the true God and delivered the same to us disintricated from the confusion of so many false Deities to whom our Ancestors were devoted It gave them to know after what manner the World was at first formed and ha's preserved fresh amongst them the memory of the most remarkable matters that arrived in that primitive Age of Men of which other nations have had onely some kind of obscure and faint glimpses in fabulous stories which afford onely enough evidence to convince the books of the Pagans of vanity and to confirm the truth of what is found in the Jewish histories And that which advantages them yet more is that their Law contains such an excellent model of all piety and virtue that more wisdom ha's been revealed to them in ten words onely then can be collected out of the Books of all the Philosophers were the quintessence extracted out of them In a Word the Books of their Law and the Revelations of their Prophets are proceeded from Heaven and as it shall more amply appear they bear with them most undeniable testimonies of it But the polity of their Religion how divine soever was to be changed and its time being expired we must otherwhere seek the rules of that which we ought to follow Wherefore to shew that their Law was to be changed and that it was establisht but for a time it must be consider'd in each of its principal parts As in the Political Laws upon which their Republick was founded In their Ceremonial Ordinances in observation whereof consisted all their external divine service And in the Ten Commandments of the Two Tables which contain the General Precepts of piety towards God and virtue which ought to be practis'd amongst men As for their Political Laws they were excellent indeed for the government of that Nation and establish'd with singular Wisdom But I conceive there is no Jew so opinative as to account them proper for the government of all sorts of Nations in all Ages For every country every people and time must have its respective laws and there is necessity of altering the same according to the variety of circumstances And as Divorce was permitted in the Commonwealth of Israel in its political government for some necessity particular to that Nation so there may be some other Nations in which likewise for some political necessity it must be absolutely forbidden It would seem unreasonable in a country where the houses are built with plain ridges for the publick authority to demolish all sort of edifices of that fashion enjoin to build only with battlements and ballisters Now it is as little comprehensible how in such a Country as France is the Laws given by Moses concerning the determination of Law-suits could be practis'd It would be requisite not only to change the order of Magistrates and practise of Courts but to new mold the manners of the intire Nation And how could the divers forms of Governments of Kingdoms and Empires be conformed to the political Law of Israel as Monarchy in France Aristocracy in Venice and Democracy in Athens Must they that should become Jews in these parts of Europe renounce all soverain powers that are so well establish'd therein according to the genius of every Nation to reform them all according to the model of the Jewish policy And if the great Cham of the Tartars with all his subjects should cause themselves to be circumcised to what purpose would the Laws of Tenths for the Levites the like be in his Country Indeed all the policy of Israel was regulated either according to the nature of that people different from most others or according to the division of their Tribes wherewith other Nations had no resemblance or else according to the quality of the Country which was unlike to others in many respects But on the other side their great Legislator the most pious amongst their Kings and the divinest amongst their Prophets have expresly promis'd the Calling of the Nations to the communion of one and the same Law with the Jews so that they shall make up but one people Rejoyce O ye Nations his people saith Moses Deut. 32.43 And David in the 117. Psalm O praise the Lord all ye Nations praise him all ye people Why but for being called to his knowledge And in Psal 69.1 O sing unto the Lord a new song All the Earth sing unto the Lord vers 3. Declare his glory among the heathen and his Wonders among all people But Isaiah more expresly when he promises in the 55. chap. of his Revelations that the Messias shall be equally a Legislator of the Jews and others vers 4. Behold I have given him for a witness to the Nations to be a leader and commander of the people Behold thou shalt call a Nation that thou knewest not and the Nations which knew not thee shall run unto thee because of the Lord thy God And 't is for the same reason that he speaks thus to the Church of God in the foregoing Chapter Sing O barren thou that didst not bear break forth into singing and cry aloud thou that knowest not what it is to travel with child c. Enlarge the place of thy tent and let them stretch forth the curtaines of thy Pavillions spare not lengthen thy cord and strengthen thy stakes For thou shalt spread forth on the right hand and on the left and thy posterity shall inherit the Nations and make the desolate Cities to be inhabited And the Jews themselves await the accomplishment of these promises Wherefore it follows necessarily that their Law as to the policy of the Commonwealth was to alter and that whereas before it oblig'd all those who had any interest and title in the Alliance which God had contracted with them the use thereof in this respect is now become free and not necessarily obligatory The truth is though political Laws of Republicks be nothing but the natural laws of justice and honesty which being general are applyed to particular matters according to the diversity of circumstances which are infinite and infinitely variable provided that in the government of every Nation the image of that natural justice be always resplendent in their Laws it is not important whether there be difference in things of lesser concernment And it would be too rigorous a yoak to subject all Nations to the same form of Laws without regard whether the humors of men and conditions of times permit it Now whereas the Law of Moses is composed of three parts equally the change of one necessarily infers with it the alteration of the rest And it must needs fall out here as it do's in the building of Palaces For he that should go about to change one part of a great uniform edifice it would be needful for him to change it all and ruine it all from top to bottom otherwise the disparity of its parts would render it unproportional and deformed But this is more manifest in the Ceremonial Law in
of it immediately after vers 6. Thus saith the Lord of Hosts Yet once it is a little while and I will shake the Heavens and the Earth and the Sea and the dry land Vers 7. And I will shake all Nations and the desire of all Nations shall come and I will fill this house with glory saith the Lord of Hosts Vers 9. The glory of this latter house shall be greater then of the former saith the Lord of Hosts and in this place will I give peace Now of whom can this be understood but of the Messias who was to enter into it and effectively fill this house with glory What else could advance it so as not onely to equal but transcend the magnificence of the other And indeed Malachy who liv'd and prophesied at the same time speaks it plainly in the 3. chap. vers 1. Behold I will send my Messenger and he shall prepare the way before me and the Lord whom ye seek shall suddenly come to his Temple even the Messenger of the Covenant whom ye delight in Behold he cometh saith the Lord of Hosts They will say perhaps that Haggai foresaw that Herod would enlarge and enrich it so magnificently that it should equal or surpass even that of Solomon And 't is true as Histories inform us that he advanc'd the same to a far greater splendor then rhat which the poor returned exiles had given it But seeing all the pompous state that he bestowed on it was but the effect of his vast and boundless ambition which he express'd almost every where by proud structures as amongst others in the City and Haven of Caesarea to the end his power and greatness might be admir'd and not the divine glory promoted how could it be agreeable to God to attribute to him the vanity of a man and even of such a man who was a stranger if not absolutely in profession at least in heart and affection from his Covenants and a cruel bloody usurper of the government of his people And if it was not well-pleasing to God that David should build him a Temple because his hands had been bloodied in so many wars which he had manag'd though very just and undertaken out of necessity for the deliverance of Israel and for the Glory of God himself how could he take pleasure in the vanity of this Monster who was formed and elemented of wind and blood and dirt Besides though it had been built all of Saphires and Diamonds could that glory have rendred it comparable to the least of the five mentioned particulars or would it have been worth the pains that God should promise to shake the Sea and the dry land the Heavens and the Earth for it to cause I say by his infinite power a universal change in the face of the World and to what purpose were it to mention the shaking of all Nations to bring the choice of them into that Temple if there were no more signifi'd by it then the proud magnificence of the Pile and vast greatness of the Stones And what Nation ever changed their seat to go to see it or to send offerings thither by their Ambassadors We see therefore the Temple demolish'd and all the attempts made to re-edifie it defeated by a special demonstration of the anger of God against them that endevour'd it so that there remains onely the dust of its ruines after neer sixteen hundred years without ever having been filled with the glory promised to it if the Messias be not yet come as the Jews pretend In the third place Daniel in the 9. chap. determinately foretold the time since the expiration of which are past a dozen Ages Seventy weeks saith the Angel are determined upon thy people and upon thy holy City to finish the transgression and to make an end of sins and to make reconciliation for iniquity and to bring in everlasting righteousness and to seal up the vision and prophecy and to anoint the most Holy Know therefore and understand that from the going forth of the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem unto the Messiah the Prince shall be seven weeks and threescore and two weeks That this place ought to be understood of the Messias nothing but obstinate blindness can dissent and 't is very strange that Passion should so feel up the eyes of some of them that in hatred of our Lord they should interpret it of some other For to whom belongs it but to the Messias either to be styled the Anointed by way of excellence or to put an end to Prophecies or to bring in and manifest eternal righteousness or to make propitiation for offenses Now what is meant by those seventy weeks Septenaries of daies or weeks or months or years or ages Of weeks of days and weeks of years there is frequent mention in the Old Testament of the rest there occur no examples And surely they cannot understand it of Ages for so they would refer the coming of the Messias to too remote a distance of time and of fifty thousand years which Daniel should have foretold there would he pass'd little more then two thousand And when would they see the accomplishment of their hopes Therefore they must be septenaries of years or moneths or weeks or dayes and indeed they ought to be understood of years But observe what their subterfuge is and to what they constantly retreat to defend their opiniastry That indeed the time prefixed by the Prophets for the sending of the Messias is expired but 't is their sins which hinder them from seeing the accomplishment of those promises By reason of them God ha's delay'd the time of their visitation and deferr'd the exhibition of the Messias and consequently prolong'd the term appointed for the duration of the Law That when they shall have perform'd a sutable repentance they shall see the effect of that which God hath promis'd at which time they do not gainsay but the Law of Moses shall cease But this Evasion is vain For supposing that God defer'd the sending of his Anointed yet at least the Temple ought to have been kept undestroy'd and the Jewish Religion maintained in its integrity and not so dreadful a dispersion of that Nation to have been suffer'd and so total an abolition of all his service For where are his sacrifices and his Altars Why did not He leave some use of them at least during the expectance of the accomplishment of that promise Mal. 1.11 From the rising of the Sun even unto the going down of the same my Name shall be great among the Gentiles in every place incense shall be offered unto my Name and a pure offering Let them consult their own Books God denounced that he would cause the Deluge to come upon the Earth and he executed it at the set time He promised Posterity to Abraham and gave it him contrary to all probability He foretold the Captivity of his Posterity in Aegypt and it came to pass and continued neither
in arms Now what is the cause of this misery but their Sins both such as are common to all men in general and particular to their own Nation For certainly God who lov'd them so tenderly and chose them out from all others to communicate his Covenants to them would not treat them so rigorously were there not some lawful cause in their extraordinary offenses And what a strange blindness and stupidity of mind is it to have so quick a resentment of evils relating to the body and not to acknowledge the cause of them What a depravity and perversity of understanding to groan under the strokes of the hand of God never to groan under the load of their own iniquity To pant incessantly after a Deliverer of the Body and never to think of the redemption of the soul They are driven out of Judaea and Heaven and Earth resound with their lamentations They are by their sins debar'd the hope of Heaven and make no matter of it They are inthralled to their corporeal enemies and murmure against God for it They themselves are sold to Satan and to Sin and do not understand the horror of this servitude They are impatient in a waiting the coming of some Person that may reassemble them from their dispersion and deliver them in reference to the body The Redeemer and Deliverer of their fouls is offer'd and preach'd to them and they reject him They flatter themselves with hope of a profound and plenteous tranquillity in all sorts of pleasures and delights of the Flesh and cheer up themselves with it They are invited to taste how good the Lord is in his compassions and they refute it Their thoughts are day and night upon gold silver silk scarlet fine linnen and jewels and their hearts leap with the fancy The Gospel tells them of riches and ornaments relating to the minde and they blaspheme it Is this the Posterity of that onely wife and intelligent people with whom God establisht his Covenants But above all the rest they do injury to the glory of that Messias who was promised to them to fancy him an earthly Prince For since themselves call his Kingdom the Kingdom of Heaven what other ought they to hope for but one spiritual and heavenly which beginning to be exercis'd here below in the souls of men which are of a spiritual nature is accomplish'd above in glory unspeakable And truly 't is to this that all the Prophets lead us from the first to the last What does that promise refer to The seed of the woman shall break the Serpents head but to the consolation of man by the hope of being deliver'd from the Curse of eternal Death into which he is fallen by the deceit of the Evil One For as he sin'd principally with his soul which is the source and principle of the actions of the body and alone capable of understanding the laws of piety and obedience so it was consentaneous that the condemnation of death should be directed to the soul in case of rebellion And that other promise In thy seed shall all the families of the Earth be blessed and I will give this Land to thee and to thy Posterity after thee wherein did it profit Abraham if it aim'd no further then that Canaan which himself never possess'd and was not given to his Posterity till above 400. years after Was it either a sufficicent consolation to him in all the Crosses that he underwent or a Promise worthy of God who establisht his Covenant with him For which of us cares what will be done a hundred years after his death As for those words of Jacob untill Shiloh come they promise a Prince of peace about whom neither fire nor sword shall glitter but he shall be the author of peace between God and men It shall come to pass saith Isaiah that the Mountain of the Lord shall be established in the top of the mountaines and shall be exalted above the Hills and all Nations shall flow unto it But what to do Come shall they say and let us go up to the Mountain of the Lord and he will teach us his ways and we will walk in his paths Therefore 't is to be enrich'd in the knowledge of the Name of the Lord and not in Jewels or Pearls to learn to moderate and subdue their Passions and not to conquer Kingdomes Also in the 25. chap. 6. vers In this mountain shall the Lord of hosts make unto all people a feast of fat things a feast of Wines on the lees of fat things full of marrow of wines on the lees well refined Can they take this according to the Letter It is certain there are some so stupifi'd with the wine of ignorance that they take it so and expect to be satiated with that horrible Leviathan which is powder'd up I know not where against the manifestation of the Messias Poor people who think the Prince of the Kingdom of Heaven will come to fill their bellies But behold what follows vers 7. And he will destroy in this mountain the face of the covering cast over all people and the veil that is spread over all Nations What is the meaning of this but that all Nations being involv'd in ignorance as in the black veil of night he will dispell all that darkness to the end they may behold the light of his knowledge that they may rejoyce I say in the light of that Sun of Righteousness who carries healing in his wings And thus through out all the Prophets which would be too long to recite there needs no more but to read them For it will be found that he is a Prince of peace upon whom the Spirit of the Lord shall rest the Spirit of Wisdom and Vnderstanding the Spirit of counsel and might the Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord. That under his reign The Wolfe shall dwell with the Lamb and the Leopard lye down with the Kid and the Calfe and the young Lyon and the fatling together and a little child shall lead them c. That is He will unite the most hostile Nations together in the same society of Religion and cicurate and mollifie the fiercest people by the knowledge of the true God and render the most untractable natures gentle and sweet Which the Prophet himself expounds immediately after They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain For the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the Sea He shall not cry nor lift up nor cause his voice to be heard in the street A bruised reed shall be not break and the smoaking flaw shall he not quench So far is it that he shall batter all to pieces with Canon-shot or hew all down with the sword And as for his Glory it must needs be other then terrestrial and corporeal Since he was to be despised and rejected of men a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief Since I say he
God moved upon the face of the waters For what is that Spirit of the Lord A great Wind say they which agitated that confused Mass of the Elements for great things are said to be God's as the Mountains of God But in the first place what verisimilitude is there that Moses should in the beginning of his History make use of a rare phrase and which is not found but in the Books of the other Prophets and perhaps no where else in his own which is enough to evince that it was not yet extant in his time In the next place whence came this great Wind and to what end serv'd it Was it to hinder that great confus'd mass from putrifying God was well able to hinder that and there being as yet no order establisht in Nature it was not needful for God to create a wind supernaturally to prevent the putrifying of the Matter by its agitation And Then the Matter of the Chaos being to continue so little a space in that estate the putrifaction of it was not to be feared Besides the word moved 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 does not signifie such a motion as the blast of a great winde but onely a gentle tremulous concussion in which regard it is attributed to the Eagle's shaking the wings in incubation over its brood as if Moses would have said The Spirit of God gently incubated on the World to cause it to be excluded or brought forth out of that confused matter But many others have handled this Doctrine at large and therefore I shall produce no more testimonies Certainly if regard be had to the Order which Christian Religion observes not so much in reference to these distinct persons considered in themselves for they are abysses which it looks upon as inscrutable as to the effects which are attributed to them in the work of Redemption of Mankind it will be found highly admirable For to the Father as to the first Principal Author of all things it attributes the care and administration of the Justice which takes vengance on the Sins of men So that 't is properly to his Person as Superintendant of the Common right of the Three in what relates to the unity of their Essence that satisfaction ha's been rendred And the first source of that Mercy whereby he was moved to determine to raise man from the misery into which he was fallen And the Invention if I may so speak of that Expedient in order to it by his incomprehensible Wisdom To the Son as to him who assum'd humane Nature and conjoin'd it with the Divine in the unity of his Person and who suffer'd in one of his Natures a Passion of infinite value by reason of the infinite dignity of his other it attributes the work of Redemption both in regard of the satisfaction which he made and the exercise and accomplishing of the other things belonging to his office So all things having been created as the Wise man speaks by that eternal Wisdom it could not be competent but to the same to raise them out of their ruins To the Holy Spirit as to him who being common to the Father and the Son is the Virtue by which both one and the other produces things and bring their purposes into being it attributes the Action which renders both the mercies of the Father and the Performances of the Son beneficial and efficacious to us For what would the Dilection of the Father advantage us if we do not experience it and the satisfaction of the Son if we do not embrace and receive it to the peace and joy of our consciences Which how can we do if the faculties of our Understandings and Wills which are so blind and perverted be not inlightned from above and rectify'd by a supernatural power So the Father who prevented the existence of all things by his goodness hath also prevented them by his mercy in restoring them to a happy being The Son by whom all things were at first created as by the Eternal Wisdom and Word hath re-establish'd and repair'd them And the Holy Spirit by virtue of whom both the Father and the Son accomplish'd the Decree of the Creation of the World hath also been the Virtue of both to perfect actually the restauration of the World Nor ought the Jews here to be exasperated or humane reason demur For as for the Jews since their own Scriptures teach this what can they oppose in contradiction Are they wont to control the words of the Lord or to measure the Doctrine he reveals to them by their own judgements Have they not learnt That his thoughts are not as their thoughts nor his wayes as their wayes but as distant as the Heaven is high above the Earth Have they not learn'd of their Prophet that not onely none hath directed the Spirit of the Lord or being his Counsellor hath taught him but also that there is no possibility of fadoming his understanding Yet their Ancestors who liv'd before the Hatred of Christian Religion had so blinded their Nation perceiv'd some shadows of these truths in the Scripture and have left divers footsteps of them in their Commentaries and Paraphrases speaking so frequently both of the Word and the Wisdom of God and of his spirit as of things distinct that there is but too much to convince the obstinacy of their descendants As for humane Reason it ought not much to be scandalis'd if there be in the nature of God a depth beyond comprehension there being in all other things which seem commensurate to its capacity so many difficulties which check it None ha's yet been found that could give account of that Motion in the Heavens called The Motion of Trepidation yea 't is not yet fully determin'd if we follow the Phaenomena of Astronomers whether the earth circulates about the Sun or the Sun about the Earth The formation of Meteors ha's not hitherto been clearly and certainly explicated nor is there any that pretends confidently to have discover'd their causes throughly The Flux and Reflux of the sea is to Philosophers a secret more deep then any of its abysses and there is no mention of any that ever rightly understood it Then in terrestrial things who is he that can declare to us the nature of the Loadstone what that attractive virtue is which draws Iron to it and that other of it's verticity towards the Poles of the World How numerous mysteries are there in the most easie Sciences which cannot be discover'd to the bottome and how many things seem facil against which the acies of our minds is blunted Who ever understood the reasons of the almost infinite variations which are observ'd in the mixture of the Elements in the production of all things as to colour figure quality quantity medicinal and venemous faculties All the world knows what a Circle is and Children are not ignorant of the shape a Square a Peasant is capable of comprehending that there is according to all appearance some proportion
cripled members after long impotence For what are the works of Magicians usually but illusions and feats of jugling rather then actions surpassing the power of Nature Others of the Jews ascribe his admirable Works to the Cabala pretending that he stole the name of God out of the Temple and that to that ineffable Name 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was annexed the power of doing miracles But besides that this is a shameless fable and unworthy to be taken notice of what colour is there that four Hebrew Letters should have the power of resuscitating the dead And if the Name of God ennabled him to work Wonders was it with the permission of God himself or against his consent If against his allowance surely it would be a pitiful case should a man by subtlety steal the name of God and do miracles by it in spight of him to whom it belongs That God I say should have devested himself of his infinite power to transfer it to four small Hebrew Characters by a irrevocable donation If with his permission and consent then hereby he confirm'd the calling of Jesus and ratified the open and clear declaration he made of being the Messias Which he would never have done in patronage of an imposture God also foreshew'd that the Messias should suffer and David apparently specifi'd the manner of his Death otherwise to what end did he say They pierced my hands and my Feet since in those times of his there was not among the Jews any custome of a punishment in which they pierc'd the hands and feet from whence David might borrow this phrase For as for what they cavil upon the word they pierced me 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as if it ought to be translated as a Lion 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the sence of the sentence which would by that means become imperfect and in suspence refutes it For what can this signifie As a Lyon my hands and my feet there being no connexion to that which precedes Now our Lord Jesus hath suffer'd death even the death of the Cross by which on the one side the words of David have been accomplisht and on the other that ha's been really brought to pass which was figuratively represented by the Lifting up of the Serpent besides that the Curse denounced against those which hang'd upon the tree is become expiated thereby David had said in the 16. Psalm Thou wilt not leave my soul in Hell neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see Corruption To what purpose spoke he thus if he meant it of himself seeing he is dead and in his dust with his fathers And yet he spoke it not extravagantly for the Holy Spirit which guided him did not suffer these words to escape him at randome To whom then ought they rather to be referr'd then to him of whom David was so express a type that he is styled by his Name Therefore since he was to dye and yet ought not undergo putrefaction in the grave it follows that he ought to rise again from the dead and this our Scriptures teach us of Christ and is of most evident verity though the Jews pretend dissatisfaction of it For why shall we not give credit to his Disciples who were eye-witesses of it since they gain'd nothing but persecutions and capital hatreds by maintaining it Who can imagine that men who naturally love Life should spontaneously abandon themselves to death to defend the delusion of a Death from which they could expect nothing Moreover David in the 68 Psalm saith Thou hast ascended on high thou hast lead captivity captive thou hast received gifts for men I beseech you who do's he speak of Is it of God as a person distinct from the Messias It cannot be Throughout all the whole space of Ages which pass'd before Penning of this Psalm never any deliverance was wrought for the people of Israel nor extraordinary favour shewn them whose greatness or manner may correspond to this passage and the strain of the whole Hymne testifies the contrary To whom can it sute but to him in whose time was to be seen the effect of the words which follow in the same place Princes shall come out of Egypt Ethiopia shall soon stretch out her hands unto God By reason of which the Kingdomes of the Earth shall sing praises unto God and Psalms unto the Lord that is to the Messias Now our Lord is ascended into Heaven after his glorious resurrection whence he hath sent those admirable gifts of the spirit which have imbued the people of the Earth with the knowledge of the Lord whereof there need no other proofs then that the Nations heretofore the most ignorant and barbarous have now so much knowledge of the Nature of God and the truths of Religion that they exceed the Jews therein as far at least as they were exceeded by the Jews before the preaching of the Gospel Daniel had foretold that after that Christ should be cut off that is after he should have suffer'd death but not for himself The People of the Prince that shall come shall destroy the City and the Sanctuary and Christ confirmed this Prophecy by foretelling that of Jerusalem and the Temple there should not be left one stone upon another Now who can doubt but that the event hath ratifi'd the Prophecy Lastly it was predicted that he should destroy the Kingdom of Satan and the worship of false Gods and since his times they have been no longer in repute even the most famous oracles have lost their very being Of which there needs no other testimonies then those of Pagan Authors who inquire after the cause of their cessation and of experience after so many Ages that their memory is quite abolisht Very good will some say but of all this we have no authors besides the Evanglists and the Apostles who are therefore justly suspected and lyable to exception as speaking in their own cause And moreover who will warrant to us say they that there were Apostles heretofore or if there were that those Writings were of their composing How frequent are cheats committed in such matters Here 't is difficult to dispute for what argument and how clear soever be brought the thing it self is of greater evidence And the Jews are very unjust and unreasonable if having no other warranty to give us of their Religion but the books of their Prophets whereunto notwithstanding they require we should yield an absolute belief and plye under those magnificent names of Moses David Jeremy Isaiah and the like they demand of us other evidence of ours then the writings of our Apostles For what reason is there to ascribe more to the former then the latter Yet let us comply in this with the obstinacy of men It is demanded whether there were Apostles heretofore But he that should demand whether there was a Caesar at Rome and an Alexander in Greece might with good reason be judg'd troublesome and impertinent for indubitating a thing of so constant credit
Lord Jesus was the Messias Because the preaching of Christ was grounded on this point That God had heretofore by his Prophets promis'd a Messias to the people of Israel who should be the Redeemer of the Nation and he was sent accordingly by God for that end in the fullness of time t in which regard he invited all the world to receive him as the Supreme Prophet Let them speak it out therefore confidently whether Christ be the Messias promised by the Old Testament or not For if he be not it behoveth to become Jews and to account him as they do for the greatest Deceiver that ever was upon the earth and hence forward turn our Churches into Synagogues reducing all Christian order to the ancient manner of the Tabernacle If he be the Messias promised by the Old Testament he is God for that describes him to be such as we have shewn by irrefragable proofs And that those Books of Moses David and the Prophets are divine what we have spoken above in the matter leaves it no longer doubtful Nevertheless admit for the present they be writings purely humane surely these excellent Theologers will not deny least the reading shame them but that they agree all in this particular That from the Nation of the Jews ought one day to arise a great and rare personage who should be King in Israel and should be called the Son and the Branch of the Lord himself And this hath been the expectation of that people in all times with which they comfort themselves still in their deplorable desolation But what moved them to speak in this manner if they had no other instinct but from their own mind Who incited Moses to set this fraud first on foot Why did the others many Ages after so carefully cherish ratifie and augment it in several circumstances with other false prophecies What profit did they reap by deluding the world with such a hope They must have had intelligence so many ages before with a man who was not yet in being to foretell that he should exist and this man born by chance at the just time which they presum'd to determine must have taken occasion from these fortuitous predictions and the expectation rais'd by them in the minds of men to declare himself the person whom so many prophets in so many different times had unanimously presag'd was to exist Now it would be a strange case that Moses should first of all without any necessity of so doing or advantage by it in reference to his design of governing the people of Israel and the establishment of his power take up a fancy of the future arising of some great Prophet and then another should come two or three hundred years after and revive this prediction made at randome and enlarge and clear it up with other new for this opinion was successively more and more confirm'd and rooted in the minds of men and that at length at the time prefixt and the set period there should be found one both confident enough to draw all those presages to his advantage and so favor'd by fortune that all the circumstances of his birth his life and his death should meet together in his person Surely ther 's as much likelihood in this as in the Imagination of Epicurus concerning the framing of the world by the casual lighting together of Atomes But there 's something yet more strange If they were predictions purely humane and also fortuitous like the Ephemerides of Nostradamus being they were cloath'd in magnificent terms and there was nothing promis'd less then a King sitting upon the throne of David who was to restore the Commonwealth of Israel faln into so miserable an estate under the power of the Romans If Jesus were merely man and intended to advantage himself by the foolish hopes of that people what a preposterous madness was it to take the course he did In stead of exciting the people to sedition against the Romanes he commands to pay tribute and pays it himself to give example In stead of insinuating into the affections of daring adventurous men and such as he might use for Captains he makes choise of a dozen poor Fishermen and people of such condition to have them continually in his train Instead of erecting his Nation to magnanimity he betakes himself to preach humility and obedience In stead of imploying the virtue of doing miracles he was so mighty in to astonish Herod or Pilate in some surprise or battail he heals the lame and the blind and the dumb and the paralytick And that which is if these Opinionists be credited the height of folly instead of raising men into hope of his victories he foretells to them which followed him that he was to dy upon the Cross and sharpely reproves one of them who went about to disswade him from that purpose of his Was this the way if it was a humane Design to be get in the world already posses'd with hope of a Messias for a great Earthly King a belief that he was the person which was promised by their Prophets Surely Mahomet us'd not this course who takes arms in hand gives freedom to slaves and because he knew his doctrine could not support it self by the prop of truth plants it in all places where he can by wars and battles Wherfore to conceive a person should endevor to serve himself after this manner of the presumptions and expectations of men is not to fancy a man but a lunatick In the next place I ask whether Jesus Christ when he called some persons with him to serve him in the work he undertook as nothing is more apparent then that he had twelve peculiar Apostles he discover'd this secret of his pretended Divinity to them or whether he abus'd them aswell as other men For if he discover'd the same to them 't was a wonderful complot that he should style himself the Son of God deport himself for very God and they profess themselves his messengers sent immediately from him to promulgate his doctrine and at last for their reward he should be ignominiously crucifi'd and each of them respectively after divers dangers both by Sea and Land after imprisonments stonings tortures and racks should conclude their miserable and painful lives by cruel and shameful deaths Truely though he chose Fishers and men of low condition yet I believe there was none among them so stupid as to be capable of being perswaded to partake in this enterprise upon these conditions For as for his having induc'd them to it by this onely consideration that great good should come thereby to the World and that the Nations should be converted by their word from Idols to the true God there was so little colour in the thing that he would never have been believ'd so little of that generosity in them which leads men to promote the universal good of the world without appearance of other recompense then misery and death that none of them would have
more nor less then the four hundred years which he had limited He promised the Deliverance of them from it and perform'd the same faithfully with a thousand miracles He foretold the Babylonish Captivity and it did not fail and he gave in charge to his Prophets to promise deliverance from it by means of Cyrus naming him a hundred years before he was born and with exact fidelity at the end of seventy years after their transportation into Babylon he brought them back into their own Country by the Edict of that Prince In a word all their History from the beginning to the End is interwoven with predictions and prophesies which have had their accomplishment without the least defect or miscarriage Whence therefore should it be that in this prediction which is the foundation of their comfort and on which all others depend God should have changed his purpose and by so long delays deluded the expectation of the people of the Jews which himself excited in them by his promises Why did not their sins hinder their deliverance from the hand of Pharaoh and the accomplishment of that Word that he would give the Land of Canaan in heritage to the seed of Abraham For they were sinners at that time as well as now and besides inclin'd to Idolatry a sin hated by God most of all and which themselves have at this day in so great abhorrence And ought not the same obstacle to have impeded their return from the Captivity of Babylon They were sinners then too and have always been of the same genius both they and their Ancestors And if by reason of some more obstinate perversness in them then in their predecessors God pleas'd to await their repentance for a time why is that time lengthned out to fifteen or sixteen hundred years that is to three or four times as much time beyond the day prefixed as between the promise and the prefixed day it self Who ever heard tell of such a tedious over-delay where the Promises of God were engaged And how long doth he attend their repentance Hath he resolv'd to give it them or to expect till they be converted of themselves and of their proper motion For if he expects the same from their voluntary and proper motion all hope of ever seeing the Messias is lost Since the horrid desolation of the City of Jerusalem the burning of the Temple the slaughter of their Nation the dispersion of the remainder to the four winds of Heaven the long servitude in which they are the reproach and ignominy which they endure the hatred of great and small and in sum all the curses they could imprecate upon their enemies being befallen them have not been sufficient to mollifie their hearts and convert them what hope is there that hereafter any thing should move them to repentance Fifteen or sixteen Ages suffice to give us a proof by them and their predecessors what their posterity will do in this case after them If God himself will give it them and touch their hearts what is the reason that he expects that so long time from another which he ha's resolv'd to execute himself and thus to expose his fidelity and constancy to the tacite suspitions of some and to the close murmurings or even open blasphemies of others Now I wish they would consider this attentively Namely that in their Books God makes two sorts of Promises to them Some are founded upon a Condition and others are as they speak Simple and Absolute As for those which are sounded upon a condition should God have prefixed a certain time for performance yet ought not he be accus'd of inconstance though he should defer it beyond the term when the condition ha's not as yet been accomplish'd For where the obligation is reciprocal and some thing is to be done first on the part of men why should any think God oblig'd to perform that which he promised not but under some previous condition Are we wont to act thus one towards another And of this Nature are the Legal promises that is the Promises of Life and Blessing upon a firm continuance in his Covenant For by saying If thou continue in the observation of my Commandments I will give thee all sorts of blessings he do's perpetually imply that in case of deviating from them the expectation of all those Benedictions is frustrated For the other which are absolute and not dependant on any condition to fail to effect them is to be wanting to his own constancy And why should God have been so forward as to promise absolutely and yet retract it afterwards upon so groundless a pretence This is the practise of vain men who promise rashly and afterwards repenting of the matter seek out excuses and pretexts to put off the effect and veil their levity Now let any man read the Old Testament from end to end and he will find that the Promises concerning the Messias are so far from being founded on any precedaneous condition on the part of men that they are not so much Promises as setled and determined Predictions Or if they ought to be called Promises as indeed they are since they are predictions of a Good to come which must afford incomparable benefit and contentment they are promises in which the Goodness and Mercy of the infinite God seems to wrastle against the obstinacy of men As soon as Adam was fallen God without being invited thereunto by his repentance even without speaking to him saies to the Serpent I will put enmity between thee and the woman and between thy seed and her seed it shall bruise thy head and thou shalt bruise his heel Can it be suspected here that without the foregoing penitence of men these words shall never be accomplisht On the contrary it is to excite our repentance which otherwise would have remained dead for they are the promises of Grace which alone as we have said elsewhere can awaken the minds of men to true repentance In like manner when the Patriarch Iacob saies The Scepter shall not depart from Judah c. Does he understand that Shiloh shall come onely provided Judah and Israel repent Certainly he had no regard to that but puts this among the absolute pure predictions which the Spirit ennabled him to make concerning his Posterity and the things which were to happen to every Tribe were it repentant or not And thus it is also in all the rest Deut. 18.18 I will raise them up a Prophet among their brethren like unto thee and will put my words in his mouth and he shall speak unto them all that I shall command him Vers 19. And it shall come to pass that whosoever will not hearken unto my words which he shall speak in my Name I will require it of him Psal 2. I have set my King upon Sion the mountain of my holiness And 7. The Lord hath said to me Thou art my Son this day have I begotten thee 8. Ask of me and I shall give thee
the Nations for thy inheritance and the uttermost parts of the Earth for thy possession 9. Thou shalt break them with a rod of iron thou shall dash them in pieces like a potters vessel c. And Isaiah 7.14 Behold A virgin shall conceive and bear a Son and shall call his name Immanuel Also chap. 11.1 And there shall come forth a rod out of the stemne of Iesse and a Branch shall grow out of his Roots 2. And the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him c. Also chap. 32.1 Behold a King shall reign in righteousness c. And likewise in that celebrated 53. chapter And Malachi having ended the second chapter with a complaint of the murmurings of the Jews against the Providence of God and likewise of their blasphemies he continues his discourse thus chap. 3.1 Behold I will send my messenger and he shall prepare the way before me and the Lord whom ye seek shall suddenly come to his Temple c. As if he would either break the heart of those Rebels by this admirable effect of an incredible goodness or warrant his Providence from blame by the execution of his immutable decrees But above all things the Prophecy of Daniel above alledged is remarkable For after having so clearly set down the time of the birth of Christ he adds vers 26. And after score and two weeks shall Messias be cut off but not for himself and the people of the â—rince that shall come shall destroy the City and the Sanctuary and the end thereof shall be with a stood and unto the end of the waâ— desolations are determin'd Now I beseech you had not this its event in Titus and the Romanes who utterly destroyed the City of Ierusalem and burnt the Temple to ashes How then could the prediction of the Desolation have been accomplish't which was not to happen till after the accomplishment of the Promise if the Promise were not executed before seeing they are both contained in the same Prophecy It remains therefore that since as it is not allowed for men to exempt themselves from subjectino to Divine Institutions so long as they are in force so neither is it lawful to extend them longer then the term appointed to them by God himself admits the Law of Moses having pass'd its time either there is now no longer any form of Religion of divine institution in the World or that some other hath been establish'd by God in its place For as to what they alledge that in several places of their Books it is said that their Law ought to endure to perpetuity 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it hath been answered a thousand times that the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 taken simply do's not necessarily signifie the perpetuity of a thing or eternity of time but oftentimes a long duration onely which began or is terminated at some certain and remarkable period as of the Deluge of the descent into Egypt of a Jubilee and the like Examples of which are very ordinary Now it would be a thing too unsutable to that great goodness which God hath always testified to men and to that special care he hath had to bring them to the knowledge of himself and by that to salvation to have abolish'd and suppress'd the true Religion without substituting another in its stead He hath always shewn that he loves the Political or Civil Societies of men which onely have relation to the conservation of their rights and civil comportments among themselves how much dearer then is the maintaining of a Religious Society to him in which the importance is concerning the preservation of his rights over us actions of piety and virtue and the eternal salvation of our souls Certainly it would be a too strange inequality in the proceedings of a Nature so wise and uniform as the Divine to have employ'd so great exact diligence in prescribing and delineating the Religion of the Jews and in all the order of it and afterwards to destroy the same totally without raising another upon its ruines And it would be too great a lightness in so constant a nature to have promised his Church in so many places of the Old Testament to cause her to subsist eternally and what is the Church but a Society regulated according to the Laws of the true Religion and yet to subvert it utterly beyond all apparent possibility of restoration Wherefore there ha's succeeded some other Religion in place of the Jewish But it can be neither the Pagan nor the Mahometane and therefore it must necessarily be the Christian And this is the business to be deduc'd more at large in the following Chapter CHAP. VI. That the Christian Religion being more excellent hath succeeded the Jewish SO numerous is the store of things that offer themselves for the proof of what the title of this Chapter promiseth that I beseech the Readers indulgence if I omit some Should I do otherwise it would be impossible to proportion this piece to the rest of the work I shall not alledge that the author of the Christian Religion and his principal Ministers were Jews and so interessed and engaged according to the natural instinct of all Nations to the maintenance of their own Religion if it ought to have been perpetually durable Nor that it was first of all to their own Nation that they adressed to perswade the same to them and did not turn to the Gentiles but onely after they had been rejected and persecuted by the Jews Nor that the Pagans converted by their preaching profess'd to be only gathered to the Jewish Nation and inserted like a wild grasse into a natural stock I shall onely compare the two Religions together so to manifest the excellence of the Christian above the Jewish and that not onely in things wherein they differ but also in such as they agree together in for ours will be found to have in either respect inestimable advantages above it And this will be sufficient for the proof of my proposition For since the Jewish was of divine institution if the Christian be more excellent it must have been drawn from the same treasures of his celestial Wisdome who enlargeth and augmenteth his favours as he pleaseth First as for the things they agree in seeing the Christian Religion acknowledges that the Books of the Jews are not onely true but divine and consequently accords with them as to all the ancient histories recorded therein of the Creation of the World the formation of man the propagation of mankind the destruction of the same by the Flood the restoring of it by the family of Noah the conflagration of Sodom the selection of Abraham the calling of Moses the miracles in Egypt and the Wilderness the deliverances by the Judges the establishment of Kings the Captivity of Babylon and the like And that the Christian Religion ha's retained the doctrines revealed therein as inviolable being of eternal and immutable truth As that there is but one God infinite