distracts their thoughts There is no charm nor counsel against necessity and a terrour that is unavoidable is above the power and the relief of Philosophy and will not be vanquish't by stubborn thoughts or proud words So that it is altogether as easie to prevail with a Man to hate and abhor his own Being as to reconcile him to the thoughts of his own destruction For by the same necessity that Nature loves and desires the continuance of it self it recoils and starts back from all thoughts of its dissolution This then is upon the Epicurean Supposition a vain an useless and unreasonable advice being 't is so insuperable a contradiction to the nature of Things So that the fear of Death which is the thing I am now to represent is as certain and inexorable as Death it self and Men may as soon devest themselves of their own Natures as suppress the convulsions of this inbred passion And now when it is so incurable and yet withall so importunate and disquieting it is easie to imagine what desperately cheerfull lives those Men must live that always live under its sad and dismal apprehensions § XXII But beside this great and sovereign Antidote against the fear of Death they have several other little receits scatter'd up and down in their Writings I shall but briefly mention them because all that little force which they seem to have depends upon the former fundamental principle First say they let us be thankfull to the bounty of Nature for making our lives so long instead of repining at it for making them no longer But I say if our whole Being be at all mortal we have no reason to be at all thankfull for it and if our whole Being be worn out with this Life it is much more eligible never to have been But then say they we were admitted into Life upon this condition that we should give place to others as others have given place to us Were we so Then were we all admitted upon unacceptable terms Yes but by troubling our selves in vain we do but add one misery to another It is true but that is a fatal misery and it is as necessary to fear Death as it is to die and that is it that makes up the complaint that we are put in such a state of Being which we cannot enjoy without this continual anguish and perplexity annexed to it So that how wise or foolish a thing it is to fear Death is not at all material but whether it be unavoidable though if it be I am sure it is a very foolish thing to endeavour against it But how irksome soever Death may be yet seeing it is fatal we ought to make it as easie as we can by a voluntary compliance with it but this beside the folly that is common to all the rest that it advises to an impossibility is not so properly compliance as despair and is like the condition of a condemn'd Malefactour that goes to his Execution onely because otherwise he must be driven and whipt to it And no Man has any other comfort all his life-Life-time against the terrours of Death than a Thief upon the Gallows that would if it were possible counterfeit to die cheerfully because there is no remedy To the same purpose is that other advice that it is in vain to fear Death because it is natural necessary and inevitable that is because it is remediless and there lies the very agony of all our horrour that a thing so infinitely terrible should withall be so utterly unavoidable And when they tell us how strange a folly and madness it is to torment our selves with the fear of that which we are infallibly certain we can never escape they do but perswade us to the madness of despair instead of courage and resolution For how foolish or unreasonable soever this fear may be it is natural antecedent to the choice of our wills and the discretion of our understandings and so above all the rules of Prudence and prescriptions of Philosophy They can onely guide and instruct our Minds in things subject to their own election but cannot affect much less over rule the instincts of Nature In the next place we are already dead say they to so much of our Life as is past and gone so that so much as we live we die and that which we call Death is but our last Death and therefore as we fear not our Death that is past why should we that which is to come But what Child understands not the difference between Life and Death and if to live be to die notwithstanding this quibble we are troubled never the less that this new way of dying puts an end to our old way of dying and if we have been dying ever since we were born that is the thing that grieves us that we cannot be dying so for ever But Bassus Aufidius the Epicurean old Man in Seneca reconciled himself to his approaching Death with this reason because it was as absurd to fear Death as old Age which yet all Men desire to come to in that as old Age follows Youth so Death follows old Age. But if he were in good earnest satisfied it is a sign that he had lived not onely to his old Age but to his second Childhood For old Age is desirable not because it follows Youth but because it defers Death and that is it which makes it so much less valuable than Youth because it is so much nearer to Death And the Philosophers reason had been altogether as comfortable if he had preferr'd old Age before Youth because his Youth was very old it being many years since he was a young Man whereas his old Age was of a later date he having been but a little time an old Man By which device he might have proved to himself that Youth is old Age and old Age Youth Much like this is that other reasoning wherewith Gassendus himself seems so much pleased that whereas we now count our selves happy if we live to an hundred years yet if the natural course of our Life were as much shorter we should be as much satisfied with twenty and if our natural course reach't to a thousand years we should then be as much troubled to die at six hundred as now at sixty and so forward It is like all the rest of the Philosophick comforts and is so far from reconciling us to Death at any time that it is a demonstration that there is no time in which an Epicurean can or ought to be content to die and that be our lives longer or shorter yet unless they are eternal we cannot rid our selves of this importunate and intolerable evil And of the same nature is that witty saying of Seneca that a little or great circle are both equal in perfection of figure though not in quantity so is the Life of Man whether it last to twenty or to an hundred years But certainly no Man that might live to an hundred
affirms 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that he quite vanisht away at last he onely says 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that he went away and this though he would seem to affirm that it was after a wonderfull manner and no body knows how is a pitifull abatement to the bigness of his former expression vanishing away Though the truth is if he had stood to it it must unavoidably have proved it self a Lye for it is utterly incredible that so strange a thing as that should have been done in so great a presence as that and yet never any notice be taken of it But in the last place the Historian would fain bid at something of his Hero's appearing after Death yet he does it so faintly that in the conclusion of all it comes to nothing especialy when he tells us that the time of his Death was altogether unknown and that the uncertainty of it took in no less than the compass of thirty years and then they that were so utterly at a loss as to the time of his decease and that for so long a space were likely to give a very wise account of the certain time of any thing that he did after it But how or to whom did he appear Why to a young Man one of his Followers that doubted of the Immortality of the Soul for ten months together after his Death But how or where Why the young Man being tired with watching and praying to Apollonius that he would appear to him onely to satisfie him in this point one day fell into a dead sleep in the School where the young Men were performing their several Exercises and on the sudden starts up in a great fright and a great sweat crying out 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I believe thee O Tyanaeus And being asked by his Companions the meaning of his transport Why says he do you not see Apollonius They answer him no but that they would be glad to give all the World that they could 'T is true says he for he onely appears to me and for my satisfaction and is invisible to all others and so tells them what he had said to him in his sleep concerning the state of Souls This poor account of a Dream and a Vision of an over-watched Boy is all that this great Story affords to vye with our Saviour's Resurrection And now upon review of this whole History it seems evident to me that this Man was so far from being endued with any extraordinary or Divine Power that he does not deserve the reputation of an ordinary Conjurer For though Huetius has taken some pains to prove him so yet he gives no evidence of it beside the Opinion of the common People and if that were enough to make a Conjurer there is no Man of an odd and a singular humour as Apollonius affected to be who is not so thought of by the common People And therefore when he was accused for it before Domitian the Emperour when he came to hear the cause slighted both him and his accusers and dismist him the Court for an idle and phantastick fellow And it is manifest from the whole series of his History that he was a very vain Man and affected to be thought something extraordinary and so wander'd all the World over in an odd Garb to be gazed at and admired and made himself considerable in that Age by Wit Impudence and Flattery of all which he had a very competent share But for his Wonder-working Faculty which he would needs pretend to he fetcht that as far off as the East Indies that is the farthest off as he thought from confutation And yet the Account that he has given of those parts is so grosly fabulous that that alone convicts his whole Life of imposture and impudence And this may suffice to make good this part of the demonstration of our Saviour's Divine Authority from the certain Evidence both of his own and his Apostles Miracles and to set it above the reach of all manner either of Objection or Competition § XXVIII But though the History of Jesus of Nazareth have this advantage of all others in that the Tradition whereby it has been conveyed down to us has proved the truth of its own Testimony by plain and undeniable Miracles yet if we set aside this peculiar Divine Attestation and consider the Tradition by it self as meerly Humane and deliver'd down in the ordinary course of things it has been so constant so catholick and so uninterrupted as to be its own demonstration For if there had been no such thing as the Story of Jesus of Nazareth in that Age there could never have been any such Tradition or if there were it was so early that if it had been false it must immediately have perished as a manifest Lye in that when it comes so near the very time in which the thing it self was acted nothing but undoubted Truth could ever have maintain'd its Authority For though it is easie at a distance to tell strange stories of the times of old as we find by those many idle and incredible Legends added to the History of the primitive Church in the after-ages of ignorance and superstition yet to raise a story so strange and remarkable as that of Jesus of Nazareth and his Apostles without any ground or foundation for it nay against the certain knowledge of those who lived in the place where it was first broacht and to gain Proselytes to such a notorious Fiction is a thing not possible in the course of humane Affairs For to pass by all the other disadvantages that I have already represented that this Tradition must labour under if it rise not up to the very time that it pretends to especially that of its being a matter of Fact which must unavoidably have destroyed it if false that which I have already proposed and come now to prosecute seems as insuperable as any of the rest viz. That great numbers of learned and wise Men who lived in the Ages next and immediately after it should after the strictest enquiry concerning its truth not onely suffer themselves to be imposed upon by so late and palpable a Fiction but lay down their Lives in defence of it This is not credible unless they were fully assured of the undoubted certainty of the thing it self and their assurance alone is to us a sufficient demonstration of it But though that be enough yet I will undertake more viz. To give an account of the grounds and reasons of their Assurance by tracing up the certain Tradition of the thing it self to the very times of the Apostles and from them deriving it down to after-ages through the hands of wise learned and judicious Men and that as I take it will make a new and distinct demonstration of the infallible certainty of the Christian Faith Now this Tradition is conveyed two manner of ways either by a succession of Churches or of single Persons First by a succession of Churches and
his Divine Authority from the undoubted and undeniable evidence of his Resurrection For to that alone he refers us as the last and most satisfactory proof of his Commission and depends upon it as the clearest demonstration not onely of his Doctrine but of all the other Arguments whereby he proved his Doctrine And for that reason it is that we find him so often injoining his Disciples not to publish his other Works and Miracles till after his Resurrection Thus when his Apostles had declared to him the firmness of their Belief that he was the true Messias he streightly charges them Matt. 16. 20. that they should then tell no Man of it and takes occasion thence to acquaint them with his approaching Death and Passion and prepare them for the belief of his Resurrection from the Grave Ascension into Glory and Mission of the Holy Ghost By which great Miracles he was as Saint Paul observes Rom. 1. 4. to be declared the Son of God with Power but chiefly by his Resurrection for it was as the same Apostle elsewhere expresses it the working of the might of his Power which he wrought in Christ when the Father of Glory raised him from the dead Ephes. 1. 19. And this probably was the meaning of those words immediately added by our Saviour to his foremention'd Discourse Verily I say unto you there are those here present that shall not taste of Death till they see the Son of Man coming in his Kingdom Matt. 16. 28. In that he was as evidently declared by this to be the Messias or Son of God as if they had seen him solemnly enthron'd in Heaven by the holy Angels So again when the Devils that he cast out were forced to confess him to be the Messias he still commands them silence He was not willing that there should be too much notice taken of him before his Resurrection because by that he intended to give such a palpable proof of his Divine Authority as should give undoubted credit to all his former Miracles And so again when he had taken his three chief Disciples to behold his Transfiguration thereby to confirm their Faith against the time of his Suffering when he had done that he charges them saying tell the Vision to no Man untill the Son of Man be risen from the dead Matt. 17. 9. Because the great evidence and certainty of that would give undoubted credit to this and all their other Reports whereas till then Men would be very difficulty perswaded to believe such prodigious and unusual things though after that and the undeniable power of the Holy Ghost in the Apostles who attested it it would be so far from being at all difficult to yield to their Testimony that it would be almost impossible to distrust it And therefore accordingly the first Preachers of the Gospel laid the whole stress of their Faith upon this one Principle This was the resolution of all their Disputes with the unbelieving World and when Men in those days enquired after the truth of the Christian Religion the onely state of the Question was whether Christ were risen from the dead This alone without the assistance of any other proof was thought such a forcible and convictive confirmation that it superseded the consideration of all other less evident and important reasonings and where this was not able to prevail upon the minds of Men they despaired of any success from any other Topicks and Principles This then being so I shall in this one Article specifie according to the method before proposed those wild those extravagant those incredible absurdities that must be swallowed upon its disbelief § IV. First then they believe that the Apostles Evangelists and Disciples of Jesus who pretended to have been eye Witnesses of it both would and could impose upon the World with a manifest lie and in that they believe ten thousand absurdities For it is easily credible no doubt that Men endued I will not say with Principles of common Sense Reason and Discretion that is more than I need suppose it is enough to our present purpose onely to suppose them possest with that natural Instinct that they have in common with all other Creatures viz. Love of Life and desire of self-preservation It is I say easily credible that such Creatures as these would so willingly so wilfully forgo all advantages of Pleasure and Profit so cheerfully expose themselves to so many Hazards and Hardships so many Reproaches and Contumelies and so undauntedly endure so many Tortures and Miseries so many Bonds and Imprisonments so many Martyrdoms and Persecutions onely to bear Testimony to what themselves knew to be a lewd and shameless Imposture 'T is a likely thing that so many plain and simple Men should conspire together to the manifest ruine of all their worldly Interests onely to gain credit and belief to a palpable Falshood That so many hundreds that pretended to be eye Witnesses both of all our Saviour's Miracles in his life-Life-time and his Resurrection after Death should lay down their Lives to attest a false Report and that no Torments no nor the most cruel Death could ever prevail upon any of them to deny or disown their Testimony It is possible indeed though not very usual that Men should lay down their Lives for a false Opinion because it is possible for them to believe it to be true but it is by no means credible that they should persist to Death for the justification of a false Testimony For if it were false they knew it to be so and then if they will die in defence of its truth they contradict the first instinct of their own Natures and throw away their Lives for nothing Especially when beside that there was no present advantage in the Lie it self so none could ensue upon it For they could not possibly expect any reward of Wealth or Honour or Power from the propagation of an extravagant and a proofless Lie Nay they quickly found that they must either part with all that was dear to them in this Life and even Life it self or forbear to spread and divulge the Fable Now that Beings endued with humane Nature should act and suffer after such a rate for no design at all nay against the design of all designs is a thing so cross to all belief that I may challenge all the Infidels in the World to assign any one thing that is more incredible If a great number of harmless and well-meaning Persons should offer their Oaths to attest any matter of Fact it justly commands and immediately over-rules our Belief And yet it is an easie thing to suppose that a great multitude would seal it with their Blood that they saw Jesus doe so many miraculous things though they were conscious to themselves that they never saw him doe any one of them They were certainly in a very pleasant humour when they covenanted among themselves to sacrifice both their Lives and Fortunes to abuse the World with an
in the Gospel that other Historians are concern'd to record as well as the Christians are exactly true that is at least a very fair probability that the Christian Writers were faithfull in those other Relations that are peculiar to their own History And this is all that can be expected from foreign Testimony for if such Writers had been exact in the Records of our Saviour's Actions they had then been Christians and not Jews or Heathens Supposing them therefore as they were no Friends to Christianity they have given in all that suffrage to it that can be reasonably demanded from them And now as for the proof hereof it had been much more easie than it is had it not been for the pride and vanity of some of our modern Criticks who care very little what becomes of the truth or falshood of things so they can shew their censuring Faculty upon words and particularly they have in this case set themselves with their utmost critical Severity to disparage or destroy the most eminent Testimonies cited by the Ancients out of foreign Writers in behalf of Christianity Scaliger the Father of them all led the Dance upon what motive I cannot imagine unless it were out of Envy to the Fame and Glory of Eusebius against whom he particularly set himself and his endeavours but however the design looking like a Novelty and carrying in it an ostentation of Learning for that reason alone he could not want a great number of Followers among that sort of Men. But to what little purpose they have spent all their pains and peevishness I now come to represent And here first Josephus the Jew who was contemporary with the Apostles agrees all along with the Evangelists in the History of that time He gives the same account and description of John the Baptist as we reade in the Gospels He gives us the same narration of Herod the Tetrarch and particularly of his marrying his Brother's Wife He mentions the Tax of Cyrenius He records the Acts of the several Governours of Judaea Pontius Pilate Felix and Portius Festus and describes the succession of the several High priests Caiaphas Joha and Alexander the death of Herod Agrippa and of Saint James the Brother of our Lord nay he gives not onely a just History but an high Character of our Lord himself All which our learned Men are willing enough to pass as certain and warrantable History excepting onely that passage concerning our Saviour Onely there is one difficulty in the Tax of Cyrenius which Saint Luke says was about the time of our Saviour's Nativity but Josephus not till after the Banishment of Archelaus which hapned at least nine years after the Death of Herod so that which way to reconcile this difference learned Men have been much puzled and towards its solution have started variety of Conjectures And therefore though it is of no very great concernment I shall give some account of it before I proceed to the Testimony concerning Jesus § XII And first of all Baronius tells us plainly that Josephus is mistaken but then this is to cut the Knot not to untie it for our business is to reconcile him and the sacred History but if we utterly reject him instead of answering the Objection we grant it viz. that there are irreconcileable differences between him and the Evangelists Though here I cannot but wonder at the unusual disingenuity of Casaubon who whereas Baronius affirms that Josephus does in many things of Chronology contradict Saint Luke and therefore if we must stand to his Authority that will enforce us to reject the Evangelist he I say inveighs and declaims upon this as if it were Baronius his Assertion and not his Argument and rates him severely as if he had positively affirm'd that the Testimony of Josephus was sufficient to oblige us to quit that of the Evangelist Whereas he onely makes use of it as a forcible Objection against appealing to Josephus in any matters wherein he contradicts the Scriptures for in such cases says he we cannot admit him without rejecting them Now I say from hence to infer that Baronius affirm'd that we were obliged so to doe became not the ingenuity of a learned Man But the truth of it is to observe once for all Casaubon was little less partial towards one Extreme than Baronius towards the other For as it was the custom of that learned Cardinal and the Writers of the Church of Rome to rake together every thing that might serve their Cause embracing the forged and spurious as well as the true and undoubted records of Antiquity So Casaubon and the learned Men of his way have been as diligent to weaken the Authority of all the most ancient and most authentick Writers so that there is not the least slip in any of the Ancients that they have not observed in their critical Notes upon them and beside that they reject whole Books of the best and earliest Antiquity But by this means they have between them both done this great service to the Christian Church that as they have discover'd the fraud of supposititious Books so they have confirm'd the Authority of the true and genuine And it is by occasion of their disputes that we are come to a certain knowledge of all the sincere records of Antiquity So that at last the Epistles of Ignatius and the Apostolical Canons that have been most of all opposed have by those great endeavours that have been employed to destroy their Authority gain'd and will for ever keep as undoubted a credit as the most unquestion'd pieces of Justin Martyr or Irenaeus The next guess is that of Beza which is followed and variously emproved by Scaliger Casaubon Grotius and others viz. That Cyrenius was employed by Augustus to take two several Musters of the People one with a Tax and the other without it and that was it that was made at the time of our Saviour's Birth For Augustus designing that compendious Account of the Roman Empire which Historians so often speak of and which he left as a guide and direction to his Successours in the Empire sent several Officers through the several Provinces to take an exact account of the number and condition of the Inhabitants and for this purpose though Quintilius Varus were then Prefect of Syria Cyrenius was join'd in Commission with him as a Person that was by reason of his residence in Syria and his Wars in Cilicia exactly acquainted with the Affairs of the East as afterwards he was sent with C. Caesar on the same Errand and when Judaea was reduced into the form of a Province after the Banishment of Archelaus and the first Tax to be imposed immediately by the Romans upon the People he was particularly singled out as the Person most able to manage it So that it is not unlikely that he might be employed in this business though not himself but Quintilius Varus was then Prefect of Syria And if this be so then
and transactions of his Life were open and conspicuous to the World he laid not the scene of his actions in a dark unknown or undiscover'd corner of the Earth but he appear'd in one of the most eminent places of all Asia all his Works were perform'd amidst his Enemies and he chose the Jews the most jealous and the most prejudiced People in the World for the Eye-witnesses of his Miracles and the Companions of his Conversation But above all Jerusalem it self the most famous City at that time in that part of the World was the scene of his most publick Actions there it was that he was put to death in the presence not onely of that City but of the whole Nation there it was that he rose from the dead there it was that his Disciples first publisht his Resurrection and there it was that some of them wrought undeniable Miracles in proof of the Divinity of his Power and the Truth of their own Testimony And Origen has observed very well that the publick Death of Jesus in the sight of all the People of the Jews was design'd by the Divine Providence as an advantageous circumstance to demonstrate the truth of his Resurrection for if it had been private and not notorious to all the Nation though he had afterward risen from the dead as he did the obscurity of his Death might have been pleaded against the certainty of his Resurrection But beside the notoriety of the matter of Fact among the Jews the strange Stories that were reported of him in a little time fill'd the World with noise and wonder No Affair in that Age was more talked of than the Story of Jesus of Nazareth every body made enquiry into the circumstances of his Actions and they were exposed to the malice of the Jews and the curiosity of the Philosophers There was never Man born as Eusebius observes upon whose account the whole World was so much concern'd as upon that of Jesus of Nazareth Mankind being as it were at first divided concerning him so that the controversie is not improperly styled by Nicephorus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the struggling and concussion of the World Now 't is a likely matter and worthy our belief that a few simple and illiterate persons should have the confidence but much more the ability to perswade the World into the belief of a Legend so palpable and so obnoxious to contradiction That they should be so impudent as to begin to publish the strange Story of his Life and stranger one of his Resurrection even in Jerusalem it self and amidst his most implacable Enemies where though it were so easie to discover the bold and manifest cheat if a cheat at all that yet it should pass without any contradiction of the matter of Fact and meet with such prodigious and unparallel'd entertainment in the Minds of so many thousands of its Inhabitants Certainly they must have been puissant and irresistible Arguments wherewith they could so briskly bear down and vanquish Jewish stubbornness Their prejudices were too strong to be overcome by any weaker proof than evident and undeniable demonstration and had they not brought some such thing along with them they might to as much purpose have preached to the Stones of the Temple as to the People of Jerusalem But that I say is the wonder that they should first publish this strange story in the very place where it was acted and yet if it were false not onely escape being convicted of Forgery which it was impossible they should upon supposition of its being false but force great numbers of Persons against their most stubborn prejudices to own and submit to the truth of their Relation and from that very place in a short time to propagate the belief of it all the World over This is the thing that I affirm not to be at all possible in the course of humane Affairs that a matter of Fact of such a nature and under these circumstances if really and indeed false should ever gain so great a belief of its being true I will grant that Mankind may be imposed upon in matters of meer Opinion as much as any Man can require but matter of Fact is of a quite different nature that depends not so much upon Mens Understandings as their Senses and the Senses of all Mankind are alike here is no difference between the learned and the unlearned And though a false Story may for a while be imposed upon the common People yet unless it appear to prove it self true with an evidence proportionable to its weight it either dyes and vanishes of its own accord or is convicted of Forgery by the more wise and judicious when they come to enquire into its grounds and pretences And yet this Story the more it was enquired into the more firmly it was believed and learned Men every where and of all persuasions when they came to examine into it could not bring their Minds to any issue concerning it till at length they were forced to resign up themselves to its full belief I have indeed heard some witty Gentlemen as our phantastick Age very much abounds with such shrew'd persons compare the first propagation of Christianity in those parts of the World with that of the late growth and spreading of the folly of Quakerism in England than which nothing could be more enormously surmised for setting aside a thousand other defects in the comparison it is notorious that that wild and enthusiastick Sect did not set up upon the pretence of a new Revelation but onely pretended to raise some foolish and fanatique conceits of their own upon supposition of the truth of an old one But if the leaders of that Rabble when they first appear'd about thirty years since at York and Bristol had pretended to have wrought in those great Cities such kind of Miracles as are recorded of our Saviour and his Apostles no Man can doubt but that they had been long since buried in contempt and oblivion And yet that is the case of Christianity that such a matter of Fact as that was gain'd such a firm belief in the place where it was first published and acted too and from thence all the World over onely by the undeniable evidence of its own Proofs and Miracles For the Men of that Age were every whit as cautious and incredulous as the Wits of ours and as I shall shew anon their Minds were prepossest with stronger prejudices of Atheism and Infidelity How then could this Story of Jesus prevail so effectually upon them but by the undeniable evidence of its truth and certainty and when it carried with it nothing in the World whereby it might bribe their belief nay when it labour'd under all other objections but onely evidence of Truth I will challenge any sober Man to frame any the least tolerable Hypothesis how it was so much as possible that it should prevail had not its truth been vouched by the most undoubted and
unquestionable proofs in the World § XX. This is the first invincible Impediment of Christianity supposing it had been false but whether true or false it labour'd under many other great disadvantages that it could never have surmounted but by the irresistible evidence and certainty of its truth And the first is its contrariety to the Vice and Wickedness of that Age in which it was first divulged The World being at that time as is evident from the Records that are left of it extreamly debaucht both in its Manners and Principles For Julius Caesar having violated all the Laws of his Countrey and overthrown the old Government that had always kept up a generous sense of Vertue and Integrity and by that means chiefly raised it self to that vast Greatness that afterwards so much exposed it to the attempts of ambitious Men. For though that spirit began to work in the time of Marius and passed down through all the great Men Cinna Sulla and Pompey all of them struggling for the sole Sovereignty of so vast an Empire the design was never compleatly compassed but by the boldness and activity of Julius Caesar. Now the success of the Caesarean Faction that were generally Atheists and Epicureans against the Patriots of the old State that were as generally eminent for Worth and Honour Vertue and Integrity and Zeal for the publick Good made the thriving Principles and Practices quickly come into Fashion and Reputation with the World And after the Death of Brutus we find no such thing as an ancient Roman but what he said in passion was seriously and universally embraced as a great truth That Vertue was nothing but an empty name So that if we survey the Roman History before and after the Usurpation of Caesar it does not look like the History of the same Nation the former abounding with the bravest examples of Gallantry and Magnanimity whereas in the latter we are generally entertain'd with no other politicks than Fraud and Treachery Even the admired wisedom of the great Augustus himself was no better than craft and dissimulation And though his Successour Tiberius be particularly remarqued for that Vice it was onely because he was not able to act his part so artificially as his Predecessour had done who dyed with that particular comfort to himself that he had so skilfully played the Comedy of humane Life and certainly of all Princes upon Record he had the most subtile faculty of appearing highly honest without any design of ever being so In short under his Reign all the Principles of Atheism and Impiety were prevalent in the Court of Rome that then prescribed Manners to the best part of the then known World neither were their Practices disagreeing to their Principles for as they cast off all restraints of Vertue and Modesty so they entirely devoted themselves to Luxury and Sensuality and studied nothing else than to emprove their bruitish Pleasures to the utmost extravagance of Enjoyment And as was the great Court of Rome so were all the other lesser Courts of their several Prefects and Governours And that not onely by imitation but by the natural baseness of the Men themselves Scarce any but the worst of Men that is Epicureans and Vilains by Principle being prefer'd by J. Caesar to Authority in the Empire though things grew much worse under the Tyranny of Mark Anthony a Man kneaded up of Lust and Malice and the onely reason why he was not more of each was because he was all both for he would never unless for the sake of his Lust quit his Cruelty nor ever unless to satisfie his Cruelty forsake his Lust and as himself was made up of all manner of Baseness so he would advance none to preferment but such as had recommended themselves to his good liking by their more than ordinary Wickedness And for that reason it was that Judaea and the parts about it were at that time more over-run with Vice and Debauchery than in any former Age in that Herod one of the vilest Men that ever lived had by the patronage of Mark Anthony obtain'd their Government and by a long Reign over them after his Patron 's Death under Augustus had familiarised all manner of the most licentious Wickedness to the People even so much that one half of the leading Men even among the Jews themselves that had been so famous through all Ages for their reverence to their Religion were no better than open and avowed Atheists Now how was it possible for such a Doctrine as Christianity that consists of Precepts of Chastity and Sobriety of Truth and Honesty of Kindness and Charity and of renouncing the Pleasures of this Life for the Rewards of another to make its way into such a wicked World as this Men of atheistical Principles are of all others the most stubborn and inflexible they scorn all manner of better Information and will not endure to enquire into the truth of any thing that might possibly undeceive them so that there is no way to overcome Persons so prejudiced and so conceited unless we can by the meer evidence of things force them into conviction And as for Men of luxurious Lives they have neither Mind nor Leisure to attend to any thing that may reclaim them It is Pain to them to think of parting with their Pleasures they will labour to preserve them upon any terms and as long as they are able to resist no information shall be able to fasten on them and therefore when the Christian Religion so suddenly reformed infinite numbers from all sorts of Vices it must have brought along with it a real Evidence equal to its pretended Authority for as it pretended to a Divine Commission by virtue whereof it required strict Obedience to all its Commands so it must have proved the reality of its Commission by such certain Evidence that it was not possible for the most refractory Persons to withstand its force and therefore when we find such multitudes so wonderfully prevail'd upon to quit their most beloved Lusts and Vices we have reason from thence onely to conclude that they were more than convinced of the undeniable truth of its pretences § XXI The next disadvantage of Christianity was its bold and open defiance to the establisht and inveterate Religions of the World For of all prejudices those of Religion are the strongest and the older they are the deeper root they take And therefore when its Enemies could plead the antiquity of many hundred years against it it could not but be a very difficult task to perswade them out of such an ancient Prescription It s meer Novelty was an Objection of no small force but when a new and upstart Religion would not be content with its own Authority but must disgrace all the settled Religions in the World and refuse its own settlement unless they may be utterly extirpated this could not but seem too sawcy a demand especially to Princes and great Men to require of them not onely
little agreement among themselves concerning the manner of the preparatory Fast before Easter and yet this variety being of long standing among them no Man thought himself obliged to impose his own particular conceit upon others in such an indifferent thing and last of all minds him of the prudence and moderation of his Predecessours especially Policarp and Anicetus who did not so much as go about to perswade one another to change the ancient custom of their Church And the effect of these Epistles from all places especially of this of Irenaeus probably was this that they diverted Victor from pursuing his design For we do not find that he ever actually excommunicated the Asian Churches but onely that he threatned it But whether he did or did not it is a worthy piece of ingenuity to charge the folly of one furious and intemperate Man upon the whole Church and that in spite of their own protestation against it And yet this is all the grossness and folly wherewith our Innovatours have made so much noise against them And thus having removed this poor Objection which I could not avoid because it has of late appear'd among us with so much huff and confidence I proceed to the remaining Witnesses of our primitive Tradition And here I cannot pass by Papias for though he were a Person of no great Learning or Judgment yet he was a Man of clear Honesty and Simplicity and living near the time of the Apostles themselves did not search after their Story in Books but made it his particular business to enquire of their familiar acquaintance after their Sayings and Customs If any came in my way says he that was a follower of the Apostles forthwith I enquired of him after the Sayings of the Ancients what Andrew what Peter what Philip what Thomas or James or John or Matthew or any other of the Lords Disciples what Ariston and John the Elder distinguisht from John the Evangelist and out of the Catalogue of the Apostles Disciples of the Lord were wont to say for I did not think I could profit my self more by reading their Books than by the more lively report of those Persons who are still alive and heard their discourses This is a peculiar sort of Testimony given in to a matter of Fact by a Man plain and simple and yet curious and inquisitive who inform'd himself of the truth of the things so lately transacted not onely by reading the Narratives that were written of them but from the more lively information of such who received it from Eye-witnesses I will easily grant that he was as Eusebius describes him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Person of a small Judgment and by consequence of little Authority as to his Opinion especially of the Millennium of which yet himself was not the first Authour but was betrayed into it by the Tradition of the Jews who generally believed that their Messias should reign a thousand years upon Earth in all manner of greatness and glory and therefore it was no wonder if those who were converted from Judaism to Christianity brought this Opinion along with them onely understanding the Jews more gross and carnal Notion in a more refined and spiritual sense and this was the dispute in those early days against the Jewish Hereticks particularly Cerinthus who believed of our Saviour as they had of the Messias that they expected that he should come once more upon Earth and reign at Jerusalem in all manner of pomp and grandeur but be that as it will Papias was ever thought of as a Man of a downright and untainted Integrity and had both the advantage of conversing with those that conversed with the Apostles and the curiosity of recording all the Traditions which they delivered to him by word of mouth and lastly was satisfied in that way of information of the truth of all those things that were registred concerning Jesus and his Apostles To him ought to be ranked Quadratus who wrote an Apologetick to the Emperour Adrian in which he positively avers that many of the Persons cured by our Lord of their Diseases were alive in his time and Aristides a Christian Philosopher at Athens who at the same time presented a learned and eloquent Apology to the same Emperour in behalf of the same cause § XXXII This is the first file of Witnesses next and immediately after the Apostles though I might have reckoned the following rank into the same Catalogue because they are twisted with them as they are with one another for as these that I have already mentioned are not all precisely of the same Age yet being of Antiquity enough to be competent Witnesses of the Tradition of the Apostles may be join'd together into one complicated Testimony of it so their next Successours followed them by the same degrees as they followed one another for Succession is not conveyed down like a Chain by certain Links but like a Cord by the same continued interweaving every part being some part of the part above it And though the Ages of the Church are distinguisht by Centuries yet the Lives of Men are not and the beginning of the next series lived with some of the former as they lived with the first that lived with the Apostles so that there is no possibility of making an Interruption any where between the Chanel and the Fountain head whereever we find the Stream that alone will certainly lead us up to its own Original But this will appear more distinctly by the degrees of its Conveyance having therefore brought the Tradition down to the time of M. Aurelius that is a considerable time beyond that of Trajan to which time Scaliger and some others are pleased to complain of a defect of Records but with what reason we have in part already seen and shall now further discover by our following Witnesses who were not onely able to testifie of their own times but of the foregoing Ages Among whom Hegesippus deserves the first place not onely for his great antiquity but for his manner of writing as an Historian and so not concern'd meerly to give an account of the Affairs of his own Age but to make a diligent enquiry into the Records and Transactions of former times He wrote five Books of Ecclesiastical History which he styled Commentaries of the Acts of the Church wherein he has in a plain and familiar style given an account of the Tradition of the Church and the most remarkable passages in it from our Lord's Death till his own time which was about or rather before the Reign of M. Aurelius for he says he came to Rome and stayed there till the time of Anicetus now Anicetus according to the latest computation succeeded in that See at the beginning of the Reign of Aurelius but according to the earlier account under Antoninus Pius so that it is probable that he was at Rome before Policarp And this description he has given of his Voyage that coming to Rome he
with them in their Atheistical Idolatry And this was the grand motive of all their persecutions against them in which they proceeded upon no other Article than that they refused to sacrifice to their Gods So that if the Heathen Religion were absurd and it is certain that nothing could be more so and if all their hatred to Christianity were founded meerly upon their zeal to that this gives a plain account of the unreasonableness of their opposing the Christian Faith notwithstanding the undeniable evidence of its Divinity And this I shall endeavour to prove as I have in the case of the Jews from the matter of Fact it self And thereby it will appear not onely that the Assertion is a probable but a certain truth and so will not onely answer but confute the Objection by proving that all the reason that Men had to oppose Christianity was their being grosly unreasonable And this I shall make good first as to publick Persecutions secondly private Oppositions The first Persecution was raised by Nero a Prince sufficiently branded for all manner of Folly and Wickedness but above all for his brutish and inhumane Cruelty and therefore it ought to be no wonder that a Person so barbarous to all Mankind even to his dearest Friends and nearest Relations should vent some of his fury upon the Christians But as bad as he was and I do not remember any Prince unless Caligula more wild and extravagant in his manners and will allow the truth of that Character which Suetonius gives of him It a degenerasse à suorum Virtutibus Neronem ut tamen Vitia cujusque quasi tradita ingenita retulerit That he lost all the Vertues of his Ancestours and retain'd all their Vices yet for all that I cannot but think him to have been painted a much greater Monster than he deserved I will indeed grant his Folly to have exceeded the ordinary rate of Madness especially his Vanity of Fidling Singing and acting of Plays for which he so highly valued himself and was so ridiculously flattered by others and for the glory of it neglected all Affairs of State left Rome to shew his skill in the Cities of Greece return'd home with triumphal Pomp in the habit of a Player and with the shews of all his Victories In short he was not so jealous of a Rival in the Empire as of a skilfull Comedian and at his fall was much more grieved to be upbraided with being a bad Fidler than a bad Emperour Neither was he less exorbitant in his Lust than in his Vanity and it was both together that so much exposed him to the publick scorn and hatred of the People But for the Vice of Cruelty wherewith he is so severely charged and of which no doubt he was highly guilty I cannot but think him overloaded by the Historians It was indeed a wild Paradox attempted by Cardan though wittily perform'd to write an Encomium of his great Vertues but above all his Clemency in which he will have him to have excelled the best of the Roman Emperours yet that he was not so bloudy as he is usually represented appears as by many other Acts of Mercy towards his Enemies so particularly as tender as he was of his Reputation by not punishing as most other Emperours were wont to doe the known Libellers against his Person and Government with capital Penalties And as for his other Severities this at least is to be pleaded in his behalf the prodigious and unparallel'd Wickedness of the Age that was so universally debauched that there was scarce a Man in it of reputation enough to give Testimony against him So that though he were both hated and condemned by the Senate it self yet the ground of the contention between them was who should have the greatest Empire in Wickedness and his restraint of their Enormities particularly their inhumane Extortion is no improbable account of their great displeasure against him And for this reason the number of his Executions is no proper Objection against his Government for that might come to pass not from his cruelty but from their own wicked practices and therefore nothing can be determin'd from that against him but by inquiring into the cause of those that suffer'd and unless it appear as it does not that they were falsely accused and unjustly condemned their being executed proves nothing either for or against him And as for his cutting off so many of his nearest Kindred the question is whether themselves forced him not to it in his own defence and if they did then it was not choice but necessity And whatever he did for reason of State was according to the practices of those times very allowable As for the Death of his Father Claudius there is no evidence that he had any hand in it that was wholly the Wickedness of Agrippina And though he seem'd too ungratefull to his memory by speaking reproachfully of him it is apparent that he was put upon it by the instigation of Seneca whom it seems that dull Emperour had disobliged As for Agrippina she was a Woman of intolerable Pride and unheard of Cruelty she had poison'd her Husband to derive the Crown upon her Son she had threatned to poison him and transfer it to Germanicus in short she would not suffer him to enjoy any share or any quiet in the Government Now what was to be done with a Woman of this temper Indeeed to kill her she being his Mother how wicked soever was inhumane and unnatural yet however her practices could not but force him to some undecent severity At least it is plain that at first he used her with due respect and bore her insolence with extraordinary patience till he saw both his Life and his Empire attempted and then it was but time to secure himself though he ought to have done it some gentler way than by putting her to Death In short if Agrippina were so bad as the Historians represent her to have been Nero was not because his cruel usage of her was in a great measure forced by her own wickedness As for Germanicus he must dye not onely as a declared Rival to the Empire but as the true and rightfull Heir of the Crown And this practice was grown so familiar that there was not an Emperour but either got the Crown or secured it by murther All which came to pass by the prodigious dotage of Augustus who after all his great craft instead of securing the Empire to his own nearest Kindred onely obliged his Successours to murther them for their own security For when he passed over the right Heirs to settle the Empire upon Tiberius it was obvious that Tiberius could never think himself secure in his Throne till all that had an antecedent right to it were removed out of the way So that the blame of Tiberius his Cruelty is in a great measure to be charged upon Augustus his Folly who by his preposterous settlement of the Crown upon him made it
illic reperietis primum Neronem in hanc sectam cum maximè Romae orientem Caesariano gladio ferocisse Sed tali dedicatore damnationis nostrae etiam gloriamur Qai enim scit illum intelligere potest non nisi grande aliquod bonum à Nerone damnatum Tentaverat Domitianus portio Neronis de crudelitate sed qua homo facile coeptum repressit restitatis etiam quos relegaverat If you search your own Records you will find that Nero was the first Emperour that imbrued his hands in Christian Blood but we glory in the hatred of such an Enemy as Nero for whoever knows the Man cannot but know that it must be some very great good thing that Nero hates And Domitian too a piece of the same cruelty made the same attempt but having in him either some little humanity or the inconstancy of Mankind for which of these Tertullian means by his qua homo is altogether ambiguous he desisted from his design and revoked his own proscriptions § XXXIX The Third Persecution hapned under the Reign of Trajan and was set on foot upon variety of designs all which were very remote from any fair Inquiry into the cause of Christianity it self The first was the old jealousie of our Saviour's Kindred and the Line of David and this as Hegesippus informs us was started by the Jews and the Gnosticks against Symeon the Son of Cleophas the Brother of Joseph then Bishop of Jerusalem and that at a time when all the Royal Family of Judah wer sought after and dispatched out of the way as pretended Rivals of the Empire And for this reason was this good Old man put to death in the Hundred and one and twentieth year of his Age. The Second motive of this Persecution was the Emperour's great jealousie of those Societies call'd Heteriae that had often created great mischief and trouble to the Empire and therefore for the prevention of such disturbances he strictly forbad all manner of associations and publick meetings and in this point of Government he was so peremptory that when Pliny moved him to erect a Corporation of Smiths at Nicomedia as a great convenience to the City he would by no means be induced to allow it Now the Assemblies of Christians being grown numerous they fell under the edge of this Law and it was accordingly executed against them by the Governours and Pro consuls in their several Provinces It is commonly supposed that this Edict against these Illegal Societies was published on purpose to ensnare the Christian Meetings and it is possible it might be so yet there is no ground for it in History but on the contrary it is manifest that this Emperour was possest with a particular jealousie against all kinds of Assemblies as appears in the foremention'd case of the Smiths of Nicomedia And that he had no particular design against the Christians is evident from his answer to Pliny's Letter by which he inform'd the Emperour how he had executed this Edict in his Province against them and what numbers he had punished for their obstinacy against the Law but having made enquiry into the design of their meetings he was sufficiently satisfied of the innocence of the men and therefore desires directions from him after what manner he should proceed against them or whether at all The Emperour upon this account that he received of the peaceableness of the Christians takes off the severity of his Edict against them and gives instructions that they should not be sought for as being really innocent yet if they were accused and Convicted they should be punished according to Law that is for the good example of Government This seems to have been all that Emperour's design in his Laws and Proceedings against the Christians otherwise certainly he would never have remitted the Execution of a Law of which he was so tender onely for their sakes But because this was the first Prosecution in which we meet with any thing like legal Proceedings against the Christians I shall give an account of all the unjust and unreasonable methods of procedure against them both in this and the following Persecutions and so without troubling the Reader with a distinct Narrative of every one give him a true State of the grounds and reasons of all and from thence it will evidently appear that they proceeded not upon any sober enquiry but were meerly driven on by brutish folly and madness The heads of their accusation then were either real or feigned the feigned were apparently the contrivances of malice and the real were as apparently the charges of folly as I shall shew in each particular The first and great charge of all was the Christians contempt of their Gods and Religion But here the cause of Paganism was so foul and brutish that it was the most dishonourable abuse that ever was put upon humane nature and were not the matter of fact undeniably evident it would have been incredible that Mankind should ever sink into such a senseless stupidity The Barbarous People whom the Greeks and Romans so much despised Worshipped onely the Heavenly Bodies but these Polite these Civilised these Philosophical Nations deified the worst of things and the worst of men and replenisht Heaven with such a rout of Deities as made it look more like a Jail full of Rogues and Villains than an Habitation of Gods and they relate such foul things of them that one would scarce believe such ill reports of the vilest of Men and if their Enemies would have set themselves to have contrived Stories that might render them odious and contemptible the blackest calumnies they could have fastned upon them must have fall'n short of the extravagance of their own Reports And as were their Gods such was their Worship too all lewdness and Debauchery and such things were acted in their Temples as were not allowed in the publick Stews The foulest uncleannesses were their highest Devotions How lascivious and obscene were the Ceremonies of Cibele Priapus Flora and Venus who were Worshipt with nothing but the vilest Lust and Wantonness So foul and beastly were the celebrated Mysteries of Bacchus that the Senate of Rome it self was at last forced to banish them out of Italy as the foulest example of Lust and Debauchery In short the prodigious Stories that they told of their greatest Deities Saturn Jupiter Ceres or the Mother of the Gods as much exceeded the wickedness of Mankind as Heaven is higher than the Earth Though the truth is they represented them much worse than they were whilst they made them work Miracles to compass their brutish ends for when all is done they were neither better nor worse than Mortal Men. Saturn and Jupiter were known Tyrants in Crete Apollo a common Fidler the Muses Servant Maids AEsculapius a Tooth drawer in Arcadia Venus a known Strumpet to Cinyras King of Cyprus not long before the Trojan War These and like these were the Gods they Worshipt and how this folly first