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
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
ancient Master is of a different strain However all this will not secure them from falling foul upon the difficulties above-mentioned of determining the extent of estimation which ought to be had of this Attribute because it will follow that there is some measure between It and the Essence of God Now it remains absolutely unknown to us whether the essence of God be infinite or not whence consequently the measure of Veneration which we ow him in regard of that Perfection is to us equally unknown Besides whereas the Faculties of all things are destinated to certain functions it will be difficult to be resolv'd what portion of power is necessary to render the Divine nature accomplisht since it cannot be understood that God either hath or ever will employ the same to the production of any effect And though it were frankly granted them that right Reason informs us either that there is no Deity or that it owns a power without circumscription Yet I dare maintain Men would make but small account of that Perfection which they knew no otherwise then by a simple ratiocination without having any actual testimony or proof of the same Who is he amongst us that cares never so little for the Great Mogul of whom it is related that he keeps thirty thousand Elephants or for any other mighty Potentate like him in those Oriental Countries because perhaps he is able to bring two or three hundred thousand armed men into the field when he pleases Do's not every one more value the authority of the meanest Gentleman in the Country where he lives if he be Lord of his village because he sees it and feels it and for that in case he offend him it serves to punish him and if he obey it he finds support by it These people assuredly have strange Imaginations and are made of principles wonderfully discordant Observe I beseech you the discourses of Epicurus when he is treating the question of the Supream Good They are universally drawn from the sentiments of the Body and from Pleasure to which our appetites naturally encline us He affirms that Nature do's not onely aspire but pine and groan after her Ease such is the violence of her inclination towards it He prescribes his Sage to refer all to his own utility and the contentment of his Senses as if he consisted onely of Body and were born for none but himself Doth he speak of the Deity and of the Honor which ought to be rendred to him He abstracts the thoughts of men so far from their proper Good he allows himself so little to be touched with the natural affection we bear towards our selves he alembicks his wits in such manner in the speculation of things purely intellectual phantastical without having any regard to his particular profit and his own satisfaction that you would judge he were all Spirit and had forgotten the care of himself and his Nature But to Character him compleately in one word he perfectly resembles that God whom he describes so negligent of humane affairs and such a lover of his own felicity For as according to his dictates God contents himself with the solitary injoyment of his eternal repose in delectation and profound vacancy from action without concerning himself with any care either of us or of our interests so Epicurus gives himself no other trouble then to seek out means how to pass his days in delights without anxious perplexing himself concerning God or things pertaining to him and so allows himself the same kindness Yet there is this difference that Epicurus do's not believe that he offends God in proclaiming openly that he takes no cognisance of things here below but dare not plainly aver that he is uncoâ—cern'd with the care of those in Heaven And nevertheless it really turns as much to the reproach of the Deity to leave all to go at random as it is horrible to make open profession of Impiety towards him But let us now proceed to the other Divine Proprieties Although the greatest part of Mankind hath always been lead to serve God by Fear of Vengeance which he inflicts on the contemners of his Majesty yet there was never any Nation but did acknowledge some remarkable Appearances of his Goodness in the Government of the Universe The whole world hath ever placed amongst his most resplendent Perfections this propensity which he hath naturally to do good to succour the Distressed to relieve the Oppressed to defend such as are injuriously outraged and even where no necessity impells or otherwise obliges him to expand himself in Liberality the Quality peculiar to benigne and generous Natures Hence have those glorious Titles been attributed to him by men upon this consideration as particularly by Homer who ordinarily stiles his Jupiter The Father of the Gods and Men not onely in as much as he is the Author of their Being as another Poet expresly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but also for the care that he hath of them and the paternal affections he beareth towards them In effect the lustre of his Majesty dazles them when they list up their eyes towards the Heavens to contemplate there the umbrage or reverse part of him that appears in their splendor His Power astonishes them when they feel the Earth tremble under their feet or hear the tumultuous murmurs of Thunder in the clouds The admiration of his Wisdom confounds them when they come to consider that he beholds all things with one glance of his eyes and one simple indivisible apprehension the Heavens the Elements the Bodies that are composed of them the innumerable variety of their faculties and operations the cogitations of our minds and of all Intellectual Beings all things which are onely in possibility the Idea's of which are multipliable to infinity their accordances and relations their opposttions and Antipathies His Justice strikes them with dread when they Survey the strokes and examples of it in mankind by Pestilences and Wars by Famines and Tempests by over-flowes of Rivers and Inundations of the Sea by lightnings discharged from Heaven and other like demonstrations of his Vengeance In a word all his other Virtues excite either Fear or Wonder in the Spirits of men but the reflection upon his Goodness and the experience they have of it is that which rejoyces them and makes their Lives sweet and desirable As for Christians they not only admire and venerate the other Attributes of God more then ever any other people did but likewise set a higher estimate on this then other Nations ever have done and make it the prime basis on which their whole profession is supported On the other side the Epicureans if they have any knowledge of it it can be onely in an imaginary speculation in the same manner as we above convinced their conjectures concerning the Power of the Deity to be and if it fall out that they at any time praise and magnifie it it cannot be otherwise inferred but that their Devotion must be
venerate the Deity in regard of the eminence of his Being and his natural perfection Because that excellence of his Being is not from Positive Law but natural otherwise men might make and unmake Gods at their pleasures as they do their Statues Either therefore the Epicureans are absolutly without Religion and as much aliens to it as Beasts or the honor which they make profession of rendring to the Deity they do not ascribe to him out of obedience to the Laws of Commonwealths every one in his own Country but because they find themselves naturally oblig'd thereunto For in case it befell them to be in some place where it were forbidden to serve God would they comply with such prohibition And if it were also commanded there to blaspheme him or preach that there is none at all could they obey those Laws without doing violence to their consciences Wherefore if there be of necessity some natural difference between piety and impiety towards God there must in like manner be some between Vice and Virtue in comportments amongst men For as the excellence of the Nature of God obliges us to certain duties towards him so also consanguinity conciliates and contracts certain obligations amongst us one towards another And when I mention consanguinity I do not onely understand that of Brethren and neer kindred amongst themselves but also that of Fellow-Citizens and Countrimen and even of men in general because there is an universal consanguinity between them all which hath its root in the communion of one and the same nature and in the dependance and derivation from one common stock And as the eminence of the Divine nature is the foundation of the honor which we render to it so the equality of ours should be the foundation of the justice which we use one towards another This the Pagans themselves well observed when they affirmed the World was a great City and the several Nation as divers Quarters of the same Town so that though there be certain duties that oblige us more strictly to our next neighbors yet there cease not to be other general ones which are incumbent upon us towards all men Add hereunto that if piety towards God be a natural and immutable obligation yet Vice and Virtue indifferent in themselves and onely good or evil by the authority of a Constitution which is subject to alteration If the law which sets a value upon Virtue happen to suffer a change and the Vice which is contrary to it become recommended by a new constitution there will result a consequence absolutely insupportable For so it may come to pass that a man may be at the same time desperately vitious a thief adulterer false-witness murderer parricide and notwithstanding very Religious toward the Deity who will love and favor him in consideration of his piety if he hath any knowledge of the same Which is a prodigious conceipt and such as without further debate the common sense of men abhors Moreover there is no person so devoid of eyes and understanding who acknowledges not some natural difference between the Beauty and Deformity of our Bodies and that the advantage of the one above the other doth not consist meerly in the opinion of men and custom as the comliness or ill-beseemingness of the greatest part of habits and fashions does I am not ignorant that Opinion bears a great stroke in some singularities and that we may account that for Beauty at this day of which in Ages past they did not make the same esteem as black eyes such as those of Venus were are more pleasing to some to others those that have something of blew as those of Minerva are described But that is in things wherein the natural difference is not so evident and where every one may have his particular sentiment without digressing very much from reason For otherwise I do not think any man would deny that Achilles or Nereus was handsomer then Thersites as Homer paints him out to us and that a strait man and of a proportionable stature is better made then a crooked Dwarfe whose arms reach down to his heels and his legs are distorted Is it then likely that there should be according to Nature a Beauty and an Ugliness of Bodies and none of the Soul so that to estimate things agreeably to reason and not after common opinion the chastity of Lucretia should not be more to be prised then the lightness of Lais nor the Virtue of Cato then the dissoluteness of Sardanapalus If it be so imagine a Commonwealth among the Antipodes in which it were as indifferent for a man to kill his Father as his neighbors Dog to rob in the corners of Woods as to hunt Hares or Deer to lye with his Sister as with a Wise espoused out of the degrees of consanguinity which circumscribe Marriages and to be as honest a thing to Lye and perjure as we account it here to be sincere in words and proceedings it will follow that that Republike is regulated with as good constitutions and laws as the best polici'd that is in Europe For such is the nature of things indifferent that they take their tincture from the most received opinions and weigh only according to the standard of policy and Positive Law But these are not barely extravagances they are distempers and frensies which the consent of all people gives the Lye to and that relick of shame which Nature hath left amongst the most corrupted Nations utterly disowns and flyes from In sincerity is there something in Truth that advantages it naturally above a Lye or is it preferred meerly by reason of custome As much without doubt as there is of difference between Being and not Being so is there of distance between Truth that results from the Being of things and is the representation of them and Falsity which is as the image of not-Being Hence it is that the perfection of the Understanding of Man consisting in the knowledge of things which Are conformably to their Being and consequently in Truth there must of necessity be an inviolable relation between the Verity of things and our Understandings which are improved and perfectionated thereby whereas they reject a Lye by a natural aversion as soon as they know it to be such And this Love of Truth hath ever appear'd uniformly in all generous souls Even little children do not readily take pleasure in stories that are told them unless so far as they fancy them to be true Now is there a Thing naturally determin'd to ennoble our Understandings which cannot be changed by Customes or Laws Opinions or Fancies and which remains always equal to it self and unvariable and is there not also something naturally determin'd to render our other faculties perfect I mean our Appetites and our Wills over which our Understandings preside Certainly it would be a very extravagant thing if Reason whereby a Man is a Man should find its perfection in the sole knowledge of Truth and that in
this we excell the condition of Beasts who are not capable of comprehending it and in the mean time for our Affections which ought to follow reason there should be no difference between us and Creatures that are destitute of it by reason of which their appetites are wil'd and undetermined without subjection to any Laws of Vice or Virtue But it would be a thing yet more absurd and extravagant if Living Creatures unfurnished of Reason having every one their proper and natural goodness which consists in a certain perfection of their actions as we give the Title of Good to a Horse a Dog for the strength of their Limbes agility of their motions vivacity of their sent and swiftness and yet a man should not be styled Good in regard of a constant and immutable perfection of his operations measuring them by the eternal rules of Truth and Reason Hesiod understood this better then these pretended Philosophers For he delivers this excellent Lesson Operum Dierum Lib. 1. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Et tu Justitiae quidem animum adjice violentia vero obliviscere prorsus Namque hanc hominibus posuit legem Saturnius Piscibus quidem feris avibus volucribus Se mutuo ut devorent quandoquidem justitia carent But if there have been sound Nations heretofore or be any such this day amongst whom that brutish Custome of devouring one another is in use or if some other such brutality of the number of those that the right Reason of Man abhors be practis'd any where without scruple or punishment yet it cannot be inferred from thence that their custome of doing so changes the nature of the thing in it self or that the thing being indifferent in its essence is diversly authoris'd according to the various fancies of Men. For there are People in whom Barbarisme hath subjected Nature and imbued them with such monstrous sentiments which ought no more to be drawn into consequence against the consentment of all other Nations then the Prodigies which emerge besides the course of Nature and violate the Laws which she ordinarily observes in the production of her Works To these people may be applyed that sentence of Petrarch Hanno dal mondo ogni virtu sbandita Ond e dal corso suo quasi smarrita Nostra Natura Since Virtue from the World they have exil'd Our Nature 's grown unsetled savage wild Whereas the Epicureans desire to pass for Philosophers they ought to have remarked that Nature hath distinguish'd our faculties to the end they might never be confounded that she hath assigned them their operations in such manner that one cannot produce those of another and that to those operations she hath determin'd certain rules in the observation or Violation whereof consists the Good and Evil which invests them with the reputation of Goodness or Improbity The Faculty of vision which we have in our Eyes is clean another thing from that of Hearing which is in our Ears and the difference which distinguishes them is so essential to their Nature that it cannot be separated from the same without their intire destruction The action of seeing is so proper to the Eye and that of Hearing to the Ear that whoso should employ the former to receive and discern Sounds and the latter to distinguish the Colours and Figures of sensible things would demonstrate that himself had his Understanding perverted in going about so to pervert the establisht order of Nature That action of seeing to which the Eye is destinated is performed in such manner that he that should attempt to see with his eyes shut or applying the thing to be seen immediately upon the Organ of the eye opened or removing it from the eye to too great a distance or lastly putting some body not diaphanous nor illuminated between the eye and it should find it were to no purpose because Nature hath so ordered that to the act of seeing all the conditions opposite to these should be exactly observed Now what she hath done in the faculties of our Bodies the same she hath also practis'd in those of our Minds There is in us one faculty of the Intellect and another of our Appetites And as our Understandings are designed for the knowledge of objects so are our Appetites conferred on us in order to our desiring or eschewing them The operation of the Understanding is neither good nor rational unless it be accommodated to the condition of the object to judge of the truth or falsity thereof according as the nature of the thing requires Neither is that of the Appetite good or commendable further then it is conformed to the condition of the subject towards which it is carried forth to desire or avoid the same according as it is naturally desireable or worthy our aversion And lastly as the rules of which we make use to frame our Understandings to legitimate ratiocination and by that means to acquire the habitude of Sciences are drawn from the nature of the things themselves so that even Epicurus although he were no excellent Logician composed a certain number of Canons by which to regulate his reasonings So the Maximes wherof we serve our selves to steer our Appetites to desire or reject the objects presented to us as is fitting and requisite and to contract the habitude of Virtues are in like manner drawn from the natures of the things whence we have a certain systeem of Morality by which to conduct our actions And this is of so much greater necessity in relation to the things which concern Virtue in as much as the operations of our other faculties are competible to us as we are Living creatures which state is not the principal of our condition whereas moral actions belong to us as we are Men which is as I may say the apex or highest atchievment of our being and makes the most excellent piece of our Definition For it would be an excessive irregularity in Nature if the most excellent Being amongst all corporeal things should be able to attain a certain term of his perfection in the operations which are common to him with Animals destitute of Reason and yet he should have no certain and determinate perfection in reference to those faculties which advance him so far above Brutes that he thereby approaches in some sort to the image of the Deity In which consideration Plato affirmed that the Supreme Good of Man consisted in his conformity with God which was excellently well declared and is supremely advantageous if whereas God is of invariable Holiness Man would give himself to imitate him by the constant exercise of an eminent Virtue But if there be nothing fixed and certain in the Nature of our Moral operations so that it is indifferent to be Vitious or Virtuous what advantage can there be in our conformity with God For it will be consequent that the Nature of God is likewise indifferent to Vice
and Virtue and that he is as an Unwritten Tablet or Wax susceptible of all impressions whatsoever without being either more or less worthy of Veneration or contempt dishonor or Praise for being either pure or polluted with Crimes just or Tyrannicall Good or Evil. If the Epicureans acknowledge what all sorts of arguments constrain them to do that there are certain Laws establisht by Nature according to which things are accounted Good or Bad and actions likewise Vitious or Virtuous in as much as they disagree from or correspond to the same they must also of necessity confess that there ought to be a Providence which after the last Act is concluded will repay the rewards of Goodness to them that have merited them and heap Vengeance upon such as have stored up the same for themselves by their evil actions Semblably as he that offends his Father or Mother deserves chastisement so in sinning against Nature in whose Laws is comprehended that of Fathers over their Children and who is the common Mother to us all without doubt we shall be obnoxious to correction For every deviation from the right way requires a correction or reducement wherefore the correction of a Person that departs from the precepts of Nature is his amendment but the correction of a vitious action is the punishment of him that committed the same Truely the Political Laws by which penalties are appointed for Crimes are not onely just in as much as they are necessary for the conservation of Commonwealths which their violation would ruin they are also so because that wickednesses though they brought no dammage to the State are of themselves punishable and that Nature teaches us that aswell in moral matters as in others Monstres which so far transgress its rules ought to be exterminated to the end their enormity do not turn to her dishonor But whereas Political Laws establish penalties onely to corrupt actions and do not punish intentions and thoughts 't is not for that bad thoughts and intentions are not as deserving of punishment as actions but because the will and intention is not apparent either to the Magistrates or Witnesses besides if all evil aims and purposes and such crimes as are committed in the mind onely were liable to penal animadversion the number of criminals would be so great that the frequency of executions would beget too much horror and the world would soon become depopulated and desart Now it is not reasonable to punish any offences but such as are proved by good evidence and it were better the world should be peopled with tolerable inhabitants then to be reduc'd to so gastly a desolation by punishments and deaths Yet there are a sort of intentions which coming to the knowledge of Judges are capitally punished as those which lead to attempts against persons in Soverainty In which there is not onely a bare regard so far as if such fore-thought design had grown to effect the Commonwealth which is under the Magistrates care might have suffered considerable prejudice but it is considered in as much as the prejudice set aside the design it of it self is too abominable to be pass'd over with impunity such horridnesses requiring to be expiated with proportional punishments Therefore seeing the counsels of which wicked actions are produced are naturally as vicious as the actions themselves which is more the actions are not vicious unless as far as they proceed from bad counsels Whereas actions are punished because of their enormity there would be too notorious a Defect and too great a Disorder in the nature of Things if there were not some power superior to that of Soveraign Magistrates which may give laws to thoughts and deliberations Now if there be any such Power it is necessary that the same have a clear cognisance of thoughts and deliberations that it call those to account that are culpable therein making their Conscience intervene as a witness against which there lies no exception and at length begin to punish them by such remorse as the apprehension of judgement begets in their breasts till afterwards it take a severer vengeance on them Now this is that which we call the Providence of God which punishes a part of those things which are done in this Life to take away all misapprehension that he endures others without exemplary punishment out of connivence and to give every one grounds of belief that he refers them to another time in which the Vengeance he will execute on them shall compensate its deferring by a greater measure of severity Of what I have now represented every man hath ten thousand witnesses in himself For the terrors which all men experience when they have committed some wickedness and whereof they do not cease to feel the effects though they be assured of exemption from penalties constituted by publike laws do sufficiently declare that there is some thing that frightens us within with the denunciation it there makes of another sort of vengeance Certainly if there were nothing to be dreaded besides the punishment which every Magistrate inflicts in his Territory what reason is there that soveraign Magistrates themselvs should be terrified with the same It is true these people object to us in this particular that those terrors are not natural but are bred of the false opinion which hath possessed the minds of all men that the Deity is incensed by reason of our offences to which they add that the profound ignorance of people hath augmented those affrightments to them as little children sear bug-bears in the Dark so that if we had not been prepossessed with such a perverse opinion by our Ancestors we should have always lived free from that fear in a perfect security They adjoin moreover that if there be any such natural Apprehensions wherewith men are discruciated they are those of the Accidents of Fortune which may arrive to all the dispensation of which is erroneously ascrib'd to Providence Divine For so speaks their Poet Nec miser impendens magnum timet aere saxum Tantalus ut fama'st cassa formidine torpens Sed magis in vita Divum metus urget inanis Mortales casumque timent quem cuique serat sors But in case this were no better grounded then on a false opinion men have been continued in whence comes it to pass that the same should have so universally possessed the minds of all Nations For who is he amongst all the people of the World that can avouch himself an exemption from these Fears In every Nation what person ha's not at some time or other had more or less experience of them Certainly that which is universal hath some foundation in Nature and that which persists constantly and maintains it self alwayes in the same sort cannot but be very deeply rooted therein on the other side vain and panick fears are incontinently dissipated and are of very short duration Time saith Cicero wears out the Errors of Opinion but it confirms the judgements and sentiments of Nature
But there is something more in the matter which is that although some have more apprehensions of them and others less yet all are desirous to be delivered from them and to finde out some remedy against them For there is nothing that so harrasses the mind or gives it such anguish as Fear does and there is no man finds any pleasure in being tormented in that manner How therefore is it come about that men have been so susceptible of these vain terrors seeing we naturally repell those things that are enemies unto us And is it not so much the more considerable that there have been always found some people although they have been very rare among others that have endeavored as Epicurus to deliver men from such affrightments by openly preaching Impiety either by words or example For David complaines that there were some even amongst the Jews that were so devoid of sense as to deny that there is a God or if there be that he takes any consideration of humane actions by his Providence A strange thing that they which would imprint such vain Fears in the mind of Men should have succeeded so happily and so universally therein notwithstanding all the natural repugnances in us against them and they which would deliver us from them could never effect their purpose although they had the assistance of natural profaneness to favour them thereunto Do's not this surpass all astonishment that the Fear of Divine Justice naturally disquiets the souls of men and causes such painful agitations therein and yet notwithstanding if Epicurus should have mounted upon the Theater at Athens and the Poet Lucretius gone into the Pulpit for Orations and there preached to the people the contempt of God and his Thunders that instead of recompensing them for attempting to free men from such a tyrannical opinion the greatest wretches would have been ready to beat out their brains with stones And that those Nations being so inflamed with love of their Liberty and an ardent hatred against Tyrants which affected the Domination over their Goods and Persons that they erected statues in their streets in honor of them that kill'd them should have so great an abhorrence against those which went about to disabuse them from a fancy which oppress'd and tyranniz'd over their souls Surely it must rather be acknowledged that Nature prevail'd and the wrath of God which is in a high degree revealed to men from Heaven and Quae caput a coeli regionibus ostendebat And it helps not to alledge that it hath not been possible for us to be delivered from these Terrors because we have not been instructed in the Doctrine of Epicurus For whosoever looks narrowly thereinto will not without admiration remark two things First that there are very few men but have a propensity to Prophaneness and consequently every one is an Instructer to himself in the Epicurean discipline Yet nevertheless the number is so small that ha's delivered themselves from the inquietudes of conscience that perhaps there never was so much as one person that became absolutely freed from them not even Lucretius or Epicurus himself In some men the more resistance they employ against those assaults the greater is their importunateness and they are re-enforced by the endeavors that are us'd to repell them so that from Impiety to which they would resign up themselves to sin more at ease without being molested by such alarms in the midst of their pleasures they fall into Superstition like a fugitive slave that is drawn back by the throat into his Masters house where he is inforced to obey whether he will or no for fear of the Scourge and the Torture Others indeed go so far that the pleasures wherein they swim and wherewith they almost totally subvert their reason remove in a manner such sentiments out of their minds so as sometimes to make a mockery thereof But 't is as when Criminals give themselves to debaucheries in the Prison For when the fumes of wine are a little exhal'd and they begin to think of their crimes with a setled consideration they fret and are excruciated with the horror of Gibbets and Wheels which are preparing for them But if it happen to them to be always drunk which yet is rarely so yet they are in their sleep tormented with horrible visions and affrighting dreams The second thing observable is that the honester part of mankind are they which feel those Terrors least by reason that a good conscience which hath knowledge of the Goodness of God and his inclination to Mercy assures and reposes it self in the same and notwithstanding such good men abhor that doctrine from the bottom of their hearts that removes all fear of the Deity out of the Mind of Man In so much that they which are least disquieted with these Troubles are the men that esteem them to have their foundations in Nature and to be grounded upon Truth On the contrary they which believe them vain and groundless are the most severely assaulted with them without being able to be released from them In which on the one side shines the Goodness of God towards them that love him sincerely and fear him awfully and on the other side his Justice upon them that disesteem him What man was ever more outragious against God then Caligula or who ever so audaciously contemned his Vengeance And for all that when so ever it thundred as if the Deity had spoke to him from Heaven he hid himself under his Bed as if he intended to make a Buckler of it against the Tempest Whereas in the midst of the Darkness in which the Pagans liv'd Socrates maintained his mind in that same tranquillity at his Death wherein he had pass'd the whole course of his days But there is one thing highly worthy consideration which is that the stings of Conscience are never so sensible and so quick as when men approach near Death or behold themselves in some eminent danger that menaces them And whence should it be so but onely that by the instinct of Nature they presage and anticipate with their fear the misery that attends the Wicked after this Life Misery I say which is so much the more horrible in the apprehensions they have of it by reason that they know not what it is and because all men have a perswasion that their souls are immortal For if Death did extinguish the Soul with the Body and so rescued both the one and the other from the Divine Vengeance and the jurisdiction of Fortune at the same time there would be nothing at all to justifie those fears in reason In case I say those terrors were not natural in us there would be no person but would free himself from them with this consideration There was a time when we were not in Being and one day we shall exist no more which was the consolation of Epicurus But on the contrary then is the time that those Alarms are redoubled and the tempests increase
their violence Insomuch that where there is lest one sparkle of piety and hope of pardon men would not have this opinion true That God hath no care of men and that he prepares neither Good nor Evil for them in the other world And where there is not so much as the least seed of piety although they are very desirous that Opinion were true yet they are not able to perswade themselves that it is so And hereof the Epicureans themselves supply us with an evident Instance For what else intends their Poet in these lines Vsque adeo res humanas vis abdita quaedam Obterit pulchros fasces saevasque secures Proculcare ludibrio sibi habere videtur What is it I beseech you that he denotes by that hidden Power Is it Nature No surely for Nature takes pleasure in the production and conservation of things not in their ruine besides that these Accidents which he mentions are not dependant on the ordinary laws of Nature Is it Fortune then No much less For wherefore should he say that she takes pleasure to shatter the grandeurs of the World disdainfully at her Feet seeing she hath no knowledge either of little or great nor whether those be the bagdes of Power or not which she tears in pieces and dashes to powder It remains therefore that it is that which we call the Providence of God which indeed sometimes takes pleasure in convincing men of their vanity and overturning the highnesses and excellencies of the Earth And this is that which extorts from Horace a disciple of the same School that handsome confession that having been formerly a contemner of the Gods the dreadful violences of thunder made him renounce that foolish wisdom wherewith he had been imbued and pronounce this memorable sentence Valet ima summis Mutare insignem attenuat Deus So great is the power of truth that even from the mouth of its adversaries it draws testimonies to its advantage CHAP. VII Of the Epicurean Opinion concerning the Immortality of the Humane Soul and the Supreme Good and what may redound from it HItherto I have touch'd but transiently upon the Questions of the Immortality of the Soul and of the Supreme Good of Man and I now come to examine what they judge of the one and wherein they place the other Which though they both require to be treated of distinctly I shall dispatch with brevity according to the universal design of this Work And forasmuch as they of former times thought that the Soul survives not the Body and the opinion of the modern Sectators is doubtful thereof some affirming others denying the same it is necessary for me to shew that if they grant that the Humane Soul is immortal they are also obliged to confess that there is a Providence I shall not scruple in the first place to alledge here for proof of the incorruptibility of our minds The consent of all Nations although I have already made use of that Argument in another matter For it seems such to me as ought in no wise to be rejected unless by contentious spirits who when they have contradicted a truth of how great evidence soever think they have atchieved an exploit of great applause For I beseech you if the soul of man be not immortal if there be no firm reasons to induce us to believe that it is so how hath such a fancy been able to become so rooted in our Minds that there is not any opinion that ha's a greater vogue in the World Not onely the Greeks and the Romanes who seem to have been better refined then other Nations have been imbued with it but the Barbarians and least civilised people have equally had this perswasion of the perpetual duration of their Minds although the quality of their estate after death was almost equally unknown to them all What therefore are those reasons that perswaded them of it and rendred that perswasion so firm and unalterable Should I say that all Nations have received it from hand to hand from their Ancesters perhaps it would stir the Epicureans spleen to mockery yet I should not affirm either an absurdity or an impertinence For all Mankind being derived from one single person and he having been indued with a more clean and particular understanding of his Being then others have had since because the race of men ha's been gradually depraved and degenerate according to the distance at which they have been removed from their originals he imparted the principles and knowledge to his descendants which are ingrasted in them and intertained from Age to Age. And although it were no more then a tradition from hand to hand which ha's been altered in divers manners by Lapse of time yet the principal part thereof which consists in the belief it self of the Immortality of the Soul hath such a foundation in Truth and in Nature that it hath been impossible even for many Ages of time which ordinarily decays all things to prevail against it or at least to deface it out of the minds of Men. Now no Relation ought to be discredited which is accompained with these evidences First that no solid and indubitable reasons can be brought against the same to convince it of falsitie as I am well assured there is none to be found against this of any reasonable probability And Secondly which is equally spread through out the whole Universe and hath been with extreme forwardness received by all Nations and Lastly which hath born up against the encounters of time and constantly maintained it self in the midst of so â—any revolutions of humane affairs so that it hath pass'd into the remotest Islands and the territories separated from us by so great seas that they have lain undiscover'd to us till within these last two hundred years Is it not a thing worthy our marveil that in such places where men had lost all knowledge of their Original and of the streights over which the people pass'd from whom they are descended and where they have in a manner forgotten humanity it self they should notwithstanding have preserv'd this belief that there is some other thing in them besides the Body of greater excellence and which subsists beyond their fate and ashes But if there be people sound in some other part of the New World which are fallen to so low a degree beneath themselves and to such a measure of brutality as not to have retain'd amongst them any shadow of this Sentiment though I much doubt whether there be any such their testimony ought not to be of any consideration not onely because they are very few in number in comparison of the rest of the World but also because that it would not be strange if they whom barbarisme ha's unman'd in all other things even so far as to have no inclination to society should likewise have extinguish'd in their Minds that impression of Nature and the tradition of their Ancestors But praised be God there are other reasons which
be made of its suffrage And I cannot imagine that there is any at this day that bears the name of Christian who esteems it to have been of Divine revelation Wherefore the little I shall say to prove it is not so much for necessity of the thing in it self as because the design of this work does not permit me to pass it over absolutely in silence To judge therefore what it was we must not conceive it such as it is amongst barbarous and savage Nations such as the Toupinamboults are at present and the people of Suevia and Sarmatia were of old For who will believe that any extraordinary Celestial light in matter of Religion ever illuminated those Nations amongst whom there is scarce seen any traces of so much as humanity It is true there have been some people in our times that have written so highly in commendation of the contentment there is in their opinion in living under the simple Laws of nature as they speak that they seem inclinable to favour the manners and condions of Savages and prefer it before ours so as to have no shame at all of their nakedness and to boast that they do not cover it but onely in respect to custom But as for these persons it is not my present purpose to dispute against them If they would speak the genuine sentiments of their hearts they would not onely not acknowledge any particular revelation of the will of God in Religion but would moreover make profession of not believing the immortality of their souls nor any Religion in the world and after having rendred themselves like to those miserable Savages in all brutalities they would surpass them in this point that they would cast under their feet all remembrance of God of whom in their Desarts and forlorn Barbarism the Margajats and Patagons have yet some fear and reverence I speak now to such as make some esteem of the improving elegancy of Learning and who have some portion of honesty lest in their conversation amongst men The Greeks and Romans therefore have without question carried the preheminence in all kindes of politeness and excellence amongst the Pagan Nations So that it is amongst them that we must seek for this particular revelation whether it may be found in the Religion of either of those people It is true the Egyptians were much celebrated for their mysteries and rare wisdom and divers have thought that all the wisdom of Greece was transported from the treasuries of Egypt by those that travell'd thither for it But if there were any thing of good among them they had it from communication with the Jews who besides that they sojourned a long time in Egypt before the Greek name arose in the world they were their neer neighbours in Palestine and had frequent and free commerce with them yet have they so viciated corrupted and obscured in their superstitions and idolatries what they had learned from them that there is none of it to be known and distinguish'd almost all the books in which they had expounded their mysteries are lost But he that is desirous to know what excellent opinions they had what divine wisdom it was that made them so cryed up he may please onely to read the Treatise written by Plutark of Isis and Osiris and he will see in the first place that the veiles and allegories under which he sayes they hid their knowledge are shameful and putid fables such idle and dull extravagancies and impertinences in themselves that it is impossible they could serve for a coverture to any conceptions I do not say heavenly and divine but worthy of men and ordinary sober sense In the next place he will finde that all that Plutark with singular acuteness of wit could uncypher of them is so dubious and the text on which he comments so plyable to all sorts of fancies that he that would set himself about it might invent several other interpretations as probable as his They are as the divers impressions of clouds to which the fancy of every man ascribes what image or lineaments seems best to him And lastly he will discover that though the expositions which that Philosopher presents us there were as certain as if they had been delivered by an Oracle yet they all terminate in two caitive and dismal Demons unknown even to them that ador'd them in uncouch speculations concerning the motions of the Moon and the Inundations of Nilus in Platonick Idea's and the Riddles of Pythagoras and in that ancient foppery of Oromasdes and Arimanius two opposite principles of all things with some cold mystical interpretations of reasons why the Egyptians religiously worshipped the Ox the Sheep the Ichneumon Larks Storks Serpents Dogs Beetles and Weesels Is not here great cause to boast of having drawn from the fountain of Divine Wisdom it self So little ground is there to think so that on the contrary there is no person of indifferent understanding but in the reading of that Treatise would pity Plutark that bestowed so much knowledge and labour in commenting upon such absurdities and could not discover them to be such What shall we then say of the Greeks who held from the Egyptians whatever they had not altogether bad and what shall we think of the Romans who had nothing but from imitation of the Greeks both in humane Sciences and Religious Politie But put the case they had borrowed nothing from the Egyptians but that this Divine Revelation had been peculiarly imparted to them I would be told from what books that were in reputation amongst them we ought now to take it For we have heard say indeed that they had Sibyls by whose means they were made acquainted with divine secrets and who also writ books of the same but the wind and time have carried them away If there be any thing lest of their Oracles as there are divers excellent Greek verses that bear their name at this day yet are with very just reason suspected by the learned the Christian Religion is clearly described in them and the Pagan so strongly and directly confuted that the Christians could scarce finde more express proofs for themselves then in those books of theirs And there is no likelihood that these were the same whom the Roman Priests went to consult as oft as there was occasion to avert some raging mortality For they taught not to render to Apollo Latona Diana Hercules Mercury or Neptune those honours which they us'd to perform to them to make them propitious in such occurrences If therefore this revelation was contained in the Books of the Sibyls it is perish'd long since and we have no more knowledge of them then of those of Numa Pompilius which were burned at Rome by authority of the Senate because they tended to the subversion and annulling of all their Religious Ceremonies They had moreover memorials of the rights of the Pontifices Augurs and Aruspices Of all which there is nothing left but the name Miserable are
on the day of resurrection shall by sounding a trumpet of five hundred years journey long puffe out all the souls of the deceased which being so dispersed about the world shall fly about every one seeking its own body They that find allegorical senses in these rare texts I think no reasonable man will judge but a portion of Hellebore were more fit for them then argumentative discourses Wherefore let him be perpetually concluded and accounted a most stupid and senselesse person who will not subscribe to this Result that the doctrine of Mahomet is so far from being of divine revelation that it is not so much as of humane institution Or if man had any share in it the evil spirit when he contriv'd it was lodged in his hypochondres CHAP. IV. Of the Religion of the Jews Whether it allows Indifference And how it ought to be held of Divine Revelation I Intimated above that the Jewish Religion is not to be distinguished according to the Sects of those that profess it but according to the times in which they liv'd Nevertheless in this contest against those that maintain Indifference in the external profession of all Religions it is not material if they betake themselves to the Jewish in what time they consider it before or after the birth of Christ For if they plead it as it was establish'd by Moses and continued down to the birth of Christ there never was any that so severely forbad its professors to participate in strange ceremonies The first Commandment of their Law is Thou shalt have no other Gods before me And next Thou shalt not make to thy self the likeness of any that is in Heaven above or in the Earth beneath or in the Waters under the earth Thou shalt not bow down before it Comprehending in one and the same prohibition both devotion towards other Gods and the expression of it towards their Images And all the books of Moses are in a manner but a commentary in confirmation of these two Commandments repeated and inculcated from page to page As likewise all the ceremonies enjoyned by the same Law differing from those of all the Gentiles were as a separation between those Nations which withheld the Gentiles from approaching to the Jews whose God they did not know and the Jews ftom communicating with the Gentiles whom they looked upon as profane and idolatrous Marriages with the Daughters of strangers were forbidden them least they should become snares to them and cause them to turn aside to other Gods and the total extirpation of the inhabitants of Canaan was commanded to the end there might remain no memory of them or their idols which might be an occasion of perversion and scandal to them And it appears by many experiences that God and men construed this Law after this manner For there is no where else to be found examples of greater resolution and constancy in maintaing of Religion They have chosen rather to be cast into burning furnaces and amongst the paws of Lions then to conform to the idolatries of Babylon They have endured cruel deaths rather then they would taste of swins flesh which was forbidden to them and in short have cheerfully suffered all kinds of oppressions and violences for the desense of their Law On the other side we do not finde more dreadful judgements inflicted on any nation for associating with other people in their religious Ceremonies For they have been inslaved by their adversaries their Country turn'd into desolation and their whole Nation carried away by their victorious enemies into a strange Land And indeed the case is too notorious of it self to be doubted If the Jewish Religion be considered as it is professed by them at this day being themselves pretend it to be of a permanent durance and not subject to any variation it follows that they must accord in this point with the doctrine of their ancestors For wherefore should it be changed in this particular being in all others invariable And truly their practise is not different from that of old They bear still about them a token imprinted in their flesh which seperates them from the rest of mankind They abhor and despise other nations as ignorant of the true God and abominate Images and Statues more in these days then ever as reminding them of the idolatry heretofore so expresly forbidden to their fathers So that they choose rather to be the scorn and hatred of all Nations and deprived of all hopes of honors pre-eminences great possessions and offices which are so powerful attractives to the rest of mankind then to conform onely in outward profession to our devotions and set foot in our Churches But if they were of the Opinion of our Indifferents were it not an easie thing for them to be baptis'd and thereby redeem themselves from so many mischiefs and partake in the honours of the Countries in which they dwell It is true some Marchands amongst them dissemble in such places where they are not permitted to sojourn but they do it with great regret and against their consciences Yet they cannot be brought to do any thing on the Saturday for fear of violating the Sabbath or to eat the flesh of swine the prohibition whereof they account perpetually valid But should the present Jews have degenerated in this particular as they have done in many others from the faith and practise of their ancestors yet there ought not any account to be made of their testimony as to the matter in question For whatever advantages they have above the Pagans and Mahometans they are nevertheless deviated from the way of salvation as well as they and cannot pretend hereafter to have that Divine Revelation which ought to be the sole Rule to men of piety and devotion Indeed their race is the noblest of all others and there is no King or people that can boast to be descended from so ancient a stock nor prove their pedigree by so authentick evidences For they are not guilty of the ridiculous vanity of the Aegyptians who by their own account are many thousand years elder then the World nor of that of the Athenians who thought themselves sprung out of their own soil They do not pretend to have been formed of the Stones of Pyrrha nor go about to rake the badges of their nobility out of the rubbidge of Troy They shew by a great series of time and an exact clear display of divers periods the world of that their first father was the common father of all and that no nation can have any manifestation of its original but from their Records As for the Antiquity of their Religion it preceded all others by many Ages It ha's been ratified by an infinite number of great and excellent miracles which made that Nation sometimes formidable to their neighbors and which being frequently exploited did without question advance it above the parallel of all other people of the Earth It ha's preserved amongst them the knowledge of
in essence and perfections and that all the petty Deities of the Pagans are trifles that he is the punisher of Vice and the rewarder of Piety and Virtue by sutable penalties and recompenses both for the body and the soul that all creatures ow him honour and obedience both because they hold their being from him and in regard of his infinite majesty that their beatitude consists in their communion with him and their ruine and extream misery in their elongation from him that he is the author of all the good that is in them and therefore to him onely is praise and thanksgiving to be rendred And also that it professes to embrace the promises of the Messias in the exhibition of whom the Jews place all the hope of their felicity and glory It might seem that in these particulars and the like the Christians ought not so much to be held to have succeeded the Jews as to be Jews themselves or indeed rather the ancient Jews to have been Christians in as much as these are the foundation of Christianity laid by the Prophets and upon which to speak strictly all the faith and piety of their ancestors was built Nevertheless the Christian Law is not without greater advantages herein as having diffused these doctrines without comparison more universally then the Jewish ever did For God being not onely the God of Jews but of all people in the world equally in as much as he framed all of the same blood it is more sutable to the goodness of his nature to communicate the knowledge of his Name to all Nations to East West North and South then to hold himself as it were included within the bounds of Iudaea and it cannot be denyed but that he presents us with a more glorious example of his love to mankind by uniting them together in a Society more strait then that of humanity it self then he did sometimes by the Law of the Jews who having their God their Laws their Ceremonies and their hopes apart look't upon all other Nations as profane and entertain'd no communion with them And certainly were not the Jews blinded by their passions they would acknowledge in this not only the excellence of the Christian Religion above their own but also that the Author of it was the true Messias promised by the Prophets For there is nothing so clear in all their Scriptures as the prediction of the calling of the Gentiles at the appearing of the Messias as was shewn above and the day is not so clear as it is evident that this Promise hath been accomplisht by the preaching of the Gospel For did not the preaching of the Apostles aim at the reducing of the Gentiles from the service of Idols to the knowledge of the God of Abraham Did not they wage a mortal and irreconcileable War against false Deities Did they not overthrow their Temples and demolish their Altars with the sound of their voices Are not the very names of the Idols of the Pagans obliterated out of the memory of men in the greatest part of the world Certainly the Romans and the Greeks whom the Iews held for aliens from the true God and the Nations which both of them accounted Barbarians in Asia Europe Africa even the Savages of the Indies which were unknown to them have done homage to the God of Israel acknowledge the Jews for those that heretofore alone serv'd him venerate their Scriptures ascribe to their Law the prerogative of being the onely rule of piety and virtue reverence their Prophets as heralds of the Divine Will have cast off and abandon'd all their images What do they require further Such a universal mutation in the whole face of the Universe such a marvellous conversion of the hearts of so many Nations in all parts of the World can they judge possible to have been made without a special divine assistance Certainly either this Prophesie The Earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the Lord as the bottom of the Sea with waters that cover it ha's been accomplish'd in the preaching of the Gospel or it will never be accomplish'd at all Wherefore the Christian Religion hath this advantage in this respect above the Jewish that God shews himself in it more affectionate and good towards men and 't is his property to be good that men have more powerful inducements by this consideration to be good one towards another in which consists their perfection and lastly that it ha's this indubitable evidence of the manifestation of the Messias Then in reference to things in which they differ they are of many sorts And as we above distinguish'd the Law of Moses into three parts the Political the Ceremonial and the Moral we will now consider each of them distinctly by it self in brief And first for the Political it needs not much to insist upon that because it do's not so directly regard Religion and yet it must not be wholly pasâ—over in silence How exact therefore so ever it was and congruous to the Nature of that people yet it cannot be denyed but the Christian Religion which hath left to all Nations the free use of their own Laws provided that honesty and equity be resplendent in their policy wherewith all the actions of men ought to be temper'd is in this point preferable before it many degrees For seeing the substance and ground-work of Political Laws is proportionate to and do's not exceed humane reason and therefore the constitution and administration of those Laws depends on Prudence it is a very evident testimony that God greatly distrusted the prudence of the people of the Jews when he took care to prescribe to them even in the least matter and to give them as their Prophet speaks Precept after precept Precept after precept line after line line after line But having diffus'd over all Nations a spirit of prudence and wisdom by the publication of the Gospel to administer their affairs with sage and good conduct it was consentaneous that the establishing of their respective Laws should be permitted to themselves And this turns both to the great adorning of the Universe and to the singular praise of the divine Wisdom For as the Wisdom of God is more illustrous in the several motions of the Heavens of which some are slow others more rapid some tend towards the East others to the West yet from all of them at last results that excellent harmony on which the conservation of the World and the production of all things in the Universe depends then if were no variety at all in their courses And as in the Earth the different streams of Rivers of which some glide so gently that their motion is scarce preceptible others rush with violence like torrents each according to the manner of the places through which they pass some flowing towards the North others towards the South and all in the mean while come from the Sea and return thither again do much more grace and adorn the
face of the World then if they all kept the same equal and uniform tract So without doubt there appears a greater Providence in the conduct of so many Nations so diversified by various sorts of Laws and Governments Monarchical Aristocratical Democratical and mixt each according to its peculiar genius all which nevertheless conspire to the glory of one and the same God and aspire to the atchievment of one and the same hope then if they were all modell'd and policyed according to the same constitutions Besides that God being willing that Christians should be people of free courage and erected to that honest liberty which is worthy of generous and noble souls it ha's pleased him that men should exercise the actions of Justice and virtue no otherwise then by following the suggestions of a nature almost restored by so excellent a Religion to its primitive integrity so that every one should be a Law unto himself It is true that a good part of the Nations which in these dayes make profession of the Christian Name do not shew that a doctrine so heavenly ha's been efficacious to cleanse the vitiosity of nature and repress the disorder of their passions so that there may seem need of more Laws to prevent frauds and injuries But this is the corruption of these dregs of Ages And he that would know what Christian charity and the uprightness of those that have embrac'd this Law is must not consider it such as it is at the present time but in the first Ages of the Church As for the Ceremonial Law 't is the Christian Religion alone that teaches us to understand the use of it by manifesting the enâ— to which it aimed For by that we are instructed that the whole structure of the Tabernacle and all the Oeconomy of the service which was performed therein by external and sensible things did refer to spiritual verities and virtues So that as much as the knowledge of divine mysteries and admirable doctrines transcends things obvious to sense by so much is the Christian Doctrine and the fruits produced by it more excellent then the Mosaical Worship It would be too long to allegorise all that pertains to it the matter will be evident by two or three examples There were two eminent Sacraments Circumcision and the Paschal Lambe To take them according to the construction of the Jews what other signification had they but onely to separate the people of the Jews and to discriminate them from other Nations and be a commemoration of their deliverance out of Egypt and the death of the First-born The one was a token imprinted in the flesh of a Covenant that seem'd to regard onely the body and the other a memorial of a deliverance meerly temporal Now we have learnt from the Christian Religion that the First was instituted to represent the need we stood in that this corrupt nature of ours which we derive from our fathers by ordinary generation should be retrenched if we would have part in the spiritual Covenant with God and the Second to be a type of him of whom it was said He was lead like a Lamb to the slaughter and whose blood and death secured our souls from the dreadful and universal destruction to which otherwise they were obnoxious And in this we do no more but follow the traces which themselves have hereof in the Prophets but could not discern To this purpose is their speaking of and exhorting to the circumcision of the heart as in contempt of that which was made in the flesh and also that of Moses's diligent injunction to sprinkle the blood of the Paschal Lambe upon the posts and tressell of the house and that it should be a perpetual institution in their generations For what virtue had the blood of a Lamb to divert the sword of an Angel and to warrant the houses of the Israelites from the calamity of others There was moreover prescrib'd by it several washings and purifications for the vessels and utensils of the Tabernacle houses and garments infected with any pollution for men and women seised on by some natural infirmity things which were accounted unclean if all these mysteries were not solicitously observed The Gospel hath taught us that all this represents true sanctification which cleanses the corrupt appetites of man and purifies his conscience And truly otherwise to what end or benefit served all these washings if they did not design something else Or why should corporeal and naturally inevitable infirmities such as the Lunar flux of women debarre them from communion with God and his Tabernacle but onely as figuring those voluntary ones of the conscience In this also we have the authority of their Prophets It is said in Ezekiel chap. 36.25 I will sprinkle clean water upon you and ye shall be clean from all your filthiness and from all your Idols will I cleanse you But how A new heart will I give you and a new spirit will I put within you and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh and I will give you an heart of flesh And I will put my spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statutes c. Now by how much piety and the internal virtue of the soul is better then the cleanness of the body so much is the recommendation and doctrine of the one more excellent then the observation of the other But this appears remarkably in the principal part of the Ceremonial Law namely in the Sacrifices For the death of beasts being as we intimated formerly incapable to make propitiation for sins and yet it being a thousand times expressed in the Law that those victimes were appointed for propitiation what remains but that they were destinated as types for the representation of a Sacrifice which in truth made real and sufficient propitiation for offenses And indeed what else could the Prophet Isaiah have referr'd to when he said chap. 53.6 All we like sheep have gone astray we have turned every one to his own way and the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all He was brought as a Lambe to the slaughter and as a sheep before the Shearers is dumbe so he opened not his mouth Especially since the blood of Bulls and Goats had no virtue for the purification of souls and yet the High Priest entred every year into the Holy of Holies with blood in the presence of the Arke of the Lord as if he had gone to offer satisfaction for the sins committed by the People what had this been but a vain and empty ceremony in case it did not typifie One who in the quality of great and Soverain Priest entred into the presence of God in the Heavens with real satisfaction for the sins of men Truly the resemblance is admirable Onely once a year a period of time in which the world seems to exist a new grow up wax old and terminate its duration by the revolution and succession of the four seasons
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
Faith of Christ against all the superstitions of the world And though some knot may be met with here or there by the way yet what man is there who addicting himself to the study of a science is deterr'd from it by one or two difficulties he finds in it How often ha's such a one vex'd his brains for the understanding of Aristotle and how many days and nights ha's he spent in the reading of his writings dispairing of being ever able perfectly to understand them who having scarce once in his life cast his Eyes upon the Epistles of Saint Paul complains of the contexture of his ratiocination and the obscurity of his doctrines And yet the affair with the Philosopher was perhaps no more then to know whether Demonstration from the Effect deserves the title of Demonstration as well as that which is made from the Cause or whether according to the Peripatetick doctrine Universals have a subsistence out of our Intellect or what reasons justifie the opinion of ranking Privation among Principles of things empty questions and of no importance in reference to Life whereas in the writings of the Apostle the argument is concerning the glory of God and the salvation of our souls But the truth is where the business is to render to God the service which we owe him the most even ways seem rugged to us but where 't is to follow our fancies all precipices become easily superable and we level mountains Had these people once understood Religion and well conceived the idea of it they would exalt the mercy of God without comparison more then they do and withal have a greater dread of his justice and where he ha's reveal'd his celestial truths they would not dare to bring a Lye into competition where he ha's manifested his will they would not presume to prefer their own before it where he ha's described the form of Religion he would have us to follow with his own hand they would not offer to equal with it either humane imaginations or inventions of Devils where he hath sworn that As he lives he will not give his glory to another and that he will bring vengeance upon his enemies by drenching his arrows in their blood they would not abuse his mercy to impiety nor sleep in so profound a supinity but would learn from those who have most of all extoll'd his compassions that 't is a terrible thing to fall into his hands The great judgements wherewith he hath chastis'd all Nations by reason of their Idolatries the dreadful calamities which he brought on his beloved People for having imitated the same the unparallel'd desolation of the City of Jerusalem and the visible Curse which pursues that miserable Nation every where for having rejected the Gospel the breaking to pieces of the Roman Empire for having persecuted it and the judgements which lie pours down from time to time upon all those who provoke him would be sufficient documents to them that though his patience be marvellous yet he is terrible in revenging contempt towards himself and the truth revealed by him As for what is alledged concerning the peace and union of minds inflam'd with so great passion through the occasion of Religion some against others and of the tranquillity of States put in combustion by differences in sacred matters did we see no other means to obtain the same but those of impiety it were more eligible to be at perpetual jars and enmities Did Christ who knew well that he came to bring fire and sword into the world by the preaching the Gospel desist therefore from preaching it or command his Apostles to conform themselves to all professions according to occasion for fear of exciting seditions and tumults No surely Should the world perish by combustions his truth must be maintained But by the grace of God we are not reduc'd to those terms To turbulent and inconsiderate minds Religion is often a pretext of commotions to violent and bloody souls the same Religion is sometimes an incitement to murders and massacres But wise and politick Princes who give not themselves up to their own passion or to the furious zeal of others have well understood how notwithstanding the diversity of professions to contain their people within the compass of duty towards them and concord together and experience hath attested that when they will employ their prudence and authority therein as they ought they are equally well served by opposite Parties So that the zeal of Religion being moderated by the laws of reason and humanity does not so transport mens minds but that they may live peaceable together under one Government although in contrary profession of Religion Besides the two Societies Civil and Religious have their rights and their laws distinct and the knowledge of the true God do's not lead to the troubling or subverting of humane Commonwealths no more then ardency we ought to have for his glory ought to render men murderers and barbarians But what tends all this discourse to For certainly these people who speak so much of the publick peace have no great care for it t is their own peace they are solicitous of And because their God is the grandeur pleasure and contentment of the world they hate the profession which crosses thâ—ir designs and lays obstacles before them which hinders them from mounting whether they aspire And being 't is an infamous thing to be accounted a despiser of the Deity and they which declare freely that Religion is not worthy to be prefer'd before the things of the world are ordinarily lookt upon as monsters by others they shelter themselvs under the fair appearence of the desire of peace and seek masks to disguise so uncomely an aspect But he that should behold the bottom of their hearts and they cannot so well hide themselves but they may be discerned cross their veil would find there the contempt of God and of his service which shame hinders them from laying open to the world In Christendom whoever is neither a Catholick nor Reformed he must of necessity be an Atheist since he cannot be either Pagan or Jew or Mahometan unless he have lost common sense together with all gust of piety And indeed for the most part either their lives or discourses convince them to be such For if there be any such person that lives in a measure honestly in the sight of the world yet he speaks disdainfully of Religion and looks upon all those as besotted who are lovers of the same Others swim in all sorts of pleasure and are so abandon'd to dissoluteness that they cause shame to mankind and horror to any that considers them These Truth accounts it a glory to have her enemies The former she cares for so much the less as they are much more rare I pray God restore them to a better mind And to him who hath afforded us the grace to bring this small work to its conclusion be honor and glory to all eternity Amen FINIS