God as given to the Jews might in our Nature be fulfilled exactly and according to the Letter and so that he who fulfilled it might be a compleat example of Holiness and Obedience to us and how great an Undertaker this required we shall have hereafter Opportunities enough to understand Now when I lay down this reason by the word Law I understand whatsoever was given to the Jews whether Moral as confirming the Law of uncorrupted Nature or Political as relating to their Civil Government or Ceremonial as referring to their various Religious Rites both the last so far as they could concern the Practice of a private Person so that indeed the whole Law as given to the Jews contain'd in it whatsoever could have been expected from Adam had he retain'd his original Innocence or whatsoever humane Nature in its utmost perfection could possibly attain to Now that such a compleat Obedience should be expected from some One Partaker of humane nature was but reasonable when the great work of Man's Redemption was in hand for since Man created in all that Perfection his Nature was capable of had yet fall'n from that Obedience which was justly expected from him he being in a condition every way capable of performing it and by that fall of his had necessarily involv'd all those who should be deriv'd from him in all those Miseries attending the guilt of Sin and since the intent of God's Goodness was that from the Obedience of one man descended of the same flesh and blood many should be made righteous or be blessed with those Rewards attending upon Righteousness as the Apostle assures us it came to pass it was but just and reasonable that that Man from whom that righteousness was to descend to Mankind that that Man should compleatly make up that Character of the first Man when in Innocence which had he persever'd in as he ought his whole Posterity had been entirely happy and yet that task was abundantly greater for the second Adam our Lord Jesus Christ than it was for the first Adam our great Parent for Adam had no Corruption deriv'd down to him from his Original from whence it has been not impertinently question'd Whether before Sin enter'd into the World and Death by Sin He was liable to the common Rules of Mortality But our Saviour when he took Flesh of the Virgin took it up at such a time as Humane nature was sunk into its utmost depravation nor would an allowance of that Roman Foolery That the Blessed Virgin was born without any Original Sin or Guilt upon her help the matter For so long as she was descended from such Parents as had their share in the Corruption of Humane Nature her Freedom would not of consequence free every one who should be born of her but she being no way beyond other Women but only on account of her Practical Holiness our Lord as descended from her must be in all things like his Brethren liable to all the Inconveniences attending a Body certainly mortal for as for his being without Sin it depended on the Union of a Mortal to an Immortal Being the very nature of which superiour Being was more effectual than the Refiner's Fire on Gold or Silver purifying that otherwise corrupt Body it was united to and fortifying it against all that proclivity to Sin and easie succumbency to Temptation which the rest of Mankind was obnoxious to Nor was it any thing but such a coacting Omnipotence which could possibly have produc'd a clean thing out of an unclean or a Body without Sin out of that which was naturally sinful There is certainly such a state as that of Eternal Happiness but it is attainable only as the reward of Merit in a proper sense or as we ordinarily say it 's as Wages which he who faithfully performs his work deserves and may justly lay claim to as his own and therefore cannot be deny'd without Injustice as for instance whereas the condition of eternal Life is This do and live whosoever it is that performs the Condition and does what 's requir'd he has for so doing provided there be no circumstantial failure in the performance of the work a just and rightful claim to that eternal Life propounded and God himself could not be just should he deny the propos'd reward to such a One as should compleatly perform the Condition set before him Had Man continued in the state of Innocence he had had this proper claim of his own to eternal Happiness he might justly have claim'd it and could not without extremity of Injustice have been deny'd it but that eternal Happiness which we now expect is of Grace or it 's the free Gift of God which we as Sinners and such we are all without exception have no proper or inherent right to but it 's not the immediate free Gift of God as if he without any performance of incumbent duty on our part would bestow upon us an eternally glorious Inheritance for this would be as inconsistent with that infinite Justice which makes up the Idaea of the Supreme God as it would be to deny Wages or a Reward to him that had truly deserved it nor is it a free giving Man such an inward Ability to perform all the punctilio's of the Divine reveal'd Will as by which they might make a full compensation to Divine Justice for the original pravity of Nature and do all such things to the utmost as could be requir'd from the beginning to the end of Life for this were to alter the whole frame of Humane Nature and to give it in the present state of things an
Body therefore it could not be presented so as the Blood of the Annual Sacrifice was by the Jewish High-priest nor could the Blood of Christ be so sprinkled as that was towards Heaven or toward the Mercy seat but our Lord's Ascension into Heaven and sitting at the righ-hand of God were one continued uninterrupted Act and that Blood which had been once offer'd upon the Cross needed not to be offer'd again he was made a perfect Messias a real Saviour through Sufferings a Saviour every way sufficient for those who should believe on him and having through his own Blood made way to the Exaltation of his Humane Nature he had no more to do but to satisfie his Followers in the truth of his Resurrection and to give them proper Instructions with respect to their future Employs and so immediately to ascend to and to sit on the right hand of the Majesty on high i. e. to exercise that absolute Dominion and Soveraignty over Believers as Man which as Man he had purchas'd at the dearest rate and as such we find him appearing in Apocalyptical Visions though at the same time bearing that Title King of kings and Lord of lords and thus have we cleared those Proofs justly alledged for our Saviour's Satisfaction for Humane Sins from Socinian Glosses and irrational Interpretations I shall now add only some short positive Evidence of the same Truth from particular Circumstances attending his Death and so conclude this particular It must therefore be remember'd That one End of our Saviour's exact fulfilling the Law was that he might be an example of Holiness and Obedience to us but if our Saviour's Sufferings were of such a nature as to import a great deal more than barely such an Example then it was really to be considered further and the Reasons of that Import to be enquired into Holiness includes all sorts of Vertue amongst the rest Patience Fortitude Courage and the like supposing our Saviour to have satisfied our Heavenly Father for our Sins to have atoned that Anger justly excited against a Rebellious World these Vertues were prodigiously eminent in him the weight of God's Wrath against Sin and Sinners was enough had it been permitted to take its course to have crush'd a world of miserable Wretches therefore it had been impossible for a meer Man to have struggled with and to have averted that terrible Indignation from us but if we take away this particular Consideration of his treading the wine-press of his Father's Indignation alone nothing seems more mean among the various accounts of the Sufferers for Truth than the Carriage of our Blessed Saviour that Man whom yet Socinians themselves acknowledge to have moved in a Sphere superiour to the rest of Adam's Race If we look upon that Death our Saviour dy'd it must be own'd it was grievous and painful yet when we consider it duly the Shame and Ignominy in it was the heaviest Circumstance attending it otherwise when we come to compare his Death as to its outward Circumstances with the Sufferings of Prophets and Martyrs of old they were meerly Trifles and inconsiderable The Apostle tells us among Faith's ancient Heroes of those who were sawn asunder so we are told in particular that great Prophet Isaiah was sawn with a wooden Saw the more dull the more lingring the more tormenting so the three Children were cast into the burning fiery Furnace by Nebuchadnezzar and Daniel into the Lions Den to have been torn in pieces under the cruel Paws of ravening Beasts where we are not to look upon the Miraculous Deliverance those illustrious Sufferers met with but upon the barbarous Cruelties intended against them but if from them we come to view the cruel Subtilties of Heathen Persecutors there we find all the variety of Tortures exquisite Malice could invent executed upon poor Christians the terrible Racks stretching their disabled Limbs and leaving no sound Joint in their Bodies a Torment terrible indeed to the strongest natural Constitutions they out-living their Pains and recovering Strength only to enable them for renewing Miseries some broken upon the Wheel dying piece by piece and Nature in the mean time sustain'd by Puddle-Water and Excrement some burnt alive in scorching Flames some broiled or roasted before lingring Fires some worried to Death by enraged Wild Beasts others cloath'd with Pitchy Vestments and so set on fire to fry away in inexpressible Pains meerly to make sport or to serve for Flambeaus to midnight Wanderers What should we descend lower to the poor persecuted Protestants in Merindo and Chabrieres or the unhappy Piedmonteses of late Years to see Mens Mouths and Womens Privities stufft with Gun-powder by barbarous Villains and so their Bodies or their Heads blown in pieces by that murdering Artifice to name no more of those inhumane Cruelties managed so that Holy Men admirable Christians have been Days and Months and Years a dying and beside all this it was oft-times the Aggravation of their Sorrows to see their Friends and nearest Relations murder'd first before their Eyes to have all the unjust and scandalous Reproaches in the World fixt upon them for Women to see their sucking Infants thrust through with Swords their own Blood and their Mothers Milk flowing from their bleeding Wounds together to see them tost and carried triumphant upon their Spears torn from their dying Mothers ript up Wombs and thrown immediately into consuming Flames these Sights such as might rack the most resolute Soul and almost squeeze sympathizing Tears from brute Beasts or insensate Rocks the very reading those dismal Tragedies are enough to make Men shiver with Horror and survey the Bloody Scene with Amazement and Consternation yet after all we find those glorious Martyrs so far from Fear or Apprehensions of their approaching Fate that never Happy Pair went with more cheerful Looks to the Bridal Bed than they went with to Racks and Wheels to Flames and Gibbets or whatever else their angry and malicious Enemies could inflict upon them nay they were so far from being daunted with the cruel Executions of their Fellow Saints that ambitious Princes were not more active to grasp at Crowns and Sceptres than they at the more splendid bloody Crown of Martyrdome nay so desirous were they of that Honour that whole Multitudes made up of Men Women and Children readily without being sought for or accus'd offered their Throats voluntarily to Pagan Governours to the Amazement and Confusion of their most violent Persecutors If we observe the Behaviour of those admirable Persons under their Sufferings their Management is all of a piece though they were all the day long as Sheep appointed to be slain though they found their Portion in this World never so severe or uncomfortable yet in all these things they were more than Conquerours through Christ who loved them they fear'd not the Cruelty of their Enemies but the Kindness of their Friends lest out of Compassion to them they should find out any means to rob them of that Crown they