of Sense that it is often deceived and imposed upon Or against Truth that there are Errors and everlasting Disputes among Mankind And because there are are we all obliged to be Scepticks and may we be positive that there is no Truth nor Certainty in the World and that no man can be sure he sees or hears or knows or lives And because there are or have been deluded and brain-sick persons are therefore none wise or in their Wits And are all Inspired Persons no more to be credited than if they were Lunaticks Or don 't they know themselves to be any more Inspired than those that are agitated by the power of a wild Imagination Confidence in Imaginary Inspirations may be great but the Perception and so the Assurance cannot be alike to what is real But tho' the Deity can so communicate it self as that the Person inspired shall know most certainly it is from God and from him alone and so there is no absolute necessity of any farther evidence to him no more than there is of Light to give evidence to Light yet that there might nothing be wanting for the further satisfaction of such as had a Revelation there was often added some sign or supernatural proof So when Gideon had some doubt of what the Angel said when he knew not what he was and was timerous when requir'd to go on a difficult Enterprize he was confirmed by the Fire out of the Rock that consumed the Flesh and by the Fleece and the Soldier 's Dream and the Interpretation of it And Moses was convinced not only of his own Mission from God but of the acceptance and authority he should upon it have with the People when the Rod in his hand was turned into a Serpent and his Hand by putting it into his bosom was made leprous and cured again in a moment by taking it out A course altogether necessary for the satisfaction of others as has been before observed and which may reasonably be demanded For if a Person shall come under the pretence of a Revelation with a Message to others and require them as they tender their Salvation to receive it and to submit to it without such Certificates as shall give Authority to it it is like one that shall take on him the Style and Character of an Ambassador without any Credentials to give him Authority and deserves no better acceptance Let then a Moses come with a Message to Pharaoh in the Name of God and require him to obey it that Prince might reasonably expect a farther confirmation than his word and it must be somewhat truly great and greater than what was done by his Magicians that should determine him to a belief of it Let Elijah confront Ahab and the Priests of Baal and they dispute his Mission and Authority he appeals to the Supreme Authority to decide it The God that answereth by fire let him be God Let a lying spirit be put in the mouth of the other Prophets in opposition unto Micaiah th a Prophet for the Conviction of all leaves it to the event saying unto Ahab If thou return at all in peace the Lord hath not spoken by me And he said Hearken O people every one of you By this means that is by Predictions and Miracles a Prophet may be known to be a Prophet and an Inspiration to be an Inspiration and by these Characters may we be able to judge of both as to the Authority of the Mission and the Truth of the Inspiration Where the Evidence was necessary there was never wanting one or both of these And though John did no Miracle yet he had the Spirit of Prophecy the People acknowledged for said they All things John spake of this man Jesus were true There may 't is likely be Inspiration where there is neither of these nor the like Evidences but there is no obligation on others to believe it without the Evidence be sufficient for such as the Evidence is such is the Obligation but the Evidence is not sufficient which rests solely on Humane Authority and has nothing but the bare word and affirmation of the Pretender to prove it To this purpose saith our Saviour If I bear witness of my self my witness is not true The works that I do bear witness of me So that Inspiration is as to others no Inspiration till it be proved It may for ought appears to the contrary be no other than Delusion or Imposture Let therefore the Imagination be never so strong the Confidence never so great the Intent never so good the Question is Whence is this what Evidence doth the Person bring of his Mission from God upon what doth it rest into what is it resolved What doth he produce more than what may be the fruit of Imagination It may all be a fit of Enthusiasm So that if a Person will pretend to immediate Inspiration were it an Age for it and much more pretend to it after Inspiration has ceased he must be able to fortify it by such Evidence as can come from none but him from whom the Inspiration came if it be Divine So much for Inspiration in opposition to Natural Impressions and Diabolical Illusions and which may serve as a general Answer to the other particular Instances that remain Thus it was in Visions which as to the Visionaries was with that Evidence as could leave no manner of doubt of what was therein represented So Micaiah describes his Vision I saw the Lord sitting on his throne and all the host of heaven standing by him on his right hand and on his left And the Lord said Who shall persuade Ahab that he may go up and fall at Ramoth-Gilead c. And by this as he himself did abide so the Event verified it vers 34. The same is to be said as to Dreams which had such a peculiar stroke upon the Imagination that the Divine had a different effect upon the Person from what was Natural and therefore Abimelech before he had expostulated the Case with Abraham communicated his Dream to his Family from the confidence he had in himself of the truth of it And especially has this a sufficient Evidence as to others 1. When such things are therein discover'd which they had before no knowledge of as was the Case of Abimelech Or 2. Which were so remote in Place or Time as none could possibly reveal but by a Divine Communication Or 3. When the Interpretation was quite different from the Dream nor was without that Interpretation to be understood This was the Case of Pharaoh about the seven fat and lean kine c. Gen. 41.38 Of Nebuchadnezzar about his own Transformation and Deposition Dan. 4.19 and that of the Midianitish Soldier Judg. 7.13 14. Where if we grant that the Dreams as to the matter might have been the effect of a rolling Imagination as Pharaoh's Kine Nebuchadnezzar's Tree and the Soldier 's Cake yet how the seven Kine
2.22 revealeth the deep and secret things and doth communicate his Will so that the Person conceives and thinks and acts as the Divine Power would have him conceive think and act It being here as with the Soul in the Body which is the Principle of all Vital Motion for though the Body be in its contrivance admirably adapted for all Offices to which the Organs of it are to serve if there were a Soul in it yet it is the Soul that must make the Eye to see and the Foot to move and the Tongue to speak or else there will be no Sight Motion nor Speech So it is here in Divine Inspiration of this sort where the Spirit of God is to the Soul what the Soul is to the Body and must make all those Impressions upon it must infuse the Power of conceiving and thinking or rather those Conceptions and Thoughts those Notions and Ideas of Things nay that Matter So that the Person Inspired doth not think his own Thoughts nor order his own Conceptions nor form his own Notions nor use his own Words where these are Inspired as far as he is Inspired Not that his Reason is not in operation as it is in Raptures Visions and Dreams where the Rational Powers are bound up as it were by Sleep for the present but that these Infusions proceeding not from any Reasoning in themselves but from an External and Supernatural Cause it is by that Cause determined to the Matter that is Inspired As a Prompter doth suggest the Matter or dictate the Words to the Interpreter he makes use of which are not to be esteemed the Words or Thoughts of the Interpreter but of the Suggester As our Saviour saith to his Disciples When they deliver you up take no thought how or what ye shall speak for it shall be given you in that same hour what ye shall speak For it is not ye that speak but the Spirit of the Father which speaketh in you Matth. 10.19 10. Now as it was the Spirit of God speaking in them that did in that case dictate and guide them in all they said so that they spake with such Authority and Ability such Wisdom and Elocution without any Premeditation as all their Adversaries were not able to gainsay or resist Luke 21.15 as we find in the Instance of St. Stephen Acts 6.10 So it was after the same manner that the Divine Spirit did breathe upon the mind as our Saviour on the Apostles in an external way the signification of the internal John 20.22 in a way imperceptible and did so insinuate it self that it became as it were one Spirit with theirs and they thought as the Spirit dispos'd them to think as well as spake as the Spirit gave them utterance Acts 2.4 This was thinking and speaking by Inspiration And this being the most eminent way of God's communicating his Will to Mankind is call'd Revelation in the New Testament especially it being immediate without the intervention of Visions or Extasies or Voices or any other means than it self and this was the way by which the Apostles received their Revelation called a Revealing by the Spirit 2. Another way by which God revealed himself was Vision or Sight This was so common that all the ways of Revelation are sometimes set forth by this term A Vision is the Representation of an Object as in a Glass which places the Visage before us and by which we have as clear a view of the things thus represented as if they were the things themselves and not the Images or appearances of them And therefore though the external senses are herein bound up and as it were laid asleep in a Trance yet the things presented at that time to the imagination and intended as a Revelation of something to happen or to be done are as plain and evident as sensible Objects that lie open to the sense Thus Balaam describes it as to himself who saw the vision of the Almighty falling into a trance but having his eyes open Numb 24.16 that is though he had not the exercise of his outward senses and so his eyes were of no more use to him when open than if they were shut yet he evidently saw whatever was presented to his mind Thus St. Paul as clearly saw our Saviour by a Representation or Vision when he was in a Trance in the Temple as he did when he actually and visibly appear'd to him at Mid-day on the way to Damascus In this case things imaginary are as if they were real remote as if they were near future as if present and secret as if open that is what sight presence and knowledge is to us in things sensible when we are awake and have the full exercise of our outward senses that is Vision to the Visionaries to such as are in an Extasy This will be farther illustrated by a reflection upon these several particulars to which if I mistake not all the instances of this kind may be reduced As 1. In Vision things imaginary and internal are represented as evidently as if they were real and external Thus much is intimated in the case of St. Peter of whom 't is said when the Angel smote him and the chains fell off from his hands he wist not that it was true which was done by the angel but thought be saw a vision From whence it follows that all this which he found to be real when he came to himself might have been represented by way of Vision and things thereby represented are as evidently proposed to the Mind as outward Objects can be to the Eye Thus it was with the same Apostle when he fell into a Trance and saw heaven opened and a certain vessel descending unto him as it had been a great sheet knit at the four corners and let down to the earth wherein were all manner of four-footed beasts of the earth c. Acts 10.10 c. Of this kind of Vision were Jeremiah's wearing a linnen Girdle and his hiding it afterwards in a hole by Euphrates and his taking a cup of fury at the Lord's hand and causing all Nations to drink of it Of the same kind were Ezekiel's eating of the Roll his typical laying Siege to Jerusalem and an hundred things more in that and other Prophetical Books In which cases when the things represented are wholly imaginary and never existent what is in Phrase positively said of them is to be supplied with as it were as in the aforesaid Vision of St. Peter when it is said Peter saw heaven opened and a sheet descending c. it being not a thing really done but only by Representation it is to be understood That he as it were saw Heaven opened 2. In Vision things remote are represented as present and the Visionary has all the advantage of sight in things presented to the Eye without the use of sight or change of place So Ezekiel when a Captive in
Chaldâ—ea had the state of Jerusalem as it was then in fact set before him whither he was brought in the visions of God and as evidently saw all things that were at that time transacted in the Temple as if he had been actually there And even the secret practices of the Elders and Priests in the most retired corners were at that distance exactly represented to him so that if he had been personally with them they had not been more visible to him There he beheld the Idols pourtrayed on the wall and the Seventy Men or Sanhedrim and Jaazaniah their Head in the midst of them with every Man his Censer in his hand and all the particulars as there described 3. In Vision things future are as evidently represented as if they were present Thus Saul when deprived of his Sight saw in a Vision Ananias coming in and by Imposition of hands restoring him to it and by which means as described to him before-hand he as perfectly knew Ananias when he came to see as if he had afore time been conversant with him From whence we may observe 1. That Vision is Supernatural so in the Old Testament Ezekiel saith The hand of the Lord was upon me And in the New St. John saith He was in the Spirit 2. That it is Internal when the Soul tho' in the Body yet for the present is as out of it as to corporeal Sensations and sees perceives and understands nothing by the external organs Thus it was with St. Paul in his wonderful Rapture when his Soul was in such an abstracted and elevated state that he himself could not tell whether he was in the body or out of the body So that when the Name of Vision is given in Scripture to this way of Divine Communication it is not from any use made of corporeal sight or that it is entertain'd with any external objects but because of the clearness and evidence of it and a conformity it therein bears to outward and corporeal Sense By which it is distinguished from external Representations which were also very frequent in those times of Revelation of which there were two sorts more especially viz. 1. That which the Jews call the Shechinah which was God's manifestation of himself in a visible Glory and Majesty without any form as he did to the Patriarchs and afterwards it was the token of his special residence among his people the Jews called therefore his dwelling between the cherubins 2. Another way of appearance was by Angels when they took upon them a humane form by way of condescension to mankind and for a freer conversation with them and from which form and umbrage the Scripture terms them Men but besides what the Sequel of Scripture and common Sense shews the Apostle hath taught us that they were Divine Messengers sent immediately from God upon especial occasions and emergencies But the Schechinah called The Glory of the Lord was a Manifestation of the Divine Presence and not a Revelation and the Angels were only Messengers of a Revelation And so neither of them belong properly to this place 3. Another way of Revelation was by Dreams There is so far an agreement between Vision and Dreams that in both the external Senses were bound up so that a Vision may be called a supernatural Dream and a Dream may be said to be a natural Vision and so in Job they seem to be taken for one and the same God speaketh in a dream in a vision of the night when deep sleep falleth upon men in slumbrings upon the bed But the Scripture otherwise usually speaks of them as two distinct ways of Revelation So Num. 12.6 If there be a prophet among you I the Lord will make my self known to him in a vision and will speak unto him in a dream So Joel 2.28 And the difference between them seems to be 1. That Vision properly speaking was generally if not always when the Visionary was awake whether by night or day but Dreams as the nature of the thing shews were when the external Senses were asleep and Reason as to its present operation was bound up with them 2. In a Vision the whole was supernatural without any humane predisposition or concurrence as the Scripture-phrase doth shew as St. John was said to be carried in the spirit into the wilderness and a Trance is said to fall upon St. Peter But to dream is a natural Motion of the Spirits and Disposition of Body which the Spirit of God or an Angel the usual Minister employ'd in such conveyances made use of both as the Mind was then in a state of repose and by the rest of the Body relaxed from the business of the day and also as what was suggested in that way made a stronger impression upon the Mind when not diverted by outward objects and occasions and that there was a cessation from all external and sensible operations For it seemed necessary naturally speaking that in all Revelations there should be a sedate disposition of Mind and an abstraction from all other Conceptions and therefore it was either sound so as in Dreams or made so by some Angelical and Divine Operation as in a Vision or Trance In both the Senses were therefore bound up but in a Vision by a supernatural Agency in Sleep or Dreams by the meer effect of Nature And if it be asked How then is there a Revelation by Dream when Revelation is supernatural and a Dream natural I answer Though it be as natural to dream as to sleep and a Dream is a Consequent if not a constant Concomitant of Sleep yet in this case which we are speaking of the Revelation or Dream was supernatural As to think or speak is natural to man but so to think or speak as is above the capacity of the Agent and what he of himself could never have thought or spoken shews that he is not so much an Agent as a Recipient and the Instrument made use of in the conveyance Thus it was no more natural for Balaam several Ages before to foretel what the children of Israel should do to the Moabites in the latter days than it was for his Ass to speak So to dream is natural but to dream of such things then in doing or of such things to come as are altogether independent on the Body nor by any methods of Nature or presumptive Art to be known or foreseen is supernatural Thus to dream was natural to Pharaoh as to others and his Dream of the Seven fat and lean Kine might have pass'd for the fruit of a nocturnal Imagination but by a Dream to be made understand that there should be successively Seven years of great Plenty and then Seven years of Famine could proceed only from a Divine Revelation And this will further appear in the process of this Discourse when I am to consider the difference between what is Natural and what is Divine c. 4. Another
sort of Revelation was by Voice and that by way of immediate communication or occasional The former of these was vouchsafed to Abraham and above all to Moses to whom God is said to have spoke face to face as a man speaketh unto his friend By which He is distinguished from all other Prophets and preferr'd above them as it is recorded Numb 12.6 7 8. If there be a prophet among you I the Lord will make my self known unto him in a vision and will speak unto him in a dream My servant Moses is not so c. With him will I speak mouth to mouth even apparently and not in dark speeches and the similitude of the Lord shall he behold That Revelation to him was after the way of communication open and clear as a Friend converses with a Friend and whenever he had occasion to know the mind of God he went to the place where he might be sure to meet him that is into the Tabernacle and there he heard the voice of one speaking unto him from between the two cherubims Numb 7.89 Next to this was the continuance of that Oracle among the Jews to which the High-Priest repair'd in any difficulties but how far the Divinity did communicate it self in that way the Scripture is not positive We find that it was with-held in the time of Saul for when he enquired of the Lord 't is said The Lord answer'd him not neither by dreams nor by Urim nor by prophets nor by any other way There was another sort of Voice which was altogether occasional and proceeded from the magnificent Glory in St. Peter's Phrase and was for some particular direction as to Hagar to Abraham c. or for testimony and confirmation as was that the Apostle speaks of when it was audibly proclaim'd from Heaven This is my beloved Son in whom I am well-pleased Thus far I have treated of the several ways of Revelation recorded in the Holy Scripture and in which God spake in time past by the prophets There was one more which the Jews of latter Ages speak of and would have continued after the other were discontinued called by them the Bath Col or the Low Voice and which after a sort they conceive was to supply the deficiency of the other but that is beside my present purpose having confined my self to Scripture alone Where also we find nothing observ'd or allow'd of another way which the Heathenish World abounded in and by which they thought the success and event of any design they had in hand might be learned and that was Divination When by the Air or Earth the flight or feeding of Birds the Entrails of Beasts c. they might judge of the way they were to take or the event of their proceedings as did the King of Babylon A Pretence foolish enough and which we can make no better a use of than to observe how desirous the World has always been of a Revelation how sensible of the need of a further direction than what mere Nature or Reason did dictate and withal how foolish Mankind was under the want of it For how can it be suppos'd that Futurities should be dependent upon such sorry Accidents or that the Divinity should thus reveal it self Therefore it is no wonder to find the true Revelation so silent as to these ludicrous matters and if we had there found such an Order of Men established by that as were the Augurs Haruspices and Extispices among the Heathens and such Rules as those had for to guide them in their observations in that sensless Art it would be a better Argument against the Authority of such a Revelation than ever yet has been or can be advanced against it by its greatest-Enemies No! these are justly reckon'd among the Abominations of the Heathen and forbidden to the Jews viz. There shall not be found among you any one that useth divination or an observer of times or an inchanter or a charmer or a consulter with a familiar spirit for all that do these things are an abomination unto the Lord. But now granting that the Deity did make known and communicate his Will in the ways before spoken of of Inspiration Vision Dreams and Voices yet there remains a great difficulty behind and that is How we may be satisfied about the truth and certainty of such a Revelation And that because as there are Supernatural Visions Voices and Dreams so there are Natural as Divine so Humane as Real so Imaginary on one hand and Pretence on the other And therefore how shall we distinguish the Supernatural from the Natural the Divine from the Humane the Real from the Imaginary and Pretended And how know we but that what we call a Divine Inspiration Vision Dream and Voice may be Natural and Humane may be Imaginary Enthusiastical and Supposititious That persons may say as those Jer. 27.25 I have dreamed I have dreamed and yet it be a Vision of their own heart Or that there may be a lying spirit in the mouth of the prophets as Micaiah said of those in his time 1 Kings 22.22 This brings to the second 2. To consider the difference between Divine Communications Natural Impressions and Diabolical Illusions whether by Inspiration or Vision Dreams or Voices In the resolution of which Case it is not my design to discourse nicely after a philosophical manner as about the force of Imagination and the influence invisible Agents have upon Mankind for that is to go a great way about without coming nearer the Point than when we first set out and is not to be done without knowing what we pretend not to know I don't question but that if we had an immediate Intuition into the state of the Mind or the operations upon it we might discern as plain a difference between Temper and Inspiration Imposture and Revelation as between day and night or as there is between an Angel of light and an Angel of darkness to such as are in the invisible state But these things are alike unknown to us only this we may say That Divine Inspiration is discover'd as Light by it self and which the person divinely moved and illuminated is as much assured of as he is of the existence of any thing in being or the truth of any Proposition as has been before said And when the Divine Power operates it hath so much the Ascendant over the natural temper that it lays a person under an uncontroulable necessity of obeying the Dictates of it as it was with the Prophets of old But if it be said Don't we see Enthusiastical Persons as confident of their Imaginary Inspirations and Visions and look upon themselves as much obliged to follow them as those that are truly Inspired do to obey what is Divine I answer Be it so yet this is of it self no Argument against the truth and certainty of Revelation and of Revelation in those ways Is it any Argument against the certainty