THE REASONABLENESS OF Christianity As delivered in the SCRIPTURES LONDON Printed for Awnsham and Iohn Churchil at the Black Swan in Pater-Noster-Row 1695. THE PREFACE THE little Satisfaction and Consistency is to be found in most of the Systems of Divinity I have met with made me betake my self to the sole Reading of the Scripture to which they all appeal for the understanding the Christian Religion What from thence by an attentive and unbiassed search I have received Reader I here deliver to thee If by this my Labour thou receivest any Light or Confirmation in the Truth joyn with me in Thanks to the Father of Lights for his Condescention to our Vnderstandings If upon a fair and unprejudiced Examination thou findest I have mistaken the Sense and Tenor of the Gospel I beseech thee as a true Christian in the Spirit of the Gospel which is that of Charity and in the words of Sobriety set me right in the Doctrine of Salvation ERRATA Page 35. line 22. read on the. p. 62. l. 26. r. Bethesda p. 63. l. 26. r. little of any thing p. 64. ult r. it was p. 65. l. 6. r. them at Ierusalem Ibid. l. 10 r. ing in that place p. 67. l. 17. r. that remained p. 69. l. 23. r. a king or rather Messiah the King p. 75. l. 6. dele these Ibid. l. 14. r. nor 〈◊〉 p. 112. l. 4. r. Bethesda p. 161. l. 2. r. and of p. 165. l. 20. r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 present World p. 194. l. 11. r. availed not Devils p. 217. l. 11. r. In his Sermon in the. p. 263. l. ◠r. before observed p. 264. l. 24. r. custom p. 271. l. 2. r. apophthegms Ibid. l. 24. r. themselves and deduces p. 282. l. 〈◊〉 r. No touch of p. 284. 1. 〈◊〉 confusion p. 287. l. 17. r. life and. p. 295. l. 22. r. the Apostles p. 203. l. 20. r. Treatise p. 304. l. 4. ◠abstract Ibid. l. 14. read them The Reasonableness of Christianity as delivered in the Scriptures T IS obvious to any one who reads the New Testament that the Doctrine of Redemption and consequently of the Gospel is founded upon the Supposition of Adam's Fall To understand therefore what we are restored to by Jesus Christ we must consider what the Scripture shews we lost by Adam This I thought worthy of a diligent and unbiassed search Since I found the two Extreams that Men run into on this Point either on the one hand shook the Foundations of all Religion or on the other made Christianity almost nothing For whilst some Men would have all Adam's Posterity doomed to Eternal Infinite Punishment for the Transgression of Adam whom Millions had never heard of and no one had authorized to transact for him or be his Representative this seemed to others so little consistent with the Justice or Goodness of the Great and Infinite God that they thought there was no Redemption necessary and consequently that there was none rather than admit of it upon a Supposition so derogatory to the Honour and Attributes of that Infinite Being and so made Jesus Christ nothing but the Restorer and Preacher of pure Natural Religion thereby doing violence to the whole tenor of the New Testament And indeed both sides will be suspected to have trespassed this way against the written Word of God by any one who does but take it to be a Collection of Writings designed by God for the Instruction of the illiterate bulk of Mankind in the way to Salvation and therefore generally and in necessary points to be understood in the plain direct meaning of the words and phrases such as they may be supposed to have had in the mouths of the Speakers who used them according to the Language of that Time and Country wherein they lived without such learned artificial and forced senses of them as are sought out and put upon them in most of the Systems of Divinity according to the Notions that each one has been bred up in To one that thus unbiassed reads the Scriptures what Adam fell from is visible was the state of perfect Obedience which is called Justice in the New Testament though the word which in the Original signifies Justice be translated Righteousness And by this Fall he lost Paradise wherein was Tranquility and the Tree of Life i. e. he lost Bliss and Immortality The Penalty annexed to the breach of the Law with the Sentence pronounced by God upon it shew this The Penalty stands thus Gen. II. 17. In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die How was this executed He did eat but in the day he did eat he did not actually die but was turned out of Paradise from the Tree of Life and shut out for ever from it lest he should take thereof and live for ever This shews that the state of Paradise was a state of Immortality of Life without end which he lost that very day that he eat His Life began from thence to shorten and wast and to have an end and from thence to his actual Death was but like the time of a Prisoner between the Sentence past and the Execution which was in view and certain Death then enter'd and shewed his Face which before was shut out and not known So St. Paul Rom. V. 12. By one man sin entred into the world and death by sin i. e. a state of Death and Mortality And 1 Cor. XV. 22. In Adam all die i. e. by reason of his Transgression all Men are Mortal and come to die This is so clear in these cited places and so much the current of the New Testament that no body can deny but that the Doctrine of the Gospel is that Death came on all Men by Adam's sin only they differ about the signification of the word Death For some will have it to be a state of Guilt wherein not only he but all his Posterity was so involved that every one descended of him deserved endless torment in Hell-fire I shall say nothing more here how far in the apprehensions of Men this consists with the Justice and Goodness of God having mentioned it above But it seems a strange way of understanding a Law which requires the plainest and directest words that by Death should be meant Eternal Life in Misery Could any one be supposed by a Law that says For Felony you shall die not that he should lose his Life but be kept alive in perpetual exquisite Torments And would any one think himself fairly dealt with that was so used To this they would have it be also a state of necessary sinning and provoking God in every Action that men do A yet harder sense of the word Death than the other God says That in the day that thou eatest of the forbidden Fruit thou shalt die i. e. thou and thy Posterity shall be ever after uncapable of doing any thing but what shall be sinful and provoking to me and shall justly deserve my wrath and
directed the Lawyer who asked Luke X. 25. What he should do to inherit eternal life Do this i. e. what is required by the Law and thou shalt live On the other side it seems the unalterable purpose of the Divine Justice that no unrighteous Person no one that is guilty of any breach of the Law should be in Paradise But that the wages of sin shold be to every man as it was to Adam an Exclusion of him out of that Happy state of Immortality and bring Death upon him And this is so conformable to the Eternal and established Law of Right and Wrong that it is spoke of too as if it could not be otherwise St. Iames says Chap. I. 15. Sin when it is finished bringeth forth death as it were by a Natural and necessary production Sin entred into the World and death by sin says St. Paul Rom. V. 12. VI. 23. The wages of sin is Death Death is the Purchase of any of every sin Gal. III. 10. Cursed is every one who continueth not in all things which are written in the Book of the Law to do them And of this St. Iames gives a Reason Chap. II. 10 11. Whosoever shall keep the whole Law and yet offend in one point he is guilty of all For he that said Do not commit Adultery said also do not Kill i. e. He that offends in any one Point sins against the Authority which established the Law Here then we have the standing and fixed measures of Life and Death Immortality and Bliss belong to the Righteous Those who have lived in an exact Conformity to the Law of God are out of the reach of Death But an Exclusion from Paradise and loss of Immortality is the Portion of Sinners of all those who have any way broke that Law and failed of a Compleat Obedience to it by the guilt of any one Transgression And thus Mankind by the Law are put upon the issues of Life or Death As they are Righteous or Vnrighteous Iust or Vnjust i. e. Exact Performers or Transgressors of the Law But yet all having sinned Rom. III. 23. and come short of the glory God i. e. the Kingdom of God in Heaven which is often called his Glory both Iews and Gentiles v. 22. So that by the deeds of the Law no one could be justified v. 20. it follows that no one could then have Eternal Life and Bliss Perhaps it will be demanded Why did God give so hard a Law to Mankind that to the Apostles time no one of Adam's Issue had kept it As appears by Rom. III. and Gal. III. 21 22. Answ. It was such a Law as the Purity of God's Nature required and must be the Law of such a Creature as Man unless God would have made him a Rational Creature and not required him to have lived by the Law of Reason but would have countenanced in him Irregularity and Disobedience to that Light which he had and that Rule which was suitable to his Nature Which would have been to have authorized Disorder Confusion and Wickedness in his Creatures For that this Law was the Law of Reason or as it is called of Nature we shall see by and by And if Rational Creatures will not live up to the Rule of their Reason who shall excuse them If you will admit them to forsake Reason in one point why not in another Where will you stop To disobey God in any part of his Commands and 't is he that Commands what Reason does is direct Rebellion which if dispensed with in any Point Government and Order are at an end And there can be no bounds set to the Lawless Exorbitancy of unconfined men The Law therefore was as St. Paul tells us Rom. VII 12 holy just and good and such as it ought and could not otherwise be This then being the case that whoever is guilty of any sin should certainly die and cease to be the benefit of Life restored by Christ at the Resurrection would have been no great Advantage for as much as here again Death must have seized upon all mankind because all had sinned For the Wages of Sin is every where Death as well after as before the Resurrection if God had not found out a way to Justifie some i. e. so many as obeyed another Law which God gave which in the New Testament is called the Law of Faith Rom. III. 27. and is opposed to the Law of Works And therefore the Punishment of those who would not follow him was to lose their Souls i. e. their Lives Mark VIII 35-38 as is plain considering the occasion it was spoke on The better to understand the Law of Faith it will be convenient in the first place to consider the Law of Works The Law of Works then in short is that Law which requires perfect Obedience without any remission or abatement So that by that Law a man cannot be Just or justified without an exact performance of every tittle Such a perfect Obedience in the New Testament is termed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which we translate Righteousness The Language of this Law is Do this and live Transgress and die Lev. XVIII 5. Ye shall keep my statutes and my judgments which if a man do he shall live in them Ezek. XX. 11. I gave them my statutes and shewed them my judgments which if a man do he shall even live in them Moses says St. Paul Rom. X. 5. describeth the righteousness which is of the Law that the man which doth those things shall live in them Gal. III. 12. The Law is not of Faith but that man that doth them shall live in them On the other side Transgress and die no dispensation no atonement V. 10. Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them Where this Law of Works was to be found the New Testament tells us viz. in the Law delivered by Moses Iohn I. 17. The Law was given by Moses but Faith and Truth came by Iesus Christ. Cap. VII 19. Did not Moses give you the Law says our Saviour and yet none of you keep the Law And this is the Law which he speaks of where he asks the Lawyer Luke X. 26. What is written in the Law how readest thou v. 28. This do and thou shalt live This is that which St. Paul so often stiles the Law without any other distinction Rom. II. 13. Not the hearers of the Law are just before God but the doers of the Law are justified 'T is needless to quote any more places his Epistles are all full of it especially this to the Romans But the Law given by Moses being not given to all Mankind How are all men sinners since without a Law there is no Transgression To this the Apostle v. 14. Answers For when the Gentiles which have not the Law do i. e. find it reasonable to do by nature the things contained in the Law these having not the
the Work for which he hath sent me To confirm them in this Faith and to enable them to do such Works as he had done he promises them the Holy Ghost Iohn XIV 25 26. These things I have said unto you being yet present with you But when I am gone the Holy Ghost the Paraclet which may signifie Monitor as well as Comfortor or Advocate which the Father shall send you in my Name he shall shew you all things and bring to your remembrance all things which I have said So that considering all that I have said and laying it together and comparing it with what you shall see come to pass you may be more abundantly assured that I am the Messiah and fully comprehend that I have done and suffered all things foretold of the Messiah and that were to be accomplished and fulfilled by him according to the Scriptures But be not filled with grief that I leave you Iohn XVI 7. It is expedient for you that I go away For if I go not away the Paraclet will not come unto you One Reason why if he went not away the Holy Ghost could not come we may gather from what has been observed concerning the Prudent and wary carriage of our Saviour all through his Ministry that he might not incur Death with the least suspicion of a Malefactor And therefore though his Disciples believed him to be the Messiah yet they neither understood it so well nor were so well confirmed in the belief of it as after that he being crucified and risen again they had received the Holy Ghost And with the Gifts of the Holy Spirit a fuller and clearer Evidence and Knowledge that he was the Messiah And were enlightned to see how his Kingdom was such as the Scriptures foretold though not such as they till then had expected And now this Knowledge and Assurance received from the Holy Ghost was of use to them after his Resurrection when they could then boldly go about and openly Preach as they did that Iesus was the Messiah confirming that Doctrine by the Miracles which the Holy Ghost impowered them to do But till he was dead and gone they could not do this Their going about openly Preaching as they did after his Resurrection that Iesus was the Messiah and doing Miracles every where to make it good would not have consisted with that Character of Humility Peace and Innocence which the Messiah was to sustain if they had done it before his Crucifixion For this would have drawn upon him the Condemnation of a Malefactor either as a stirrer of Sedition against the Publick Peace or as a Pretender to the Kingdom of Israel And hence we see that they who before his Death preached only the Gospel of the Kingdom that the Kingdom of God was at hand As soon as they had received the Holy Ghost after his Resurrection changed their stile and every where in express words declare that Iesus is the Messiah that King which was to come This the following words here in St. Iohn XVI 8-14 confirm Where he goes on to tell them And when he is come he will convince the World of Sin Because they believed not on me Your Preaching then accompanied with Miracles by the assistance of the Holy Ghost shall be a Conviction to the World that the Iews sinned in not believing me to be the Messiah Of Righteousness or Justice Because I go to my Father and ye see me no more By the same Preaching and Miracles you shall confirm the Doctrine of my Ascension and thereby convince the World that I was that Iust One who am therefore ascended to the Father into Heaven where no unjust Person shall enter Of Iudgment Because the Prince of this World is judged And by the same assistance of the Holy Ghost ye shall convince the World that the Devil is judged or condemned by your casting of him out and destroying his Kingdom and his Worship where ever you Preach Our Saviour adds I have yet many things to say unto you but you cannot bear them now They were yet so full of a Temporal Kingdom that they could not bear the discovery of what a kind of Kingdom his was nor what a King he was to be And therefore he leaves them to the coming of the Holy Ghost for a farther and fuller discovery of himself and the Kingdom of the Messiah For fear they should be scandalized in him and give up the hopes they had now in him and forsake him This he tells them v. 1. of this XVI Chapter These things I have said unto you that you may not be scandalized The last thing he had told them before his saying this to them we find in the last Verses of the precedent Chapter When the Paraclet is come the Spirit of Truth he shall witness concerning me He shall shew you who I am and witness it to the World And then Ye also shall bear witness because ye have been with me from the beginning He shall call to your mind what I have said and done that ye may understand it and know and bear Witness concerning me And again here Iohn XVI after he had told them they could not bear what he had more to say he adds v. 13. Howbeit when the Spirit of Truth is come he will guide you into all Truth and he will shew you things to come He shall glorifie me By the Spirit when he comes ye shall be fully instructed concerning me And though you cannot yet from what I have said to you clearly comprehend my Kingdom and Glory yet he shall make it known to you wherein it consists And though I am now in a mean state and ready to be given up to Contempt Torment and Death So that ye know not what to think of it Yet the Spirit when he comes shall glorifie me and fully satisfie you of my Power and Kingdom And that I sit on the right hand of God to order all things for the good and increase of it till I come again at the last day in fulness of Glory Accordingly the Apostles had a full and clear sight and perswasion of this after they had received the Holy Ghost And they preached it every where boldly and openly without the least remainder of doubt or uncertainty But that they understood him not yet even so far as his Death and Resurrection is evident from v. 17 18. Then said some of the Disciples among themselves What is this that he saith unto us A little while and ye shall not see me And again a little while and ye shall see me and because I go to the Father They said therefore what is this that he saith a little while We know not what he saith Upon which he goes on to Discourse to them of his Death and Resurrection and of the Power they should have of doing Miracles But all this he declares to them in a Mystical and involved way of speaking as he tells them himself v. 25. These things
accounted worthy to obtain that World and the Resurrection from the Dead neither marry nor are given in marriage Neither can they die any more for they are equal unto the Angels and are the SONS OF GOD being the Sons of the Resurrection And he that shall read St. Paul's Arguing Acts XIII 32 33. will find that the great Evidence that Jesus was the Son of God was his Resurrection Then the Image of his Father appeared in him when he visibly entred into the state of Immortality For thus the Apostle reasons We Preach to you how that the Promise which was made to our Fathers God hath fulfilled the same unto us in that he hath raised up Iesus again As it is also written in the second Psalm Thou art my Son this day have I begotten thee This may serve a little to explain the Immortality of the Sons of God who are in this like their Father made after his Image and Likeness But that our Saviour was so he himself farther declares Iohn X. 18. Where speaking of his Life he says No one taketh it from me but I lay it down of my self I have power to lay it down and I have power to take it up again Which he could not have had if he had been a Mortal Man the Son of a Man of the Seed of Adam Or else had by any Transgression forfeited his Life For the wages of Sin is Death And he that hath incurred Death for his own Transgression cannot lay down his Life for another as our Saviour professes he did For he was the Just One Acts VII 57. and XII 14. Who knew no sin 2 Cor. V. 21. Who did no sin neither was guile found in his mouth And thus As by Man came Death so by Man came the Resurrection of the Dead For as in Adam all die so in Christ shall all be made alive For this laying down his Life for others our Saviour tells us Iohn X. 17. Therefore does my Father love me because I lay down my life that I might take it again And this his Obedience and Suffering was rewarded with a Kingdom which he tells us Luke XXII His Father had appointed unto him And which 't is evident out of the Epistle to the Hebrews Chap. XII 2. he had a regard to in his Sufferings Who for the joy that was set before him endured the Cross despising the shame and is set down at the right hand of the Throne of God Which Kingdom given him upon this account of his Obedience Suffering and Death He himself takes notice of in these words Iohn XVII 1-4 Iesus lift up his eyes to Heaven and said Father the hour is come glorifie thy Son that thy Son also may glorifie thee As thou hast given him power over all flesh that he should give Eternal Life to as many as thou hast given him And this is Life Eternal that they may know thee the only true God and Iesus the Messiah whom thou hast sent I have glorified thee on Earth I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do And St. Paul in his Epistle to the Philippians Chap. II. 8-11 He humbled himself and became obedient unto Death even the death of the Cross. Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him and given him a name that is above every name That at the name of Iesus every knee should bow of things in Heaven and things in Earth and things under the Earth And that every Tongue should confess that Iesus Christ is Lord. Thus God we see designed his Son Christ Iesus a Kingdom an Everlasting Kingdom in Heaven But Though as in Adam all die so in Christ all shall be made alive And all men shall return to Life again at the last day Yet all men having sinned and thereby come short of the Glory of God as St. Paul assures us Rom. III. 23. i.e. Not attaining to the Heavenly Kingdom of the Messiah which is often called the Glory of God as may be seen Rom. V. 2. XV. 7. II. 7. Mat. XVI 27. Mark VIII 38. For no one who is unrighteous i. e. comes short of perfect Righteousness shall be admitted into the Eternal Life of that Kingdom As is declared 1 Cor. VI. 9. The unrighteous shall not inherit the Kingdom of God And Death the Wages of Sin being the Portion of all those who had transgressed the Righteous Law of God The Son of God would in vain have come into the World to lay the Foundations of a Kingdom and gather together a select People out of the World if they being found guilty at their appearance before the Judgment-seat of the Righteous Judge of all men at the last day instead of entrance into Eternal Life in the Kingdom he had prepared for them they should receive Death the just Reward of Sin which every one of them was guilty of This second Death would have left him no Subjects And instead of those Ten Thousand times Ten Thousand and Thousands of Thousands there would not have been one left him to sing Praises unto his Name saying Blessing and Honour and Glory and Power be unto him that sitteth on the Throne and unto the Lamb for ever and ever God therefore out of his Mercy to Mankind and for the erecting of the Kingdom of his Son and furnishing it with Subjects out of every Kindred and Tongue and People and Nation proposed to the Children of Men that as many of them as would believe Iesus his Son whom he sent into the World to be the Messiah the promised Deliverer And would receive him for their King and Ruler should have all their past Sins Disobedience and Rebellion forgiven them And if for the future they lived in a sincere Obedience to his Law to the utmost of their power the sins of Humane Frailty for the time to come as well as all those of their past Lives should for his Son's sake because they gave themselves up to him to be his Subjects be forgiven them And so their Faith which made them be baptized into his Name i.e. Enroll themselves in the Kingdom of Iesus the Messiah and profess themselves his Subjects and consequently live by the Laws of his Kingdom should be accounted to them for Righteousness i.e. Should supply the defects of a scanty Obedience in the sight of God Who counting this Faith to them for Righteousness or Compleat Obedience did thus Justifie or make them Just and thereby capable of Eternal Life Now that this is the Faith for which God of his free Grace Justifies sinful Man For 't is God alone that justifieth Rom. VIII 33. Rom. III. 26. We have already shewed by observing through all the History of our Saviour and the Apostles recorded in the Evangelists and in the Acts what he and his Apostles preached and proposed to be believed We shall shew now that besides believing him to be the Messiah their King it was farther required that those who would have the Priviledge Advantages and
to set up according to their Ancient Prophesies of him Which gave them hopes of an extraordinary Man yet to come from God who with an Extraordinary and Divine Power and Miracles should evidence his Mission and work their Deliverance And of any such extraordinary Person who should have the Power of doing Miracles they had no other expectation but only of their Messiah One great Prophet and worker of Miracles and only One more they expected who was to be the Messiah And therefore we see the People justified their believing in him i. e. their believing him to be the Messiah because of the Miracles he did Iohn VII 31. And many of the people believed in him and said when the Messiah cometh will he do more Miracles than this man hath done And when the Jews at the Feast of Dedication Iohn X. 24 25. coming about him said unto him How long dost thou make us doubt If thou be the Messiah tell us plainly Iesus answered them I told you and ye believed not the works that I do in my Father's name bear witness of me And Iohn V. 36. He says I have a greater witness than that of John for the works which the Father hath given me to do the same works that I do bear witness of me that the Father hath sent me Where by the way we may observe that his being sent by the Father is but another way of expressing the Messiah Which is evident from this place here Iohn V. compared with that of Iohn X. last quoted For there he says that his Works bear witness of him And what was that witness viz. That he was the Messiah Here again he says that his works bear witness of him And what is that witness viz. That the Father sent him By which we are taught that to be sent by the Father and to be the Messiah was the same thing in his way of declaring himself And accordingly we find Iohn IV. 53. XI 45. and elsewhere many hearkened and assented to this Testimony and believed on him seeing the things that he did 2. Another way of declaring the Coming of the Messiah was by Phrases and Circumlocutions that did signifie or intimate his Coming though not in direct words pointing out the Person The most usual of these were The Kingdom of God and of Heaven because it was that which was oftnest spoken of the Messiah in the Old Testament in very plain words And a Kingdom was that which the Jews most looked after and wished for In that known place Isa. IX The GOVERNMENT shall be upon his shoulders he shall be called the PRINCE of Peace Of the increase of his GOVERNMENT and Peace there shall be no end Vpon the THRONE of David and upon his KINGDOM to order it and to establish it with Iudgment and with Iustice from henceforth even for ever Micah V. 2. But thou Bethlehem Ephratah though thou be little among the thousands of Judah yet out of thee shall He come forth unto me that is to be the RVLER in Israel And Daniel besides that he calls him Messiah the PRINCE Chap. IX 25. In the account of his Vision of the Son of Man Chap. VII 13 14. says There was given him Dominion Glory and a KINGDOM that all People Nations and Languages should serve him His Dominion is an everlasting Dominion which shall not pass away and his KINGDOM that which shall not be destroyed So that the Kingdom of God and the Kingdom of Heaven were common Phrases amongst the Jews to signifie the times of the Messiah Luke XIV 15. One of the Jews that sat at meat with him said unto him Blessed is he that shall eat bread in the Kingdom of God Chap. XVII 20. The Pharisees demanded When the Kingdom of God should come And St. Iohn Baptist came saying Repent for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand A Phrase he would not have used in Preaching had it not been understood There are other Expressions that signified the Messiah and his Coming which we shall take notice of as they come in our way 3. By plain and direct words declaring the Doctrine of the Messiah speaking out that Jesus was He As we see the Apostles did when they went about Preaching the Gospel after our Saviour's Resurrection This was the open clear way and that which one would think the Messiah himself when he came should have taken especially if it were of that moment that upon mens believing him to be the Messiah depended the forgiveness of their sins And yet we see that our Saviour did not But on the contrary for the most part made no other discovery of himself at least in Iudea and at the beginning of his Ministry but in the two former ways which were more obscure Not declaring himself to be the Messiah any otherwise than as it might be gathered from the Miracles he did and the conformity of his Life and Actions with the Prophesies of the Old Testament concerning him and from some general discourses of the Kingdom of the Messiah being come under the name of the Kingdom of God and of Heaven Nay so far was he from publickly owning himself to be the Messiah that he forbid the doing of it Mark VIII 27-30 He asked his Disciples whom do men say that I am And they answered John the Baptist but some say Elias and others one of the Prophets So that it is evident that even those who believed him an extraordinary Person knew not yet who he was or that he gave himself out for the Messiah though this was in the third Year of his Ministry and not a year before his Death And he saith unto them but whom say ye that I am And Peter answered and said unto him Thou art the Messiah And he charged them that they should tell no man of him Luke IV. 41. And Devils came out of many crying Thou art the Messiah the Son of God And he rebuking them suffered them not to speak that they knew him to be the Messiah Mark III. 11 12. Unclean spirits when they saw him fell down before him and cryed saying Thou art the Son of God And he straitly charged them that they should not make him known Here again we may observe from the comparing of the two Texts that Thou art the Son of God or Thou art the Messiah were indifferently used for the same thing But to return to the matter in hand This concealment of himself will seem strange in one who was come to bring Light into the World and was to suffer Death for the Testimony of the Truth This reservedness will be thought to look as if he had a mind to conceal himself and not to be known to the World for the Messiah nor to be believed on as such But we shall be of another mind and conclude this proceeding of his according to Divine Wisdom and suited to a fuller Manifestation and Evidence of his being the Messiah When we consider that he was to
have heard it out of his own mouth And That had been his Publick Doctrine to his followers Which was openly preached by the Apostles after his Death when he appeared no more And of this they were accused Acts XVII 5-9 But the Iews which believed not moved with envy took unto them certain lewd fellows of the baser sort and gathered a company and set all the City in an uproar And assaulted the House of Jason and sought to bring them out to the people And when they found them Paul and Silas not they drew Jason and certain brethren unto the Rulers of the City crying these that have turned the World upside down are come hither also whom Jason hath received And these all do contrary to the decrees of Caefar saying that there is another King one Iesus And they troubled the People and the Rulers of the City when they heard these things And when they had taken Security of Jason and the other they let them go Though the Magistrates of the World had no great regard to the talk of a King who had suffered Death and appeared no longer any where Yet if our Saviour had openly declared this of himself in his Life-time with a train of Disciples and Followers every where owning and crying him up for their King the Roman Governour of Iudea could not have forborn to have taken notice of it and have made use of their Force against him This the Jews were not mistaken in and therefore made use of it as the strongest Accusation and likeliest to prevail with Pilate against him for the taking away his Life It being Treason and an unpardonable Offence which could not scape Death from a Roman Deputy without the Forfeiture of his own Life Thus then they Accuse him to Pilate Luke XXIII 2. We found this fellow perverting the Nation and forbidding to give Tribute to Caesar saying that he himself is the Messiah a King Our Saviour indeed now that his time was come and he in Custody and forsaken of all the World and so out of all danger of raising any Sedition or Disturbance owns himself to Pilate to be a King after having first told Pilate Iohn XVIII 36. That his Kingdom was not of this World And for a Kingdom in another World Pilate knew that his Master at Rome concerned not himself But had there been any the least appearance of truth in the Allegations of the Jews that he had perverted the Nation forbidding to pay Tribute to Caesar or drawing the People after him as their King Pilate would not so readily have pronounced him Innocent But we see what he said to his Accusers Luke XXIII 13 14. Pilate when he had called together the Chief Priests and the Rulers of the People said unto them You have brought this man unto me as one that perverteth the People and behold I having examined him before you have found no fault in this man touching those things whereof you accuse him No nor yet Herod for I sent you to him and lo nothing worthy of death is done by him And therefore finding a man of that mean Condition and innocent Life no mover of Seditions or disturber of the Publick Peace without a Friend or a Follower would have dismissed him as a King of no consequence as an innocent man falsely and maliciously accused by the Jews How necessary this Caution was in our Saviour to say or do nothing that might justly offend or render him suspected to the Roman Governour and how glad the Jews would have been to have any such thing against him we may see Luke XX. 20. The Chief Priests and the Scribes watched him and sent forth spies who should feign themselves just men that might take hold of his words that so they might deliver him unto the Power and Authority of the Governour And the very thing wherein they hoped to entrap him in this place was paying Tribute to Caesar which they afterwards falsely accused him of And what would they have done if he had before them professed himself to have been the Messiah their King and Deliverer And here we may observe the wonderful Providence of God who had so ordered the state of the Jews at the time when his Son was to come into the World that though neither their Civil Constitution nor Religious Worship were dissolved yet the Power of Life and Death was taken from them Whereby he had an Opportunity to publish the Kingdom of the Messiah that is his own Royalty under the name of the Kingdom of God and of Heaven Which the Jews well enough understood and would certainly have put him to Death for had the Power been in their own hands But this being no matter of Accusation to the Romans hindred him not from speaking of the Kingdom of Heaven as he did Sometimes in reference to his appearing in the World and being believed on by particular Persons Sometimes in reference to the Power should be given him by the Father at his Resurrection And sometimes in reference to his coming to Judge the World at the last day in the full Glory and completion of his Kingdom These were ways of declaring himself which the Jews could lay no hold on to bring him in danger with Pontius Pilate and get him seized and put to Death Another Reason there was that hindred him as much as the former from professing himself in express words to be the Messiah and that was that the whole Nation of the Jews expecting at this time their Messiah and deliverance by him from the Subjection they were in to a Foreign Yoke the body of the People would certainly upon his declaring himself to be the Messiah their King have rose up in Rebellion and set him at the Head of them And indeed the miracles that he did so much disposed them to think him to be the Messiah that though shrouded under the obscurity of a mean Condition and a very private simple Life and his passing for a Galilean his Birth at Bethlehem being then concealed and he not assuming to himself any Power or Authority or so much as the Name of the Messiah yet he could hardly avoid being set up by a Tumult and proclaimed their King So Iohn tells us Chap. V. 14 15. Then those men when they had seen the Miracles that Iesus did said This is of a truth that Prophet that should come into the World When therefore Iesus perceived that they would come to take him by force to make him King he departed again into a Mountain himself alone This was upon his feeding of Five Thousand with five Barley Loaves and two Fishes So hard was it for him doing those miracles which were necessary to testifie his Mission and which often drew great multitudes after him Mat. IV. 25. to keep the heady and hasty multitude from such Disorder as would have involved him in it and have disturbed the course and cut short the time of his Ministry and drawn on him the Reputation
and Death of a Turbulent Seditious Malefactor Contrary to the design of his coming which was to be offered up a Lamb blameless and void of Offence his Innocence appearing to all the World even to him that delivered him up to be crucified This it would have been impossible to have avoided if in his Preaching every where he had openly assumed to himself the Title of their Messiah Which was all was wanting to set the People in a flame who drawn by his miracles and the hopes of finding a Deliverer in so extraordinary a man followed him in great numbers We read every where of multitudes And in Luke XII 1. of Myriads that were gathered about him This conflux of People thus disposed would not have failed upon his declaring himself to be the Messiah to have made a Commotion and with Force set him up for their King It is plain therefore from these these two Reasons why though he came to Preach the Gospel and Convert the World to a belief of his being the Messiah and though he says so much of his Kingdom under the Title of the Kingdom of God and the Kingdom of Heaven he yet makes it not his business to perswade them that he himself is the Messiah or does in his Publick Preaching declare himself to be him He inculcates to the People on all occasions that the Kingdom of God is come He shews the way of Admittance into this Kingdom viz. Repentance and Baptism and teaches the Laws of it viz. Good Life according to the strictest Rules of Vertue and Morality But who the King was of this Kingdom he leaves to his miracles to point out to those who would consider what he did and make the right use of it now Or to witness to those who should hearken to the Apostles hereafter when they preached it in plain words and called upon them to believe it after his Resurrection when there should be no longer any fear that it should cause any disturbance in Civil Societies and the Governments of the World But he could not declare himself to be the Messiah without manifest danger of Tumult and Sedition And the miracles he did declared it so much that he was fain often to hide himself and withdraw from the concourse of the People The Leper that he cured Mark I. though forbid to say any thing yet blazed it so abroad that Iesus could no more openly enter into the City but was without in desart places And there they came to him from every quarter And thus he did more than once This being premised let us take a view of the Promulgation of the Gospel by our Saviour himself and see what it was he taught the World and required men to believe The first beginning of his Ministry whereby he shewed himself seems to be at Cana in Galilee soon after his Baptism where he turned Water into Wine Of which St. Iohn Chap. II. 11. says thus This beginning of Miracles Iesus made and manifested his glory and his Disciples believed in him His Disciples here believed in him but we hear not of any other Preaching to them but by this Miracle whereby he manifested his Glory i. e. of being the Messiah the Prince So Nathanael without any other Preaching but only our Saviour's discovering to him that he knew him after an extraordinary manner presently acknowledges him to be the Messiah crying Rabbi Thou art the Son of God Thou art the King of Israel From hence staying a few days at Capernaum he goes to Ierusalem to the Passover and there he drives the Traders out of the Temple Iohn II. 12-15 saying Make not my Father's House a House of merchandize Where we see he uses a Phrase which by Interpretation signifies that he was the Son of God though at that time unregarded v. 16. Hereupon the Jews demand What sign dost thou shew us since thou doest these things Iesus answered Destroy ye this Temple and in three days I will raise it again This is an instance of what way Jesus took to declare himself For 't is plain by their Reply the Jews understood him not nor his Disciples neither For 't is said v. 22. When therefore he was risen from the dead his Disciples remembred that he said this to them And they believed the Scripture and the saying of Iesus to them This therefore we may look on in the beginning as a Pattern of Christ's Preaching and shewing himself to the Jews Which he generally followed afterwards viz. such a manifestation of himself as every one at present could not understand but yet carried such an Evidence with it to those who were well disposed now or would reflect on it when the whole course of his Ministry was over as was sufficient clearly to convince them that he was the Messiah The reason of this method used by our Saviour the Scripture gives us here at this his first appearing in Publick after his entrance upon his Ministry to be a Rule and Light to us in the whole course of it For the next Verse taking notice that many believed on him because of his Miracles which was all the Preaching they had 'T is said v. 24. But Iesus did not commit himself unto them because he knew all men i. e. He declared not himself so openly to be the Messiah their King as to put himself into the Power of the Jews by laying himself open to their malice whom he knew would be so ready to lay hold on it to accuse him For as the next Verse 25. shews he knew well enough what was in them We may here farther observe That Believing in his Name signifies believing him to be the Messiah V. 22. tells us That many at the Passover believed in his name when they saw the Miracles that he did What other Faith could these Miracles produce in them who saw them but that this was He of whom the Scripture spoke who was to be their Deliverer Whilst he was now at Ierusalem Nicodemus a Ruler of the Jews comes to him Iohn III. 1-21 to whom he Preaches Eternal Life by Faith in the Messiah v. 15. 17. But in general terms without naming himself to be that Messiah though his whole Discourse tends to it This is all we hear of our Saviour the first Year of his Ministry But only his Baptism Fasting and Temptation in the beginning of it and spending the rest of it after the Passover in Iudea with his Disciples Baptizing there but when he knew that the Pharisees reported that he made and baptized more Disciples than John he left Judea and got out of their way again into Galilee John IV. 1. 3. In his way back by the Well of Sichar he discourses with the Samaritan Woman And after having opened to her the True and Spiritual Worship which was at hand which the Woman presently understands of the times of the Messiah who was then looked for Thus she answers v. 25. I know that the Messiah cometh When he is
have I spoken to you in Proverbs i. e. In General Obscure Aenigmatical or Figurative terms All which as well as Allusive Apologues the Jews called Proverbs or Parables Hitherto my declaring of my self to you hath been obscure and with reserve And I have not spoken of my self to you in plain and direct words because ye could not bear it A Messiah and not a King you could not understand And a King living in Poverty and Persecution and dying the Death of a Slave and Malefactor upon a Cross you could not put together And had I told you in plain words that I was the Messiah and given you a direct Commission to Preach to others that I professedly owned my self to be the Messiah you and they would have been ready to have made a Commotion to have set me upon the Throne of my Father David and to fight for me that your Messiah your King in whom are your hopes of a Kingdom should not be delivered up into the hands of his Enemies to be put to Death And of this Peter will instantly give you an Example But the time cometh when I shall no more speak unto you in Parables but I shall shew unto you plainly of the Father My Death and Resurrection and the coming of the Holy Ghost will speedily enlighten you and then I shall make you know the Will and Design of the Father What a Kingdom I am to have and by what means and to what end v. 27. And this the Father himself will shew unto you For he loveth you because ye have loved me and have believed that I came out from the Father Because ye have believed that I am the Son of God the Messiah That he hath anointed and sent me Though it hath not been yet fully discovered to you what kind of Kingdom it shall be nor by what means brought about And then our Saviour without being asked explaining to them what he had said And making them understand better what before they stuck at and complained secretly among themselves that they understood not They thereupon declare v. 30. Now are we sure that thou knowest all things and needest not that any man should ask thee 'T is plain thou knowest mens Thoughts and Doubts before they ask By this we believe that thou comest forth from God Iesus answered Do ye now believe Notwithstanding that you now believe that I came from God and am the Messiah sent by him Behold the hour cometh yea is now come that ye shall be scattered And as it is Mat. XXVI 31. and shall all be scandalized in me What it is to be scandalized in him we may see by what followed hereupon if that which he says to St. Peter Mark XIV did not sufficiently explain it This I have been the more particular in That it may be seen that in this last Discourse to his Disciples where he opened himself more than he had hitherto done and where if any thing more was required to make them Believers than what they already believed we might have expected they should have heard of it there were no new Articles proposed to them but what they believed before viz. That he was the Messiah the Son of God sent from the Father Though of his manner of proceeding and his sudden leaving the World and some few particulars he made them understand something more than they did before But as to the main design of the Gospel viz. That he had a Kingdom that he should be put to Death and rise again and ascend into Heaven to his Father and come again in Glory to Judge the World This he had told them And so had acquainted them with the Great Council of God in sending him the Messiah and omitted nothing that was necessary to be known or believed in it And so he tells them himself Iohn XV. 15. Henceforth I call ye not Servants for the Servant knoweth not what his Lord does But I have called ye Friends for ALL THINGS I have heard of my Father I have made known unto you though perhaps ye do not so fully comprehend them as you will shortly when I am risen and ascended To conclude all in his Prayer which shuts up this Discourse he tells the Father what he had made known to his Apostles The Result whereof we have Iohn XVII 8. I have given unto them the words which thou gavest me and they have received them and THEY HAVE BELIEVED THAT THOV DIDST SEND ME Which is in effect that he was the Messiah promised and sent by God And then he Prays for them and adds v. 20 21. Neither pray I for these alone but for them also who shall believe on me through their word What that Word was through which others should believe in him we have seen in the Preaching of the Apostles all through the History of the Acts viz. This one great Point that Jesus was the Messiah The Apostles he says v. 25. know that thou hast sent me i. e. are assured that I am the Messiah And in v. 21. 23. he Prays That the World may believe which v. 23. is called knowing that thou hast sent me So that what Christ would have believed by his Disciples we may see by this his last Prayer for them when he was leaving the World as well as by what he Preached whilst he was in it And as a Testimony of this one of his last Actions even when he was upon the Cross was to confirm this Doctrine by giving Salvation to one of the Thieves that was crucified with him upon his Declaration that he believed him to be the Messiah For so much the words of his Request imported when he said Remember me Lord when thou comest into thy Kingdom Luke XXIII 42. To which Jesus replied v. 43. Verily I say unto thee to day shalt thou be with me in Paridise An Expression very remarkable For as Adam by sin left Paradise i. e. a state of Happy Immortality Here the believing Thief through his Faith in Iesus the Messiah is promised to be put in Paradise and so re-instated in an Happy Immortality Thus our Saviour ended his Life And what he did after his Resurrection St. Luke tells us Acts I. 3. That he shewed himself to the Apostles forty days speaking things concerning the Kingdom of God This was what our Saviour preached in the whole Course of his Ministry before his Passion And no other Mysteries of Faith does he now discover to them after his Resurrection All he says is concerning the Kingdom of God And what it was he said concerning that we shall see presently out of the other Evangelists having first only taken notice that when now they asked him v. 6. Lord wilt thou at this time restore again the Kingdom to Israel He said unto them v. 7. It is not for you to know the Times and the Seasons which the Father hath put in his own power But ye shall receive Power after that the Holy Ghost is come
hath given to them that obey him Acts XVII 30. Paul tells the Athenians That now under the Gospel God commandeth all Men every where to REPENT Acts XX. 21. St. Paul in his last Conference with the Elders of Ephesus professes to have taught them the whole Doctrine necessary to Salvation I have says he kept back nothing that was profitable unto you But have shewed you and have taught you publickly and from house to house Testifying both to the Iews and to the Greeks And then gives an account what his Preaching had been viz. REPENTANCE towards God and Faith towards our Lord Iesus the Messiah This was the Sum and Substance of the Gospel which St. Paul Preached and was all that he knew necessary to Salvation viz. Repentance and believing Iesus to be the Messiah And so takes his last farewel of them whom he should never see again v. 32. in these words And now Brethren I commend you to God and to the word of his Grace which is able to build you up and to give you an inheritance among all them that are sanctified There is an Inheritance conveyed by the Word and Covenant of Grace but it is only to those who are Sanctified Acts. XXIV 24. When Felix sent for Paul that he and his Wife Drusilla might hear him concerning the Faith in Christ Paul reasoned of Righteousness or Justice and Temperance the Duties we owe to others and to our selves and of the Judgment to come Till he made Felix to tremble Whereby it appears that Temperance and Iustice were Fundamental parts of the Religion that Paul professed and were contained in the Faith which he Preached And if we find the Duties of the Moral Law not pressed by him every where We must remember That most of his Sermons left upon Record were Preached in their Synagogues to the Jews who acknowledged their Obedience due to all the Precepts of the Law And would have taken it amiss to have been suspected not to have been more Zealous for the Law than he And therefore it was with reason that his Discourses were directed chiefly to what they yet wanted and were averse to the knowledge and imbracing of Jesus their promised Messiah But what his Preaching generally was if we will believe him himself we may see Acts XXVI Where giving an Account to King Agrippa of his Life and Doctrine he tells him v. 20. I shewed unto them of Damascus and at Ierusalem and throughout all the Coasts of Iudea and then to the Gentiles that they should repent and turn to God and do works meet for Repentance Thus we see by the Preaching of our Saviour and his Apostles that he required of those who believed him to be the Messiah and received him for their Lord and Deliverer that they should live by his Laws And that though in consideration of their becoming his Subjects by Faith in him whereby they believed and took him to be the Messiah their former Sins should be forgiven Yet he would own none to be his nor receive them as true denizons of the New Ierusalem into the inheritance of Eternal Life but leave them to the Condemnation of the Unrighteous who renounced not their former Miscarriages and lived in a sincere Obedience to his Commands What he expects from his Followers he has sufficiently declared as a Legislator And that they may not be deceived by mistaking the Doctrine of Faith Grace Free-Grace and the Pardon and Forgiveness of Sins and Salvation by him which was the great End of his Coming He more than once declares to them For what omissions and miscarriages he shall Judge and Condemn to Death even those who have owned him and done Miracles in his Name when he comes at last to render to every one according to what he hath DONE in the Flesh Sitting upon his Great and Glorious Tribunal at the end of the World The first place where we find our Saviour to have mentioned the day of Judgment is Ioh. V. 28 29. in these words The hour is coming in which all that are in their Graves shall hear his i. e. the Son of God's Voice and shall come forth They that have DONE GOOD unto the Resurrection of Life And they that have DONE EVIL unto the Resurrection of Damnation That which puts the distinction if we will believe our Saviour is the having done good or evil And he gives a reason of the necessity of his Judging or Condemning those who have done Evil in the following words v. 30. I can of my own self do nothing As I hear I judge And my Iudgment is just Because I seek not my own Will but the Will of my Father who hath sent me He could not judge of himself He had but a delegated Power of Judging from the Father whose Will he obeyed in it and who was of purer Eyes than to admit any unjust Person into the Kingdom of Heaven Matt. VII 22 23. Speaking again of that day he tells what his Sentence will be depart from me ye WORKERS of Iniquity Faith in the Penitent and Sincerely Obedient supplies the defect of their Performances and so by Grace they are made Just. But we may observe None are Sentenced or Punished for Unbelief but only for their Misdeeds They are Workers of Iniquity on whom the Sentence is Pronounced Matt. XIII 14. At the end of the World the Son of Man shall send forth his Angels And they shall gather out of his Kingdom all Scandals and them which DO INIQVITY And cast them into a Furnace of Fire There shall be wailing and gnashing of Teeth And again v. 49. The Angels shall sever the WICKED from among the IVST and shall cast them into the Furnace of Fire Matt. XVI 24. For the Son of Man shall come in the Glory of his Father with his Angels And then be shall Reward every Man according to his WORKS Luke XIII 26. Then shall ye begin to say We have eaten and drunk in thy Presence and thou hast taught in our Streets But he shall say I tell you I know you not Depart from me ye WORKERS of Iniquity Matt. XXV 21-26 When the Son of Man shall come in his Glory and before him shall be gathered all Nations He shall set the Sheep on his right hand and the Goats on his Left Then shall the King say to them on his Right hand Come ye blessed of my Father inherit the Kingdom prepared for you from the Foundation of the World For I was an hungred and ye gave me Meat I was thirsty and ye gave me drink I was a stranger and ye took me in Naked and ye cloathed me I was sick and ye visited me I was in Prison and ye came unto me Then shall the Righteous Answer him saying Lord When saw we thee an hungred and fed thee c. And the King shall answer and say unto them Verily I say unto you In as much as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my
cannot please God and which recommended the Saints of Old St. Paul places in the middle of the List of those who were Eminent for their Faith And whom he sets as Patterns to the converted Hebrews under Persecution to encourage them to persist in their confidence of Deliverance by the Coming of Iesus Christ And in their belief of the Promises they now had under the Gospel Not to draw back from the Hope that was set before them Nor Apostatize from the Profession of the Christian Religion This is plain from v. 35-38 of the precedent Chapter Cast not away therefore your confidence which hath great recompence of Reward For ye have great need of persisting or Perseverance for so the Greek word signifies here which our Translation renders Patience Vid. Luke VIII 15. That after ye have done the Will of God ye might receive the Promise For yet a little while and he that shall come will come and will not tarry Now the just shall live by Faith But if any man draw back my soul shall have no pleasure in him The Examples of Faith which St. Paul enumerates and proposes in the following words Chap. XI plainly shew that the Faith whereby those Believers of old pleased God was nothing but a steadfast relyance on the Goodness and Faithfulness of God for those good things which either the light of Nature or particular Promises had given them grounds to hope for Of what avail this Faith was with God we may see v. 4. By Faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent Sacrifice than Cain by which he obtained witness that he was Righteous V. 5. By Faith Enoch was translated that he should not see Death For before his translation he had this Testimony that be pleased God V. 7. Noah being warned of God of things not seen as yet being wary by Faith prepared an Ark to the saving of his House By the which be condemned the World and became Heir of the Righteousness which is by Faith And what it was that God so graciously accepted and rewarded we are told v. 11. Through Faith also Sarah her self received strength to conceive seed and was delivered of a Child when she was past age How she came to obtain this Grace from God the Apostle tells us Because she judged him Faithful who had promised Those therefore who pleased God and were accepted by him before the Coming of Christ did it only by believing the Promises and relying on the Goodness of God as far as he had revealed it to them For the Apostle in the following words tells us v. 13. These all died in Faith not having received the accomplishment of the Promises but having seen them afar off And were perswaded of them and embraced them This was all that was required of them to be perswaded of and embrace the Promises which they had They could be perswaded of no more than was proposed to them Embrace no more than was revealed according to the Promises they had received and the Dispensations they were under And if the Faith of things seen afar off If their trusting in God for the Promises he then gave them If a belief of the Messiah to come were sufficient to render those who lived in the Ages before Christ Acceptable to God and Righteous before him I desire those who tell us that God will not nay some go so far as to say cannot accept any who do not believe every Article of their particular Creeds and Systems to consider why God out of his Infinite Mercy cannot as well Justifie Man now for believing Iesus of Nazareth to be the promised Messiah the King and Deliverer as those heretofore who believed only that God would according to his Promise in due time send the Messiah to be a King and Deliverer There is another Difficulty often to be met with which seems to have something of more weight in it And that is that though the Faith of those before Christ believing that God would send the Messiah to be a Prince and a Saviour to his People as he had promised And the Faith of those since his time believing Iesus to be that Messiah promised and sent by God shall be accounted to them for Righteousness Yet what shall become of all the rest of Mankind who having never heard of the Promise or News of a Saviour not a word of a Messiah to be sent or that was come have had no thought or belief concerning him To this I Answer That God will require of every man According to what a man hath and not according to what he hath not He will not expect the Improvement of Ten Talents where he gave but One Nor require any one should believe a Promise of which he has never heard The Apostle's Reasoning Rom. X. 14. is very just How shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard But though there be many who being strangers to the Common-wealth of Israel were also strangers to the Oracles of God committed to that People Many to whom the Promise of the Messiah never came and so were never in a capacity to believe or reject that Revelation Yet God had by the Light of Reason revealed to all Mankind who would make use of that Light that he was Good and Merciful The same spark of the Divine Nature and Knowledge in Man which making him a Man shewed him the Law he was under as a Man Shewed him also the way of Attoning the merciful kind compassionate Author and Father of him and his Being when he had transgressed that Law He that made use of this Candle of the Lord so far as to find what was his Duty could not miss to find also the way to Reconciliation and Forgiveness when he had failed of his Duty Though if he used not his Reason this way If he put out or neglected this Light he might perhaps see neither The Law is the eternal immutable Standard of Right And a part of that Law is that a man should forgive not only his Children but his Enemies upon their Repentance asking Pardon and Amendment And therefore he could not doubt that the Author of this Law and God of Patience and Consolation who is rich in Mercy would forgive his frail Off-spring if they acknowledged their Faults disapproved the Iniquity of their Transgressions beg'd his Pardon and resolved in earnest for the future to conform their Actions to this Rule which they owned to be Just and Right This way of Reconciliation this hope of Attonement the Light of Nature revealed to them And the Revelation of the Gospel having said nothing to the contrary leaves them to stand and fall to their own Father and Master whose Goodness and Mercy is over all his Works I know some are forward to urge that place of the Acts Chap. IV. as contrary to this The words v. 10. 12. stand thus Be it known unto you all and to all the People of Israel that by the Name of Iesus