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   Title: The Lively Oracles Given to Us: or the Christians Birth-right and
   Duty in the Custody and Use of the Holy Scripture.
   Creator(s): Allestree, Richard (1619-1681)
   CCEL Subjects: All;
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    THE

                                LIVELY ORACLES

GIVEN TO US.

    OR THE

Christians Birth-right

AND DUTY,

    In the custody and use of the

HOLY SCRIPTURE.
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   By the Author of
   The Whole Duty of Man, &c.
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   Search the Scriptures, Joh. 5. 39.
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   At the Theater in Oxford, 1713

   Imprimatur.

   JO. NICHOLAS

   Vice-Cancell. Oxon.

   Junii 10, 1678.
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  THE

PREFACE.

   IN the Treatise of the Government of the Tongue, publish’d by me heretofore,
   I had occasion to take notice among the exorbitances of that unruly part,
   which sets on fire the whole course of nature, and it self is set on fire
   from hell, Jam. 3. 6. of the impious vanity prevailing in this Age, whereby
   men play with sacred things, and exercise their wit upon the Scriptures by
   which they shall be judg’d at the last day, Joh. 12. 48.

   But that Holy Book not only suffering by the petulancy of the Tongue, but
   the malice of the Heart, out of the abundance whereof the mouth speaks,
   Matt. 12. 34. and also from that irreligion, prepossession, and supiness,
   which the pursuit of sensual pleasures certainly produces; the mischief is
   too much diffus’d and deeply rooted, to be controul’d by a few casual
   reflections. I have therefore thought it necessary, both in regard of the
   dignity and importance of the subject, as also the prevalence of the
   opposition, to attempt a profess’d and particular vindication of the Holy
   Scriptures, by displaying their native excellence and beauty, and enforcing
   the veneration and obedience that is to be paid unto them.

   This I design’d to do in my usual method, by an address to the affections of
   the Reader; soliciting the several passions of love, hope, fear, shame and
   sorrow, which either the Majesty of God in his Sublime Being, his goodness
   derived to us, or our ingratitude return’d to him, could actuate in persons
   not utterly obdurate.

   But whereas men when they have learn’d to do amiss, quickly dispute and
   dictate; I found my self concern’d to pass sometimes within the verge of
   controversy, and to discourse upon the principles of reason, and deductions
   from Testimony, which in the most important transactions of human life are
   justly taken for evidence. In which whole performance I have study’d to
   avoid the entanglements of Sophistry, and the ambition of unintelligible
   Quotations; and kept my self within the reach of the unlearned Christian
   Reader, to whose uses my labours have been ever dedicated.

   All that I require is that men would bring as much readiness to entertain
   the Holy Scriptures, as they do to the reading profane Authors, I am
   asham’d to to say, as they do to the incentives of vice and folly, nay, to
   the libels and invectives that are levell’d against the Scriptures.

   If I obtain this, I will make no doubt that I shall gain a farther point;
   that from the perusal of my imperfect conceptions, the Reader will proceed
   to the study of the Scriptures themselves: there tast and see how gracious
   the Lord is, Psal. 34. 8. and, as the Angel commands Saint John, Revelat.
   10. 9. eat the Book: where he will experimentally find the words of David
   verify’d, Ps. 19. 7. The Law of the Lord is an undefiled Law, converting the
   Soul: the testimony of the Lord is sure, and giveth wisdom to the simple.
   The Statutes of the Lord are right, and rejoyce the heart; the Commandment
   of the Lord is pure, and giveth light to the eyes. The Fear of the Lord is
   clean and endureth for ever, the Judgements of the Lord are true and
   righteous altogether. More to be desir’d are they than gold, yea, than much
   fine gold, sweeter also than hony and the hony-comb. Moreover by them is thy
   servant taught, and in keeping of them there is great reward.

   It is said of Moses, Exod. 34. 29. that having receiv’d the Law from God,
   and convers’d with him in Mount Sinai fourty days together, his face shone,
   and had a brightness fix’d upon it that dazled the beholders; a pledge and
   short essay not only of his appearance at Mount Tabor, Matt. 17. 1. where,
   at the Transfiguration he again was seen in glory: but of that greater, and
   yet future change when he shall see indeed his God face to face, and share
   his glory unto all eternity. The same Divine Goodness gives still his Law to
   every one of us. Let us receive it with due regard and veneration; converse
   with him therein, instead of fourty days, during our whole lives, and so
   anticipate and. certainly assure our interest in that great Transfiguration,
   when all the faithful shall put off their mortal flesh, be translated from
   glory to glory, eternally behold their God, see him as he is, and so enjoy
   him. 

   Conversation has every where an assimilating power; we are generally such as
   are the Men, and Books, and business that we deal with: but surely no
   familiarity has so great an influence on Life and Manners, as when Men hear
   God speaking to them in his Word. That Word which the Apostle Hebr. 4. 12.
   declares to be quick and powerful, sharper than any two-edg’d sword,
   piercing to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and
   marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intent of the heart.

   The time will come when all our Books however recommended for subtilty of
   discourse, exactness of method, variety of matter, eloquence of Language;
   when all our curious Arts, like those mention’d Acts 19. 19. shall be
   brought forth, and burnt before all men: When the great Book of nature, and
   heaven it self shall depart as a scroul roll’d together, Revel. 6. 14. At
   which important season ’twill be more to purpose to have study’d well, that
   is, transcrib’d in practice this one Book, than to have run thro’ all
   besides, for then the dead, small and great, shall stand befere God, and the
   Books shall be open’d, and another Book shall be open’d which is the Book of
   Life, and the dead shall be judg’d out of those things which were written in
   the Books according to their works, Revel. 20. 21.

   In vain shall men alledge the want of due conviction, that they did not know
   how penal it would be, to disregard the Sanctions of Gods Law, which they
   would have had enforc’d by immediate miracle; the apparition of one sent
   from the other world who might testify of the place of torment. This
   expectation the Scripture charges every where with the guilt of tempting
   God, and indeed it really involves this insolent proposal, that the Almighty
   should be oblig’d to break his own Laws, that men might be prevail’d with to
   keep his. But should he think fit to comply herein, the condescension would
   be as successless in the event, as ’tis unreasonable in the offer. Our
   Saviour assures, that they who hear not Moses and the Prophets, the
   instructions and commands laid down in holy Scripture, would not be wrought
   upon by any other method, would not be persuaded by that which they allow
   for irresistable conviction, tho’ one rose again from the dead, Luke 16. 31.
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    THE

                                LIVELY ORACLES

  GIVEN TO US,

   Or the Christians Birth-right and Duty in the custody and use of the

                                HOLY SCRIPTURE.

                                   SECT. I.

   The several Methods of Gods communicating the knowledge of himself.

   GOD, as he is invisible to human eyes, so he is unfathomable by human
   understandings; the perfection of his nature, and the impotency of ours,
   setting us at too great a distance to have any clear perception of him. Nay,
   so far are we from a full comprehension, that we can discern nothing at all
   of him, but by his own light; those discoveries he hath been pleas’d to make
   of himself.

   2. THOSE have been of several sorts; The first was by infusion in mans
   creation, when God interwove into mans very constitution and being the
   notions and apprehensions of a Deity: and at the same instant when he
   breath’d into him a living soul, imprest on it that native religion, which
   taught him to know and reverence his Creator, which we may call the instinct
   of humanity. Nor were those principles dark and confus’d, but clear and
   evident, proportionable to the ends they were design’d to, which were not
   only to contemplate the nature, but to do the will of God; practice being
   even in the state of innocence preferable before an unactive speculation.

   3. BUT this Light being soon eclips’d by Adams disobedience, there remain’d
   to his benighted posterity, only some faint glimmerings, which were utterly
   insufficient to guide them to their end, without fresh aids, and renew’d
   manifestations of God to them. It pleas’d God therefore to repair this
   ruine, and by subsequent revelations to communicate himself to the
   Patriarchs in the first Ages of the World: afterwards to Prophets, and other
   holy men; till at last he revealed himself yet more illustriously in the
   face of Jesus Christ, 2 Cor. 4. 6.

   4. THIS is the one great comprehensive Revelation wherein all the former
   were involv’d, and to which they pointed; the whole mystery of Godliness
   being compris’d in this of Gods being manifested in the flesh, and the
   consequents thereof, 1 Tim. 3. 16. whereby our Saviour as he effected our
   reconciliation with God by the sacrifice of his death; so he declar’d both
   that, and all things else that it concern’d man to know in order to bliss,
   in his doctrine and holy life. And this Teacher being not only sent from
   God, Jo. 3. but being himself God blessed for ever, it cannot be that his
   instructions can want any supplement. Yet that they might not want
   attestation neither to the incredulous world; he confirm’d them by the
   repeated miracles of his life, and by the testimony of those who saw the
   more irrefragable conviction of his Resurrection and Ascension. And they
   also might not want credit and enforcement, the holy Spirit set to his seal,
   and by his miraculous descent upon the Apostles, both asserted their
   commission, and enabled them for the discharge of it, by all gifts necessary
   for the propagating the Faith of Christ over the whole World.

   5. THESE were the waies by which God was pleased to reveal himself to the
   Forefathers of our Faith, and that not only for their sakes, but ours also,
   to whom they were to derive those divine dictates they had receiv’d. St.
   Stephen tells us, those under the Law receiv’d the lively Oracles to deliver
   them down to their posterity, Acts 7. 38. And those under the Gospel, who
   receiv’d yet more lively Oracles from him who was both the Word and the
   Life, did it for the like purpose; to transmit it to us upon whom the ends
   of the world are come. By this all need of repeated Revelations is
   superseded, the faithful deriving of the former, being sufficient to us for
   all things that appertain to life and godliness, 2 Pet. 1. 3.

   6. AND for this, God (whose care is equal for all successions of men) hath
   graciously provided, by causing Holy Scriptures to be writ; by which he hath
   deriv’d on every succeeding Age the illuminations of the former. And for
   that purpose endowed the Writers not only with that moral fidelity requisite
   to the truth of History, but with a divine Spirit, proportionable to the
   great design of fixing an immutable rule for Faith and Manners. And to give
   us the fuller security herein, he has chosen no other penmen of the New
   Testament, than those who were the first oral Promulgers of our Christian
   Religion; so that they have left to us the very same doctrine they taught
   the Primitive Christians; and he that acknowledges them divinely inspir’d in
   what they preach’d, cannot doubt them to be so in what they writ. So that we
   all may enjoy virtually and effectively that with of the devout Father, who
   desir’d to be St. Paul’s Auditor: for he that hears any of his Epistles
   read, is as really spoke to by Saint Paul, as those who were within the
   sound of his voice. Thus God, who in times past spak: at sundry times, and
   in diverse manners to our Fathers by the Prophets, and in the latter days by
   his Son, Heb. 1. 1, 2. continues to speak to us by these inspir’d Writers;
   and what Christ once said to his Disciples in relation to their preaching is
   no less true of their writings: He that despiseth you, despiseth me, Luk.
   10. 16. All the contempt that is at any time flung on these sacred Writings,
   rebounds higher, and finally devolves on the first Author of those
   doctrines, whereof these are the Registers and Transcripts.

   7. BUT this is a guilt which one would think peculiar to Infidels and
   Pagans, and not incident to any who had in their Baptism lifted themselves
   under Christs banner: yet I fear I may say, of the two parties, the
   Scripture has met with the worst treatment from the latter. For if we
   measure by the frequency and variety of injuries, I fear Christians will
   appear to have out-vied Heathens: These bluntly disbelieve them, neglect,
   nay perhaps scornfully deride them. Alas, Christians do this and more; they
   not only put contempts, but tricks upon the Scripture, wrest and distort it
   to justify all their wild phancies, or secular designs; and suborn its
   Patronage to those things it forbids, and tells us that God abhors.

   8. INDEED so many are the abuses we offer it, that he that considers them
   would scarce think we own’d it for the words of a sensible man, much less of
   the great omniscient God. And I believe ’twere hard to assign any one so
   comprehensive and efficacious cause of the universal depravation of manners,
   as the disvaluing of this divine Book, which was design’d to regulate them.
   It were therefore a work worthy another inspired writing, to attempt the
   rescue of this, and recover it to its just estimate. Yet alas, could we hope
   for that, we have scoffers who would as well despise the New as the Old; and
   like the Husbandmen in the Gospel, Mat. 21. 36. would answer such a
   succession of messages by repeating the same injuries.

   9. To such as these ’tis I confess vain for man to address; nay ’twere
   insolence to expect that human Oratory should succeed where the divine fails
   yet the spreading infection of these renders it necessary to administer
   antidotes to others. And besides, tho’ (God be blest) all are not of this
   form, yet there are many who, tho’ not arriv’d to this contempt, yet want
   some degrees of that just reverence they owe the sacred Scriptures, who give
   a confus’d general assent to them as the Word of God, but afford them not a
   consideration and respect answerable to such an acknowledgment. To such as
   these, I shall hope it may not be utterly vain to attempt the exciting of
   those drowsy notions that lie unactive in them; by presenting to them some
   considerations concerning the excellence and use of the Scripture: which
   being all but necessary consequences of that principle they are supposed to
   own, viz. that they are Gods word, I cannot much question their assent to
   the speculative part: I wish I could as probably assure my self of the
   practick.

   10. INDEED were there nothing else to be said in behalf of holy Writ, but
   that it is Gods word, that were enough to command the most awful regard to
   it. And therefore it is but just we make that the first and principal
   consideration in our present discourse. But then ’tis impossible that that
   can want others to attend it; since whatsoever God saies, is in all respects
   compleatly good. I shall therefore to that of its divine original add
   secondly the consideration of its subject Matter; thirdly, of its excellent
   and no less diffusive end and design; and fourthly, of its exact propriety
   and fitness to that design: which are all such qualifications, that where
   they concur, nothing more can be requir’d to commend a writing to the esteem
   of rational men. And upon all these tests, notwithstanding the cavil of the
   Romanists and others, whose force we shall examin with the unhappy issue of
   contrary counsels, this Law of God will be found to answer the Psalmists
   character of it Ps. 19. 7. The Law of God is perfect: and ’twill appear that
   the custody and use thereof is the Birth-right and Duty of every Christian.
   All which severals being faithfully deduced, it will only remain that I add
   full cautions as will be necessary to the due performance of the aforesaid
   duty, and our being in some degree render’d perfect, as this Law of God, and
   the Author thereof himself is perfect, Matt. 5. 48.
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                                   SECT. II.

   The Divine Original, Endearments and Authority of the Holy Scripture.

   MENS judgments are so apt to be bias’d by their affections, that we often
   find them readier to consider who speaks, than what is spoken: a temper very
   unsafe, and the principle of great injustice in our inferior transactions
   with men; yet here there are very few of us that can wholly divest our
   selves of it, whereas, when we deal with God ( in whom alone an implicit
   faith may securely be reposed ) we are nice and wary, bring our scales and
   measures, will take nothing upon his word which holds not weight in our own
   balance. ’Tis true, he needs not our partiality to be justified in his
   sayings, Psal. 51. 4. His words are pure, even as the silver tried seven
   times in the fire, Psalm. 12. 6. able to pass the strictest test that right
   reason (truly so called) can put them to. Yet it shews a great perverseness
   in our nature that we who so easily resign our understandings to fallible
   men, stand thus upon our guard against God make him dispute for every inch
   he gains on us; nor will afford him what we daily grant to any credible man,
   to receive an affirmation upon trust of his veracity.

   2. I am far from contradicting our Saviours Precept, of Search the
   Scriptures Jo. 7. or Saint Pauls, of proving all things, 1 Thes. 5. 21. we
   cannot be too industrious in our inquest after truth, provided we still
   reserve to God the decisive vote, and humbly acquiesce in his sense, how
   distant soever from our own; so that when we consult Scripture (I may add
   reason either) ’tis not to resolve us whether God be to be believed or no in
   what he has said, but whether he hath said such and such things: for if we
   are convinc’d he has, reason as well as Religion commands our assent.

   3. WHATEVER therefore God has said, we are to pay it a reverence merely upon
   the account of its Author, over and above what the excellence of the matter
   exacts: and to this we have all inducements as well as obligation: there
   being no motives to render the words of men estimable to us, which are not
   eminently and transcendently applicable to those of God.

   4. THOSE motives we may reduce to four: first, the Authority of the Speaker;
   secondly, his Kindness; thirdly, his Wisdom, and fourthly, his Truth. First,
   for that of Authority: that may be either native, or acquired; the native is
   that of a parent, which is such a charm of observance, that we see Solomon,
   when he would impress his counsels, assumes the person of a Father; Hear O
   my children the instructions of a Father, Prov. 4. 1. And generally thro’
   that whole Book he uses the compellation of my Son, as the greatest
   endearment to engage attention and reverence. Nay so indispensible was the
   obligation of children in this respect, that we see the contumacious child
   that would not hearken to the advice of his Parents; was by God himself
   adjudged to death, Deut. 21. 20.

   5. NOR have only Gods, but mens Laws exacted that filial reverence to the
   dictates of Parents. But certainly no Parent can pretend such a title to it
   as God, who is not only the immediate Father of our persons, but the
   original Father of our very nature; not only of our flesh, but of our
   spirits also, Heb. 12. 9. So that the Apostles Antithesis in that place is
   as properly applied to counsels as corrections; and we may as rightly infer,
   that if we give reverence to the advices of our earthly Parents; much more
   ought we to subject our selves to this Father of our spirits. And we have
   the very same reason wherewith to enforce it: for the Fathers of our flesh
   do as often dictate, as correct according to their own pleasures, prescribe
   to their children not according to the exact measures of right and wrong,
   but after that humor which most predominates in themselves. But God alwaies
   directs his his admonitions to our profit, that we may be partakers of his
   holiness, Heb. 12. 10. So that we are as unkind to our selves, as irreverent
   towards him, whenever we let any of his words fall to the ground; whose
   claim to this part of our reverence is much more irrefragable than that of
   our natural Parents.

   6. BUT besides this native Authority there is also an acquired; and that we
   may distinguish into two sorts: the one of dominion, the other of
   reputation. To the first kind belongs that of Princes, Magistrates, Masters,
   or any that have coercive power over us. And our own interest teaches us not
   to slight the words of any of these, who can so much to our cost second them
   with deeds. Now God has all these titles of jurisdiction; He is the great
   King, Psal. 48. 2. Nor was it only a complement of the Psalmists; for
   himself owns the stile, I am a great King, Mal. 1. He is the judge of all
   the World, Gen. 18. yea, that Ancient of days, before whom the Books were
   open’d, Dan. 7. 13. He is our Lord and Master by right both of Creation and
   Redemtion; and this Christ owns even in his state of inanition; yea, when he
   was about the most servile employment, the washing his Disciples feet, when
   he was most literally in the form of a servant; yet he scruples not to
   assert his right to that opposite title; You call me Master, and Lord; and
   ye say well, for so 1 am; Jo. 13. 13. Nor are these empty names, but
   effectively attended with all the power they denote. Yet so stupid are we,
   that whilst we awfully receive the dictates of our earthly Superiors, we
   slight and neglect the Oracles of that God who is King of Kings, and Lord of
   Lords. When a Prince speaks, we are apt to cry out with Herods Flatterers,
   the voice of a God, and not of a man, Acts 12. Yet when it is indeed the
   voice of God, we choose to listen to any thing else rather than it. But let
   us saddy remember, that notwithstanding our contempts, this word shall (as
   our Saviour tells us) judge us at the last day, Jo. 12. 48.

   7. A second sort of acquir’d Authority is that of reputation. When a man is
   famed for some extraordinary excellencies, whether moral or intellectual,
   men come with appetite to his discourses, greedily suck them in, nor need
   such a one bespeak attention; his very name has done it for him, and
   prepossess’d him of his Auditors regard. Thus the Rabbies among the Jews,
   the Philosophers among the Greeks, were listened to as Oracles, and to cite
   them was (by their admiring Disciples) thought a concluding Argument. Nay,
   under Christianity, this admiration of mens persons has been so inordinate,
   that it has crumbled Religion away in little insignificant parties; whilst
   not only Paul, Apollo or Cephas, but names infinitely inferior, have become
   the distinctive characters of Sects and separate Communions. So easily alas
   are we charm’d by our prepossessions, and with itching ears run in quest of
   those doctrines which the fame of their Authors, rather than the evidence of
   truth, commends to us.

   8. AND hath God done nothing to get him a repute among us? has he no
   excellencies to deserve our esteem? is he not worthy to prescribe to his own
   creatures? if we think yes, why is he the only person to be disregarded? or
   why do we so unseasonably depart from our own humour, as not to give his
   Word a reverence proportionable to that we pretend for him; nay, which we
   actually pay to men of like passions with our selves? A contempt so absurd
   as well as impious, that we have not the example of any the most barbarous
   people to countenance us. For tho’ some of them have made very wild mistakes
   in the choice of their Deities, yet they have all agreed in this common
   principle, that whatever those Deities said, was to be receiv’d with all
   possible veneration; yea, such a deference gave they to all significations
   of the divine will, that as they would undertake no great enterprize without
   consulting their Auguries; so upon any inauspicious signs they relinquish’d
   their attempts. And certainly if we had the same reverence for the true God
   which they had for the false, we should as frequently consult him. We may do
   it with much more ease and certainty: we need not trust to the entrails of
   Beasts, or motion of Birds we need not go to Delphos, or the Lybian Hammon
   for the resolving our doubts: but what Moses said to Israel is very
   applicable to us, the Word is nigh thee, Deut. 30. 14. That Word which David
   made his Counsellor, Psal. 119. 24, his Comforter, ver. 50. his Treasure,
   ver. 72. his Study, ver. 99. And had we those awful apprehensions of God
   which he had, we should pay the like reverence to his Word. Did we well
   ponder how many titles of Authority he has over us, we should surely be
   asham’d to deny that respect to him in whom they all conspire, which we dare
   not deny to them separately in humane Superiors.

   9. A second motive to esteem mens words, is the kindness of the speaker.
   This has such a fascinating power, as nothing but extreme ill nature can
   resist. When a man is assur’d of the kindness of him that speaks, whatever
   is spoken is taken in good part. This is it that distinguishes the
   admonitions of a friend from the reproaches of an enemy; and we daily in
   common conversation receive those things with contentment and applause from
   an intimate and familiar, which spoken by a stranger or enemy would be
   despis’d or stomach’d. So insinuating a thing is kindness, that where it has
   once got it self believ’d, nothing it says after is disputed; it supples the
   mind, and makes it ductile and pliant to any impressions.

   10. BUT what human kindness is there that can come in any competition with
   the Divine? it surpasses that of the nearest and dearest relations; Mothers
   may forget, yet will I not forget thee, Isa. 49. 15. And the Psalmist found
   it experimentally true, When my Father and my Mother forsake me, the Lord
   taketh me up, Ps. 27. 10. The tenderest bowels compared to his are adamant
   and flint: so that ’tis a most proper epithet the Wise man gives him, O Lord
   thou lover of souls, Wis. 11. 26. Nor is this affection merely mental: but
   it attests it self by innumerable effects. The effects of love are all
   reducible to two heads, doing and suffering; and by both there God has most
   eminently attested his love to us.

   11. FOR the first, we cannot look either on our bodies or our souls, on the
   whole Universe about us, or that better World above us; but we shall in each
   see the Lord hath done great things for us, Psal. 126. Nay, not only our
   enjoyments, but even the capacity to enjoy, is his bounty. Had not he drawn
   mankind out of his original clay, what had we been conscern’d in all the
   other works of his Creation? So that if we put any value either upon what we
   have or what we are, we cannot but account our selves so much indebted to
   this his active love. And tho’ the passive was not practicable by the divine
   Nature simply and apart, yet that we might not want all imaginable evidences
   of his love, he who was God blessed for ever, linkt his impassible to, our
   passible nature; assum’d our humanity, that he might espouse our sorrows,
   and was born on purpose that he might die for us. So that sure we may say in
   his own words, greater love than this hath no man; Jo. 15. 13.

   12. AND now ’tis very hard, if such an unparallel’d love in God, may not as
   much affect us, as the slight benefactions of every ordinary friend; if it
   cannot so much recommend him to our regard, as to rescue his word from
   contempt, and dispose us to receive impressions from it; (especially when
   his very speaking is a new act of his kindness, and design’d to our greatest
   advantage.)

   13. BUT if all he has done and suffer’d for us cannot obtain him so much
   from us, we must surely confess, our disingenuity is as superlative as his
   love. For in this instance we have no plea for our selves. The discourses of
   men ’tis true may sometimes be so weak and irrational, that tho’ kindness
   may suggest pity, it cannot reverence; But this can never happen in God,
   whose wisdom is as infinite as his love. He talks not at our vain rate who
   often talk only for talkings sake; but his words are directed to the most
   important ends and address’d in such a manner as befits him in whom are all
   the treasures of wisdom and knowledge, Col. 2. And this is our third
   consideration, the wisdom of the Speaker.

   14. HOW attractive a thing Wisdom is, we may observe in the instance of the
   Queen of Sheba, who came from the utmost parts of the earth, as Christ faies
   Mat. 12. 42. to hear the Wisdom of Solomon. And the like is noted of the
   Greek Sages, that they were address’d to from all parts, by persons of all
   ranks and qualities, to hear their Lectures. And indeed the rational nature
   of man does by a kind of sympathetick motion close with whatever hath the
   stamp of reason upon it. But alas, what is the profoundest wisdom of men,
   compar’d with that of God? He is the essential reason; and all that man can
   pretend to is but an emanation from him; a ray of his Sun, a drop of his
   Ocean: which as he gives, so he can also take away. He can infatuate the
   most subtil designers; And (as he saies of himself) makes the diviners mad:
   turns the wise men back, and makes their wisdom foolishness, Esay 44. 25.

   15. HOW impious a folly is it then in us, to Idolize human Wisdom with all
   its imperfections, and despise the divine? yet this every man is guilty of,
   who is not attracted to the study of sacred Writ by the supereminent wisdom
   of it’s Author. For such men must either affirm that God has not such a
   supereminency, or that, tho’ he has in himself; he hath not exerted it in
   this writing; The former is down-right blasphemy; and truly the latter is
   the same, a little varied. For that any thing, but what is exactly wise can
   proceed from infinite wisdom, is too absurd for any man to imagine. And
   therefore he that charges Gods Word with defect of wisdom must
   interpretatively charge God so too. For tho’ ’tis true, a wise man may
   sometimes speak foolishly; yet that happens through that mixture of
   ignorance, or passion which is in the most knowing of mortals: but in God,
   who is a pure act, and essential wisdom, that is an impossible supposition.

   16. NAY, indeed it were to tax him of folly beyond what is incident to any
   sensible man; who will still proportion his instruments to the work he
   designs. Should we not conclude him mad, that should attempt to fell a
   mighty Oak with a Pen-knife, or stop a Torrent with a whisp of Straw? And
   sure their conceptions are not much more reverend of God, who can suppose
   that a writing design’d by him for such important ends, as the making men
   wise unto salvation, 2 Tim. 3. 15. the casting down all that exalts it self
   against the obedience of Christ, 2 Cor. 10. 5. should it self be foolish and
   weak: or that he should give it those great attributes of being sharper than
   a two edged-sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit,
   of the joints and marrow, Heb. 4. 14. if its discourses were so flat and
   insipid as some in this profane Age would represent them.

   17. ’TIS true indeed, ’tis not, as the Apostle speaks the wisdom of this
   world, 1 Cor. 2. 6. The Scripture teaches us not the arts of undermining
   governments, defrauding and circumventing our Brethren; but it teaches us
   that which would tend much more even to our temporal felicity; and as reason
   prompts us to aspire to happiness, so it must acknowledge that is the higher
   wisdom which teaches us to attain it.

   18. AND as the Holy Scripture is thus recommended to us by the wisdom of its
   Author; so in the last place is it by his truth, without which the other
   might rather raise our jealousy than our reverence. For wisdom without
   sincerity degenerates into serpentine guile; and we rather fear to be
   ensnar’d than hope to be advantag’d by it. The most subtil addresses, and
   most cogent arguments prevail not upon us, where we suspect some insidious
   design. But where wisdom and fidelity meet in the same person, we do not
   only attend, but confide in his counsels. And this qualification is most
   eminently in God. The children of men are deceitful upon the weights, Psal.
   62. 9. Much guile often lurks indiscernably under the fairest appearances:
   but Gods veracity is as essentially himself, as his wisdom, and he can no
   more deceive us, than he can be deceiv’d himself. He is not man that he
   should lie, Numb. 23. 19. He designs not (as men often do) to sport himself
   with our credulity; and raise hopes which he never means to satisfy: he
   saies not to the seed of Jacob, seek ye me in vain, Exod. 45. 19. but all
   his promises are yea and Amen, 2 Cor. 1. 20. He is perfectly sincere in all
   the proposals he makes in his word: which is a most rational motive for us
   to advert to it, not only with reverence but love.

   19. AND now when all these motives are thus combined; the authority, the
   kindness, the wisdom, the veracity of the speaker, what can be requir’d more
   to render his words of weight with us? If this four-fold cord will not draw
   us, we have sure the strength, not of men, but of that Legion we read of in
   the Gospel, Mat. 5. 1. For these are so much the cords of man, so adapted to
   our natures, nay to our constant usage in other things, that we must put off
   much of our humanity, disclaim the common measures of mankind, if we be not
   attracted by them. For I dare appeal to the breast of any sober, industrious
   man, whether in case a person, who he were sure had all the fore-mention’d
   qualifications, should recommend to him some rules as infallible for the
   certain doubling, or trebling his estate, he would not think them worth the
   pursuing; nay, whether he would not plod and study on them, till he
   comprehended the whole Art. And shall we then when God, in whom all those
   qualifications are united, and that in their utmost transcendencies, shall
   we, I say, think him below our regard, when he proposes the improving our
   interests, not by the scanty proportions of two or three; but in such as he
   intimated to, Abraham, when he shew’d him the Stars, as the representative
   of his numerous off-spring, Gen. 5. 15. when he teaches us that highest, and
   yet most certain Alchymy, of refining, and multiplying our enjoyments, and
   then perpetuating them?

   20. ALL this God do’s in Scripture; and we must be stupidly improvident, if
   we will take no advantage by it. It was once the complaint of Christ to the
   Jews, I am come in my Fathers name, and ye receive me not: if another shall
   come in his own name, him ye will receive, Jo. 5. 43. And what was said by
   him the eternal essential Word, is no less applicable to the written; which
   coming in the name, and upon the message of God, is despis ’d and slighted,
   and every the lightest composure of men preferr’d before it. As if that
   signature of Dignity it carries, served rather as a Brand to stigmatize and
   defame, than adorn and recommend it. A contempt which strikes immediatly at
   God himself, whose resentments of it, tho’ for the present supprest by his
   longsuffering, will at last break out upon all who persevere so to affront
   him, in a judgment worthy of God, Wisd. 12. 26.

   21. BUT after all that has been said, I foresee some may say, that 1 have
   all this while but beaten the air, have built upon a principle which some
   flatly deny, others doubt of, and have run away with a supposition that the
   Bible is of divine Original, without any attempt of proof. To such as these
   I might justly enough object the extreme hard measure they offer to Divinity
   above all other Sciences. For in those, they still allow some fundamental
   maxims, which are presupposed without proof; but in this they admit of no
   Postulata, granted principle on which to superstruct. If the same rigor
   should be extended to secular cases, what a damp would it strike upon
   commerce? For example, a man expects fair dealing from his Neighbour, upon
   the strength of those common notions of Justice he presumes writ in all mens
   hearts: but according to this measure, he must first prove to every man he
   deals with, that such notions there are, and that they are obligatory: that
   the wares expos’d to sale are his own; that dominion is not founded on
   grace, or that he is in that state, and so has a property to confer upon
   another that the person dealt with paies a just price; do’s it in good
   money; and that it is his own, or that he is in the state of grace, or needs
   not be so, to justify his purchase: and at this rate the Market will be as
   full of nice questions as the Schools. But because complaints and retortions
   are the common refuge of causes that want better Arguments, I shall not
   insist here; but proceed to a defence of the question’d Assertion, that the
   Bible is the Word of God.

   22. IN which I shall proceed by these degrees. First, I shall lay down the
   plain grounds upon which Christians believe it. Secondly, I shall compare
   those with those of less credibility which have generally satisfied mankind
   in other things of the like nature. And thirdly, I shall consider whether
   those who are dissatisfied with those grounds, would not be equally so with
   any other way of attestation.

   23. BEFORE I enter upon the first of these, I desire it may be consider’d,
   that matters of fact are not capable of fuch rigorous demonstrative
   evidences, as mathematical propositions are. To render a thing fit for
   rational belief, there is no more requir’d, but that the motives for it do
   over poise those against it; and in that degree they do so, so is the belief
   stronger or weaker.

   24. NOW the motives of our belief in the present case, are such as are
   extrinsick, or intrinsick to the Scriptures; of which the extrinsick are
   first, and preparative to the other; and indeed all that, can reasonably be
   insisted on to a gain-saier, who must be suppos’d no competent judge of the
   latter. But as to the former, I shall adventure to say, that the Divine
   Original of the Scripture hath as great grounds of credibility as can be
   expected in any thing of this kind. For that God inspir’d the Pen-men of
   Holy Writ, is matter of fact, and being so, is capable of no other external
   evidence but that of testimony: and that matter of fact being also in point
   of time so remote from us, can be judg’d of only by a series of Testimonies
   deriv’d from that Age wherein the Scriptures were written, to this: and the
   more credible the testifiers, and the more universal the Testimony, so much
   the more convincing are they to all considering men.

   25. AND this attestation the Scripture hath in the highest circumstances, it
   having been witnes’d to in all Ages, and in those Ages by all persons that
   could be presum’d to know any thing of it. Thus the Old Testament was own’d
   by the whole Nation of the Jews, as the writings of men inspir’d by God, and
   that with such evidence of their mission, as abundantly satisfied those of
   that Age, of their being so inspir’d; and they deriv’d those Writings with
   that attestation to their posterity. Now that those of the first Ages were
   not deceiv’d, is as morally certain as any thing can be suppos’d. For in the
   first part of the Bible is contain’d the history of those miracles wherewith
   God rescued that people out of Egypt, and instated them in Canaan, Now if
   they who liv’d at that time, knew that such miracles were never done, ’tis
   impossible they could receive an evident Fable as an inspir’d truth. No
   single person, much less a whole Nation can be suppos’d so stupid. But if
   indeed they were eye-witnesses of those miracles, they might with very good
   reason conclude, that the same Moses who was by God impower’d to work them,
   was so also for the relating them; as also all those precedent events from
   the Creation down to that time, which are recorded by him.

   26. SO also for the preceptive parts of those Books, those that saw those
   formidable solemnities, with which they were first publish’d, had sure
   little temptation to doubt that they were the dictates of God, when written.
   Now if they could not be deceiv’d themselves, ’tis yet less imaginable that
   they should conspire to impose a cheat upon their posterities; nor indeed
   were the Jews of so easy a credulity, that ’tis at all probable the
   succeeding Generations would have been so impos’d on: their humour was
   stubborn enough, and the precepts of their Law severe and burdensome enough
   to have tempted them to have cast off the yoak, had it not been bound upon
   them by irresistible convictions of its coming from God. But besides this
   Tradition of their Elders, they had the advantage of living under a
   Theocracy, the immediate guidance of God; Prophets daily were rais’d up
   among them, to fore-tell events, to admonish them of their duty, and reprove
   their back-slidings yet even these gave the deference to the written Word;
   nay, made it the test by which to try true inspirations from false: To the
   Law and to the Testimony; if they speak not according to it, there is no
   light in them, Esay 18. 20. So that the veneration which they had before
   acquir’d, was still anew excited by fresh inspirations, which both attested
   the old, and became new parts of their Canon.

   27. NOR could it be esteem’d a small confirmation to the Scriptures, to find
   in succeeding Ages the signal accomplishments of those prophecies which were
   long before registred in those Books; for nothing less than divine Power and
   Wisdom could foretell, and also verify them. Upon these grounds the Jews
   universally thro’ all successions receiv’d the Books of the Old Testament as
   divine Oracles, and look’d upon them as the greatest trust that could be
   committed to them: and accordingly were so scrupulously vigilant in
   conserving them, that their Masorits numbred not only the sections, but the
   very Words, nay Letters, that no fraud or inadvertency might corrupt or
   defalk the least iota of what they esteem’d so sacred. A farther testimony
   and sepiment to which, were the Samaritan, Chaldee, and Greek Versions:
   which being made use of in the Synagogues of Jews, in their dispersions, and
   by the Samaritans at Sichem, could not at those distances receive an uniform
   alteration, and any other would be of no effect. Add to this, that the
   Original exemplar of the Law, was laid up in the Sanctuary, that the Prince
   was to have a Copy of it alwaies by him, and transcribe it with his own
   hand; that every Jew was to make it his constant discourse and meditation,
   teach it his Children, and wear part of it upon his hands and forehead. And
   now sure ’tis impossible to imagine any matter of fact to be more carefully
   deduced, or irrefragably testified, nor any thing believ’d upon stronger
   evidence.

   28. THAT all this is true in reference to the Jews, that they did thus own
   these Writings as divine, appears not only by the Records of past Ages, but
   by the Jews of the present, who still own them, and cannot be suspected of
   combination with the Christians. And if these were reasonable grounds of
   conviction to the Jews, (as he must be most absurdly sceptical that shall
   deny) they must be so to Christians also, who derive them from them: and
   that with this farther advantage to our Faith, that we see the clear
   completion of those Evangelical prophecies which remain’d dark to them, and
   consequently have a farther Argument to confirm us, that the Scriptures of
   the Old Testament are certainly divine.

   29. THE New has also the like means of probation: which as it is a
   collection of the doctrine taught by Christ and his Apostles, must if truly
   related be acknowledged no less divine than what they orally deliver’d. So
   that they who doubt its being divine, must either deny what Christ and his
   Apostles preach’d to be so; else distrust the fidelity of the relation The
   former strikes at the whole Christian faith; which if only of men, must not
   only be fallible but is actually a deceit, whilst it pretends to be of God,
   and is not. To such Objectors we have to oppose those stupendous miracles
   with which the Gospel was attested such as demonstrated a more than human
   efficacy. And that God should lend his omnipotence to abet the false
   pretensions of men, is a conceit too unworthy even for the worst of men to
   entertain.

   30. ’TIS true, there have been by God permitted lying miracles, as well as
   true ones have been done by him; such as were those of the Magicians in
   Egypt, in opposition to the other of Moses; but then the difference between
   both was so conspicuous, that he must be more partial and disingenuous, than
   even those Magicians were, who would not acknowledge the disparity, and
   confess in those which were truely supernatural the finger of God, Exod. 8.
   19. Therefore both in the Old and New Testament it is predicted, that false
   Prophets should arise, and do signs and wonders, Deut. 13. 1. Matt. 24. 11,
   24. as a trial of their fidelity who made profession of Religion; whether
   they would prefer the few and trivial sleights which recommend a deceiver,
   before those great and numberless miracles which attested the sacred Oracles
   deliver’d to the sons of men by the God of truth. Whether the trick of a
   Barchochebas, to hold fire in his mouth; that of Marcus the Heretick, to
   make the Wine of the Holy Sacrament appear blood; or that of Mahomet, to
   bring a Pidgeon to his ear, ought to be put in balance against all the
   Miracles wrought by Moses, our Saviour, or his Apostles. And in a word;
   whether the silly stories which Iamblichus solemnly relates of Pythagoras,
   or those Philostratus tells of Apollonius Tyaneus, deserve to rival those of
   the Evangelists. It is a most just judgment, and accordingly threatned by
   Almighty God that they who would not obey the truth should believe a lie, 2
   Thes. 2. 11. But still the Almighty, where, any man or devil do’s proudly,
   is evidently above him, Exod. 18. 11. will be justified in his sayings, and
   be clear when he is judged, Rom. 3. 4.

   31. BUT if men will be Scepticks, and doubt every thing, they are to know
   that the matter call’d into question, is of a nature that admits but two
   waies of solution; probability, and testimony. First for probability, let it
   be consider’d, who were the first promulgers of Christs Miracles. In his
   life time they were either the patients on whom his Miracles were wrought,
   or the common people, that were spectators: the former, as they could not be
   deceiv’d themselves, but must needs know whether they were cur’d or no; so
   what Imaginable design could they have to deceive others? Many indeed have
   pretended impotency as a motive of compassion; but what could they gain by
   owning a cure they had not? As for the Spectators, as their multitude adds
   to their credibility; (it being morally impossible that so many should at
   once be deluded in a matter so obvious to their senses) so do’s it also
   acquit them from fraud and combination. Cheats and forgeries are alwaies
   hatch’d in the dark, in close Cabals, and private Junctos. That five
   thousand men at one time, and four thousand at another, should conspire to
   say, that they were miraculously fed, when they were not; and all prove true
   to the fiction, and not betray it, is a thing as irrational to be suppos’d,
   as impossible to be parallel’d.

   32. BESIDES, admit it possible that so many could have join’d in the deceit,
   yet what imaginable end could they have in it? Had their lie been
   subservient to the designs of some potent Prince that might have rewarded
   it, there had been some temptation: but what could they expect from the
   reputed Son of a Carpenter, who had not himself where to lay his head? Nay,
   who disclaim’d all secular power; convey’d himself away from their
   importunities, when they would have forced him to be a King: And
   consequently, could not be look’d on as one that would head a Sedition, or
   attempt to raise himself to a capacity of rewarding his Abettors. Upon all
   thee considerations, there appears not the least shadow of probability, that
   either those particular persons who publish’d the cures they had receiv’d,
   or those multitudes who were witnesses and divulgers of those, or his other
   miracles, could do it upon any sinister design, or indeed upon any other
   motive but gratitude and admiration.

   33. IN the next place, if we come to those miracles which succeeded Christs
   death, those most important; and convincing of his Resurrection and
   Ascension, and observe who were the divulgers of those, we shall find them
   very unlikely to be men of design; a set of illiterate men, taken from the
   Fisher-Boats, and other mean occupations: and such as needed a miracle as
   great as any of those they were to assert (the descent of the Holy Ghost) to
   fit them for their office. What alas could they drive at, or how could they
   hope that their testimony could be received, so much against the humour and
   interest of the present Rulers; unless they were assur’d not only of the
   truth of the things, but also of some supernatural aids to back and fortify
   them? Accordingly we find, that till they had receiv’d those; till by the
   descent of the Holy Ghost they were endued with power from on high, Luk. 24.
   49. they never attempted the discovery of what they had seen: but rather hid
   themselves, kept all their assemblies in privacy and concealment, for fear
   of the Jews, Jo. 20. 10. and so were far enough from projecting any thing
   besides their own safety. Afterwards, when they began to preach, they had
   early Essays, what their secular advantages would be by it; threatnings and
   revilings, scourgings and imprisonments, Act. 4. 20. 5. 18, 40. And can it
   be imagined, that men who a little before had shewed themselves so little in
   love with suffering, that none of them durst stick to their Master at his
   apprehension, but one forswore, and all forsook him; can it, 1 say, be
   imagin’d that these men should be so much in love with their own Fable, as
   to venture all sorts of persecution for the propagating it? Or if they
   could, let us in the next place consider what probability there could be of
   success.

   34. THEIR preaching amounted to no less than the Deifying of one, whom both
   their Roman and Jewish Rulers, nay, the generality of the people had
   executed as a malefactor: so that they were all engag’d, in defence of their
   own Act, to lift their testimony with all the rigour that conscious jealousy
   could suggest. And where were so many concern’d inquisitors, there was very
   little hope for a forgery to pass. Besides the avow’d displeasure of their
   Governours made it a hazardous thing to own a belief of what they asserted.
   Those that adher’d to them could not but know, that at the same time they
   must espouse their dangers and sufferings. And men use not to incur certain
   mischiefs, upon doubtful and suspicious grounds.

   35. YET farther, their doctrine was design’d to an end to which their
   Auditors could not but have the greatest reluctancy: they were to struggle
   with that rooted prepossession which the Jews had for the Mosaical Law,
   which their Gospel out-dated; and the Gentiles for the Rites and Religion of
   their Ancestors; and, which was harder than either, the corruptions and
   vices of both: to plant humility and internal sanctity, so contrary to that
   ceremonial holiness, upon which the Jews so valued themselves, and despis’d
   others: and Temperance, Justice, and Purity, so contrary to the practice,
   nay, even the religion of the Heathen: and to attempt all this with no other
   allurement, no other promise of recompence but what they must attend in
   another world, and pass too through reproaches and afflictions, torments and
   death; These were all such invincible prejudices, as they could never hope
   to break thorough with a lie; nay, which they could not have encounter’d
   even with every common truth, but only with that, which being divine,
   brought its aids with it; without which ’twas utterly impossible for all the
   skill or oratory of men to overcome such disadvantages.

   36. AND yet with all these did these rude inartificial men contest, and that
   with signal success: no less than three thousand Proselytes made by Saint
   Peter’s first Sermon; and that in Jerusalem, the Scene where all was acted;
   and consequently where ’twas the most impossible to impose a forgery. And at
   the like miraculous rate they went on, till as the Pharisees themselves
   complain, they had filled Jerusalem with their doctrine, Acts 5. 28. nor did
   Judea set bounds to them; their sound went out into all Nations, Rom. 10.
   18, and their doctrine spread it self through all the Gentile world.

   37. AND sure so wonderful an event, so contrary to all humane measures,
   do’s sufficiently evince there was more than man in it. Nothing but the same
   creative Power that produc’d light out of darkness, could bring forth
   effects so much above the proportion of the cause. Had these weak
   instruments acted only by their natural powers, nothing of this had been
   achiev’d. Alas could these poor rude men learn all Languages within the
   space of fifty days, which would take up almost as many years of the most
   industrious Student? and yet had they not been able to speak them, they
   could never have divulg’d the Gospel to the several Nations, nor so
   effectually have convinc’d the by-standers, Acts 2. that they acted by a
   higher impulse. And to convince the world they did so, they repeated their
   Masters miracles as well as his doctrine; heal’d the sick cast out devils,
   rais’d the dead. And where God communicated so much of his power, we may
   reasonably conclude he did it to promote his own work, not the work of the
   devil, as it must have been if this whole Scene were a lie.

   38. WHEN all this is weigh’d, I presume there will remain little ground to
   suspect that the first planters of Christian Faith had any other design than
   what they avowed, viz. the bringing men to holiness here, and salvation
   hereafter. The suspicion therefore, if any, must rest upon latter times; and
   accordingly some are willing to perswade themselves and others, that the
   whole Scheme of our Religion is but a lately devis’d Fable to keep the world
   in awe, whereof Princes have made some use, but Clergy-men more; and that
   Christ and his Apostles are only actors whom themselves have conjured up
   upon the Stage to pursue their plot.

   39. 1N answer to this bold, this blasphemous suggestion, I should first
   desire these Surmisers to point out the time when, and the persons who began
   this design; to tell us exactly whence they date this politick Religion, as
   they are pleas’d to suppose it. If they cannot, they are manifestly unjust
   to reject our account of it when they can give none themselves; and fail
   very much of that rigid demonstration they require from others. That there
   is such a profession as Christianity in the world, is yet (God be blest)
   undeniable; (though at the rate it has of late declin’d, God knows how long
   it will be so:) we say it came by Christ, and his Apostles, and that it is
   attested by an uninterrupted testimony of all the intervening Ages, the
   suffrage of all Christian Churches from that day to this. And sure they who
   embraced the Doctrine, are the most competent witnesses from whence they
   receiv’d it.

   40. YET lest they should be all thought parties to the design, and their
   witness excepted against, it has pleas’d God to give us collateral
   assurances, and make both Jewish and Gentile Writers give testimony to the
   Antiquity of Christianity. Josephus do’s this, lib. 20. chap. 8. and lib.
   18. chap. 4. where, after he has given an account of the crucifixion of
   Christ exactly agreeing with the Evangelists he concludes, And to this day
   the Christian people, who of him borrow their name, cease not to increase. I
   add not the personal elogium which he gives of our Saviour; because some are
   so hardy to controul it: also I pass by what Philo mentions of the religious
   in Egypt, because several Learned men refer it to the Essens, a Sect among
   the Jews, or some other. There is no doubt of what Tacitus and other Roman
   Historians speak of Christ as the Author of the Christian doctrine; which it
   had been impossible for him to have done, if there had then been no such
   doctrine, or if Christ had not been known as the Founder of it. .So
   afterward Pliny gives the Emperour Trajan an account both of the manners,
   and multitude of the Christians; and makes of the innocence of the one, and
   the greatness of the other, an Argument to slacken the persecution against
   them. Nay, the very bloody Edicts of the persecuting Emperors, and the
   scoffs and reproaches of Celsus, Porphyry, Lucian, and other profane
   opposers of this Doctrine, do undeniably assert its being. By all which it
   appears, that Christianity had in those Ages not only a being, but had also
   obtain’d mightily in the world, and drawn in vast numbers to its profession:
   and vast indeed they must needs be, to furnish out that whole Army of
   Martyrs, of which profane, as well as Ecclesiastick writers speak. And if
   all this be not sufficient to evince that Christianity stole not clancularly
   into the world, but took its rise from those times and Persons it pretends,
   we must renounce all faith of Testimony, and not believe an inch farther
   than we see.

   41. I suppose I need say no more to shew that the Gospel, and all those
   portentous miracles which attested it, were no forgeries, or stratagems of
   men. I come now to that doubt which more immediately concerns the Holy
   Scripture, viz. whether all those transactions be so faithfully related
   there, that we may believe them to have been dictated by the spirit of God.
   Now for this, the process need be but short, if we consider who were the
   Pen-men of the New Testament; even for the most part of the Apostles
   themselves: Matthew, and John who wrote two of the Gospels were certainly
   so: and Mark, as all the Ancients aver, was but the Amanuensis to Saint
   Peter, who dictated that Gospel. Saint Luke indeed comes not under this
   first rank of Apostles; yet is by some affirm’d to be one of the seventy
   Disciples: however an Apostolical person ’tis certain he was, and it was no
   wonder for such to be inspir’d. For in those first Ages of the Church men
   acted more by immediate inflation of the Spirit than since. And accordingly
   we find Stephen, tho’ but a Deacon, had the power of Miracles and preach’d
   as divine as the prime Apostles, Acts 7. And the gift of the Holy Ghost was
   then a usuial concomitant of conversion, as appears in the Story of
   Cornelius, Acts 10. 45, 46. Besides, Saint Luke was a constant attendant on
   Saint Paul (who deriv’d the Faith not from man, but by the immediate
   revelation of Jesus Christ, as himself professes, Galat. 1. 12.) and is by
   some said to have wrote by dictate from him, as Mark did from Saint Peter.
   Then as to the Epistles they all bear the names of Apostles, except that to
   the Hebrews, which yet is upon very good grounds presum’d to be Saint
   Paul`s. Now these were the Persons commissionated by Christ to preach the
   Christian doctrine, and were signally assisted in the discharge of that
   office; so that as he tells them, it was not they, who speak, but the spirit
   of the Father that spake in them, Matt. 13. 11. And if they spake by Divine
   Inspiration, there can be no question that they wrote so also. Nay, indeed
   of the two, it seems more necessary they should do the latter. For had they
   err’d in any thing they orally deliver’d, they might have retracted and
   cured the mischief: but these Books being design’d as a standing immutable
   rule of Faith and Manners to all successions, any errour in them would have
   been irreparable, and have entail’d it self upon posterity: which agreed
   neither with the truth, nor goodness of God to permit.

   42. NOW that these Books were indeed writ by them whose names they bear, we
   have as much assurance as ’tis possible to have of any thing of that nature,
   and that distance of time from us. For however some of them may have been
   controverted, yet the greatest part have admitted no dispute; whole
   Doctrines agreeing exactly with the others, give testimony to them. And to
   the bulk of those writings, it is notorious that the first Christians
   receiv’d them from the Apostles, and so transmitted them to the ensuing
   Ages, which receiv’d them with the like esteem and veneration. They cannot
   be corrupted, faies Saint Austin in the thirty second Book against Faustis
   the Manich. c. 16. because they are and have been in the hands of all
   Christians. And whosoever should first attempt an alteration, he would be
   confuted by the inspection of other ancienter Copies. Besides, the
   Scriptures are not in some one Language, but translated into many: so that
   the faults of one Book would be corrected by others more ancient, or in a
   different Tongue.

   43. AND how much the body of Christians were in earnest concern’d to take
   care in this matter, appears by very costly evidences; multitudes of them
   choosing rather to part with their lives than their Bibles. And indeed ’tis
   a sufficient proof, that their reverence of that Book was very avowed and
   manifest; when their Heathen persecutors made that one part of their
   persecution. So that as wherever the Christian Faith was receiv’d, this Book
   was also, under the notion we now plead for, viz. as the writings of men
   inspir’d by God: so it was also contended for even unto death: and to part
   with the Bible was to renounce the Faith. And now, after such a cloud of
   testimonies, we may sure take up that (ill apply’d) saying of the High
   Priest, Matt. 26. 65. what farther need have we of witnesses.

   44. YET besides these, another sort of witnesses there are, I mean those
   intrinsick evidences which arise out of the Scripture it self; but of these
   I think not proper here to insist, partly because the subject will be in a
   great degree coincident with that of the second general consideration; and
   partly because these can be argumentative to none who are not qualified to
   discern them. Let those who doubt the Divine Original of Scripture, well
   digest the former grounds which are within the verge of reason; and when by
   those they are brought to read it with due reverence, they will not want
   Arguments from the Scripture it self to confirm their veneration of it.

   45. IN the mean time, to evince how proper the former discourse is to found
   a rational belief that the Scripture is the word of God, I shall compare it
   with those measures of credibility upon which all humane transactions move,
   and upon which men trust their greatest concerns without diffidence or
   dispute.

   46. THAT we must in many things trust the report of others, is so necessary,
   that without it humane society cannot subsist. What a multitude of subjects
   are there in the world, who never saw their Prince, nor were at the making
   of any Law? if all these should deny their obedience, because they have it
   only by hear-say, that there is such a man, and such Laws, what would become
   of Government? So also for property, if nothing of testimony may be
   admitted, how shall any man prove his right to any thing? All pleas must be
   decided by the sword, and we shall fall into that state (which some have
   fancied the primitive) of universal hostility. In like manner for traffick
   and commerce; how should any Merchant first attempt a trade to any foreign
   part of the world, if he did not believe that such a place there was? and
   how could he believe that, but upon the credit of those who have been there?
   Nay, indeed how could any man first attempt to go but to the next Market
   Town, if he did not from the report of others, conclude that such a one
   there was? so that if this universal diffidence should prevail, every man
   should be a kind of Plantagnus, fix’d to the soil he first sprung up in. The
   absurdities are indeed so infinite, and so obvious, that I need not dilate
   upon them.

   47. BUT it will perhaps be said, that in things that are told us by our
   contemporaries, and that relate to our own time, men will be less apt to
   deceive us, because they know ’tis in our power to examine and discover the
   truth. To this I might say, that in many instances it would scarce quit cost
   to do so, and the inconveniences of tryal would exceed those of belief. But
   1 shall willingly admit this probable argument, and only desire it may be
   applied to our main question, by considering whether the primitive
   Christians who receiv’d the Scripture as divine, had not the same security
   of not being deceiv’d, who had as great opportunities of examining, and the
   greatest concern of doing it throughly, since they were to engage, not only
   their future hopes in another world, but (that which to nature is much more
   sensible) all their present enjoyments, and even life it self upon the truth
   of it.

   48. BUT because it must be confess’d that we who are so many Ages remov’d
   from them, have not their means of assurance; let us in the next place
   consider, whether an assent to those testimonies they have left behind them,
   be not warranted by the common practice of mankind in other cases. Who is
   there that questions there was such a man as William the Conqueror in this
   Island? Or, to lay the Scene farther, who doubts there was an Alexander, a
   Julius Cæsar, an Augustus? Now what have we to found this confidence on
   besides the Faith of History? And I presume even those who exact the
   severest demonstrations for Ecclesiastick story, would think him a very
   impertinent Sceptick that should do the like in these. So also, as to the
   Authors of Books; who disputes whether Homer writ the Iliads, or Virgil the
   Æneids, or Cæsar the Commentaries, that pass under their names? yet none of
   these have been attested in any degree like the Scripture. ’Tis said indeed,
   that Cæsar ventured his own life to save his Commentaries, imploying one
   hand to hold those above the water, when it should have assisted him in
   swiming. But whoever laid down their lives in attestation of that, or any
   humane composure, as multitudes of men have done for the Bible?

   49. BUT perhaps ’twill be said, that the small concern men have, who wrote
   these, or other the like Books, inclines them to acquiesce in the common
   opinion. To this I must say, that many things inconsiderable to mankind have
   oft been very laboriously discuss’d, as appears by many unedifying Volumes,
   both of Philosophers and School-men. But whatever may be said in this
   instance, ’tis manifest there are others, wherein mens real and greatest
   interests are intrusted to the testimonies of former Ages. For example, a
   man possesses an estate which was bought by his great Grandfather, or
   perhaps elder Progenitor: he charily preserves that deed of purchase, and
   never looks for farther security of his title: yet alas, at the rate that
   men object against the Bible, what numberless Cavils might be rais’d against
   such a deed? How shall it be known that there was such a man as either
   Seller or Purchaser? if by the witnesses they are as lyable to doubt as the
   other; it being as easie to forge the attestation as the main writing: and
   yet notwithstanding all these possible deceits, nothing but a positive proof
   of forgery can invalidate this deed. Let but the Scripture have the same
   measure, be allowed to stand in force, to be what it pretends to be, till
   the contrary be (not by surmises and possible conjectures) but by evident
   proof evinc’d and its greatest Advocates will ask to more.

   50. A like instance may be given in publick concerns; the immunities and
   rights of any Nation, particularly here of our Magna Charta, granted many
   Ages since, and deposited among the publick Records: to make this signify
   any thing, it must be taken for granted, that this was without falsification
   preserved to our times; yet how easy were it to suggest that in so long a
   succession of its keepers, some may have been prevail’d on by the influence
   of Princes to abridge and curtail its concessions; others by a prevailing
   faction of the people to amplify and extend it? Nay, if men were as great
   Scepticks in Law, as they are in Divinity, they might exact demonstrations
   that the whole thing were not a forgery. Yet, for all these possible
   surmises, we still build upon it, and should think he argued very
   fallaciously, that should go to evacuate it, upon the force of such remote
   suppositions.

   51. NOW I desire it may be consider’d whether our security concerning the
   holy Scripture be not as great, nay, greater than it can be of this. For
   first, this is a concern only of a particular Nation, and so can expect no
   foreign attestation; and secondly, it has all along rested on the fidelity
   of its keepers; which has been either a single person, or at best some small
   number at a time; whereas the Scriptures have been witness’d to by persons
   of all Nations; and those not single, but collective Bodies and Societies,
   even as many as there have been Christian Churches throughout the world. And
   the same that are its Attestors have been its Guardians also, and by their
   multitudes made it a very difficult, if not an impossible thing to falsify
   it in any considerable degree; it being not imaginable, as I shew’d before
   from St. Austin, all Churches should combine to do it: and if they did not,
   the fraud could not pass undetected: and if no eminent change could happen,
   much less could any new, any counterfeit Gospel be obtruded, after
   innumerable Copies of the first had been translated into almost all
   Languages, and dispers’d throughout the world.

   52. THE Imperial Law compil’d by Justinian, was soon after his death, by
   reason of the inroads of the Goths, and other barbarous Nations, utterly
   lost in the Western world; and scarce once heard of for the space of five
   hundred years, and then came casually to be retriv’d upon the taking of
   Amalsis by the Pisans, one single copy being found there at the plundering
   of the City. And the whole credit of those Pandects, which have ever since
   govern’d the Western world, depends in a manner on that single Book,
   formerly call’d the Pisan; and now, after that Pisa was taken by the
   Florentines, the Florentine Copy. But notwithstanding this, the body of the
   Civil Law obtains; and no man thinks it reasonable to question its being
   really what it pretends to be, notwithstanding its single, and so long
   interrupted derivation. I might draw this parallel thro’ many other
   instances, but these may suffice to shew, that if the Scripture might find
   but so much equity, as to be tried by the common measures of other things,
   it would very well pass the test.

   53. BUT men seem in this case (like our late Legislators) to set up new
   extraregular Courts of Justice, to try those whom no ordinary rules will
   cast, yet their designs require should be condemn’d: And we may conclude,
   ’tis not the force of reason, but of prejudice, that makes them so unequal
   to themselves as to reject the Scripture, when they receive every thing else
   upon far weaker grounds. The bottom of it is, they are resolv’d not to obey
   its precepts; and therefore think it the shortest cut to disavow its
   authority; for should they once own that, they would find themselves
   intangled in the most inextricable dilemma; that of the Pharisees about John
   Baptist: If we say from heaven, he will say, why then did you not believe
   him? Matt. 21. 25. If they confess the Scriptures divine, they must be
   self-condemn’d in not obeying them. And truly men that have such
   preingagements to their lusts, that they must admit nothing that will
   disturb them; do but prevaricate when they call for greater evidence and
   demonstrations: for those bosom Sophisters will delude the most manifest
   conviction; and like Juglers make men disbelieve even their own senses. So
   that any other waies of evidence will be as disputable with them, as those
   already offer’d: which is the third thing I proposed to consider.

   54. IT has been sometimes seen in popular mutinies, that when blanks have
   been sent them they could not agree what to ask: and were it imaginable that
   God should so far court the infidelity of men, as to allow them to make
   their own demands, to set down what waies of proof would perswade them; I
   doubt not there are many have obstinacy enough to defeat their own methods,
   as well as they do now Gods. ’Tis sure there is no ordinary way of
   conviction left for them to ask. God having already (as hath also been
   shew’d) afforded that. They must therefore resort to immediate revelation,
   expect instant assurances from heaven, that this Book we call the Bible is
   the word of God.

   55. MY first question then is, in what manner this revelation must be made
   to appear credible to them. The best account we .have of the several waies
   of revelation is from the Jews, to whom God was pleas’d upon new emergencies
   signally to reveal himself. These were first dreams; secondly, visions; by
   both which the Prophets receiv’d their inspirations. Thirdly, Urim and
   Thummim. Fourthly, the Bath-col (as they term it) Thunder and voice from
   Heaven. Let us consider them distinctly, and see whether our Sceptical men
   may not probably find somewhat to dispute in every one of these. And first
   for dreams, it is among us so hard to distinguish between those that arise
   from constitution, prepossession of phancy, diabolical, or divine infusion,
   that those that have the most critically consider’d them, do rather
   difference them by their matter, than any certain discriminating
   circumstances: and unless we had some infallible way of discerning, our
   dependence on them may more probably betray than direct us. ’Tis
   unquestionable that dually phancy has the greatest stroke in them. And if he
   that should commit himself to the guidance of his waking phancy, is not like
   to be over-wisely govern’d, what can we expect from his sleeping? All this
   and more may doubtless be soberly enough objected against the validity of
   our common dreams.

   56. BUT admit there were now such divine dreams as brought their evidence
   along with them; yet sure ’tis possible for prejudic’d, men to resist even
   the clearest convictions. For do we not see some that have made a shift to
   extinguish that natural light, those notions which are interwoven into the
   very frame and constitution of their minds, that so they may sin more at
   ease, and without reluctancy? and sure ’tis as possible for them to close
   their eyes against all raies from without too, to resist revelation as well
   as instinct and more likely, by how much a transient cause is naturally less
   operative than a permanent. An instance of this we have in Balaam, who being
   in these nightly visitations prohibited by God to go to Balak; and tho’ he
   knew then what he afterwards saies, Num. 23. 19. that God was not a man that
   he should lie, nor the son of man that be should repent; yet he would not
   take God at his firm word, but upon a fresh bait to his covetousness, tries
   again for an answer more indulgent to his interest. Besides, if God should
   thus reveal himself to some particular persons, yet ’tis beyond all
   president or imagination, that he should do it to every man; and then how
   shall those who have these dreams, be able to convince others that they are
   divine?

   53. ’TIS easy to guess what reception a man that produces no other authority
   would have in this ludicrous Age: he would certainly be thought rather to
   want sleep, than to have had revelations in it. And if Jacob and the
   Patriarchs, who were themselves acquainted with divine dreams, yet did not
   believe Josephs; any man that should now pretend in that kind, would be sure
   to fall under the same irony that he did, to be entertain’d with a behold
   this dreamer cometh, Gen. 37. 19.

   58. THE second way of revelation by vision was, where the man was wrapt into
   an extasy, his spirit for a while suspended from all sensible communication
   with the body, and entertain’d with supernatural light. In these the
   Prophets saw emblematical representations of future events, receiv’d
   knowledge of divine Mysteries, and commission and ability to discharge the
   whole prophetick office. Now suppose God should now raise us Prophets, and
   inspire them after this manner; what would the merry men of this time say to
   it? Can we think that they who rally upon all that the former Prophets have
   writ, would look with much reverence on what the new ones should say? Some
   perhaps would construe their raptures to be but like Mahomets Epilepsy
   others a fit of frenzy, others perhaps a being drunk with new wine Acts. 2.
   13. but those that did the most soberly consider it, would still need a new
   revelation to attest the truth of this: there being far more convincing
   arguments to prove the Scriptures divine, than any man can alledge to prove
   his inspiration to be so. And ’tis sure a very irrational method, to attempt
   the clearing of a doubt by somewhat which is it self more doubtful.

   59. A third way, was by Urim and Thummin, which Writers tell us was an
   Oracle resulting from the Letters which were graven in the High Priests
   Pectoral, to which in all important doubts the Jews of those Ages resorted,
   and receiv’d responses; but whether it were by the suddain prominency, or
   resplendency of the letters, or by any other way, is not material in this
   place to enquire: one: one thing is certain, that the Ephod, and
   consequently the Pectoral was in the Priests custody, and that he had the
   administration of the whole affair. Now I refer it to consideration, whether
   this one circumstance would not (to those prejudic’d men I speak of) utterly
   evacuate the credit of the Oracle. They have taught themselves to look on
   Priest-hood, whether Legal or Evangelical, only as a better name for
   imposture and cosenage: and they that can accuse the Priests for having kept
   up a cheat for so many Ages, mud needs think them such omnipotent Juglers,
   that nothing can be fence against their Legerdemain: and by consequence,
   this way of revelation would rather foment their displeasure at the
   Ecclesiatticks, than satisfy their doubts of the Scripture.

   60. LASTLY, for the fourth way, that of thunder and voice from Heaven,
   tho’ that would be a signal way of conviction to unprejudiced men, yet it
   would probably have as little effect as the rest upon the others: men that
   pretend to such deep reasoning, would think it childish to be frighted out
   of their opinion by a clap of Thunder; some Philosophical reason shall be
   found out, to satisfy them that ’tis the effect only of some natural cause,
   and any the most improbable shall serve turn to supplant the fear of its
   being a divine testimony to that which they are so unwilling should be true.
   As for the voice from Heaven, it must either be heard by others, and related
   to them; or else immediatly by themselves: if the former, ’twill lie under
   the same prejudice which the Bible already do’s, that they have it but by
   hearsay: and reporters would fall under the reproach either of design or
   frenzy; that they meant to deceive, or were themselves deceiv’d by their own
   distemper’d phancy. But if themselves should be Auditors of it; ’tis odds
   but their bottomless jealousies in divine Matters would suggest a
   possibility of fraud, tho’ they knew not how to trace it: nay ’tis more than
   possible that they will rather disbelieve their own senses, than in this
   instance take their testimony with all its consequences.

   61. NOR is this a wild supposition for we see it possible for not only
   single men but, multitudes to disbelieve their senses through an excess of
   credulity witness the Doctrine of Transubstantiation. Why may it not then be
   as possible for others to do the like thro’ a greater excess of incredulity?
   Besides mens prepossessions and affections have a strange influence on their
   Faith: men many times will not suffer themselves to believe the most
   credible things, if they cross their inclination. How often do we see
   irregular Patients that will not believe any thing that their appetite
   craves will do them hurt, tho’ their Physicians, nay, their own even
   sensitive experience attest it to them? And can we think that a diseas’d
   mind, gasping with an Hydropick thirst after the pleasures of sin, will ever
   assent to those premises, whose conclusion will engage to the renouncing
   them? Will not a luxurious voluptuous person be willing rather to give his
   ears the lie, to disbelieve what he hears, than permit them more deeply to
   disoblige his other senses, by bringing in those restraints and
   mortifications which the Scripture would impose upon them?

   62. THUS we see how little probability there is, that any of these waies of
   revelation would convince these incredulous men. And indeed, those that will
   not believe upon such inducements as may satisfy men of sober reason, will
   hardly submit to any other method, according to that Assertion of Father
   Abraham, If they hear not Moses and the Prophets, neither will they be
   perswaded, tho’ one rose from the dead Luk. 16. 31. Now at this rate of
   infidelity, what way will they leave God to manifest any thing convincingly
   to the world? which is to put him under an impotency greater than adheres to
   humanity for we men have power to communicate our minds to others, tell
   whetherto we own such or such a thing to which we are intitled; and we can
   satisfy our Auditors that it is indeed we that speak of them: but if every
   method God uses, do’s rather increase than satisfy mens doubts, all
   intercourse between God and man is intercepted; and he must do that of
   necessity, which Epicurus fancied he did of his choice; viz. keep himself
   unconcern’d in the affairs of mortals, as having no way of communicating
   with them. Nay (what is yet, if possible, more absurd) he must be suppos’d
   to have put the works of his Creation out of his own reach, to have given
   men discoursive faculties, and left himself no way of address to them.

   63. THESE inferences how horridly soever they sound, yet 1 see not how they
   can be disclaim’d by those, who are unsatisfied with all those waies by
   which God hath hitherto reveal’d himself to the world. For can it be
   imagin’d that God who created man a reasonable creature, that himself might
   be glorified in his free and rational obedience: (when all other creatures
   obey upon impulse and instinct) can it, I say, be imagin’d, that he should
   so remisly pursue his own design, as to let so many Ages pass since the
   Creation, and never to acquaint mankind with the particulars wherein that
   obedience was to be exercis’d. This sure were so disagreeable to his wisdom
   and goodness, that it cannot be charged upon his will: and consequently they
   who own not that he has made any such revelation, must tacitly tax him of
   impotence, that he could not do it. But if any man will say he has, and yet
   reject all this which both Jews and Christians receive as such, let him
   produce his testimonies for the others, or rather (to retort his own
   measure) his demonstrations. And then let it appear whether his Scheme of
   Doctrine, or ours, will need the greater aid of that easy credulity he
   reproaches us with.

   64. 1 have now gone thro’ the method I proposed for evincing the Divine
   Original of the Scriptures, and shall not descend to examine those more
   minute and particular Cavils which profane men make against them; the proof
   of this, virtually superseding all those. For if it be reasonable to believe
   it the Word of God, it must be reasonable also to believe it of perfection
   proportionable to the Author; and then certainly it must be advanced beyond
   all our objections. For to those who except to the stile, the incoherence,
   the contradictions, or whatever else in Scripture; I shall only ask this one
   question, whether it be not much more possible that they (who can pretend to
   be nothing above fallible men) may misjudge, than that the infallible God
   should dictate any thing justly liable to those charges: I am sure they must
   depart as much from Reason as Religion, to affirm the contrary. But alas,
   instead of this implicit submission to Gods Word, men take up explicit
   prejudices against it; condemn it without ever examining the truth of the
   allegation. ’Tis certain, that in a writing of such Antiquity, whose
   original Language has Idioms and Phrases so peculiar, whose Country had
   customs so differing from the rest of the world; ’tis impossible to judge of
   it without reference to all those circumstances. Add to this, that the
   Hebrew has been a dead Language for well nigh two thousand years, no where
   in common use: nor is there any other ancient Book now extant in it, besides
   those (yet not all neither,) of the Old Testament.

   65. NOW of those many who defame Holy Writ, how few are there that have the
   industry to enquire into those particulars? And when for want of knowledge,
   some passages seem improper, or perhaps contradictory the Scripture must
   bear the blame of their ignorance, and be accus’d as absurd and
   unintelligible, because themselves are stupid and negligent. It were
   therefore methinks but a reasonable proposal, that no man should arraign it,
   till they have used all honest diligence, taken in all probable helps for
   the understanding it and if this might be obtain’d, I believe most of its
   Accusers would like those of the Woman in the Gospel Jo. 8. 9, drop away, as
   conscious of their own incompetency: the loudest out-cries that are made
   against it, being commonly of those who fall upon it only as a fashionable
   theme of discourse, and hope to acquire themselves the reputation of wits by
   thus charging God foolishly. But he that would candidly and uprightly
   endeavour to comprehend before he judges, and to that end industriously use
   those means which the providence of God by the labours of pious men hath
   afforded him, will certainly find cause to acquit the Scripture of those
   imputations which our bold Criticks have cast upon it. I do not say that he
   shall have all the obscurities of it perfectly clear’d to him; but he shall
   have so many of them as are for his real advantage, and shall discern such
   reasons why the rest remain unfathomable, as may make him not only justify,
   but celebrate the wisdom of the Author.

   66. YET this is to be expected only upon the fore-mention’d condition, viz.
   that he come with sincere and honest intentions; for as for him that comes
   to the Scripture with design, and wishes to find matter of cavil and
   accusations; there is little doubt but that spirit of impiety and
   profaneness which sent him thither, will meet him there as a spirit of
   delusion, and occecation. That Prince of the Air will cast such mists, raise
   such black vapours; that as the Apostle speaks, the light of the glorious
   Gospel of Christ shall not shine unto him, 2 Cor. 4. 5. Indeed were such a
   man left only to the natural efficacy of prejudice, that is of it self so
   blinding, so infatuating a thing, as commonly fortifies against all
   conviction. We see it in all the common instances of life; mens very senses
   are often enslav’d by it: the prepossession of a strong fancy will make the
   objects of sight or hearing appear quite different from what they are. But
   in the present case, when this shall be added to Satanical illusions, and
   both left to their operations by Gods withdrawing his illuminating grace,
   the case of such a man answers that description of the Scripture, They have
   eyes and see not, ears have they and hear not, Rom. 11. 8. And that God will
   so withdraw his grace, we have all reason to believe, he having promis’d it
   only to the meek, to those who come with malleable ductile spirits, to
   learn, not to deride or cavil. Saint Peter tells us, that the unlearned and
   unstable wrest the Scripture to their own destruction 2 Pet. 3. 16. And if
   God permit such to do so, much more will he the proud and malicious.

   67. 1 say not this, to deter any from the sturdy of Holy Scripture, but only
   to caution them to bring a due preparation of mind along with them; Gods
   Word being like a generous soveraign medicament, which if simply and
   regularly taken, is of the greatest benefit; but if mix’d with poison,
   serves only to make that more fatally operative. To conclude, he that would
   have his doubts solv’d concerning Scripture, let him follow the method our
   blessed Lord has prescrib’d: Let him do the will of God, and then he shall
   know of the doctrine, whether it be of God, Jo. 7. 17. Let him bring with
   him a probity of mind, a willingness to assent to all convictions he shall
   there meet with; and then he will find grounds sufficient to assure him that
   it is Gods Word, and consequently to be receiv’d with all the submission and
   reverence, that its being so exacts.
     _________________________________________________________________

                                  SECT. III.

   Subject matter treated of in the Holy Scripture, is excellent, as is also
   its end and deign.

   WE have hitherto consider’d the holy Scripture only under one notion, as it
   is the Word of God; we come now to view it in the subject matter of it, the
   several parts whereof it consists; which are so various and comprehensive,
   that they shew the whole is deriv’d from him who is all in all. 1 Cor. 15.
   28. But that we may not speak only loosely, and at rovers we will take this
   excellent frame in pieces, and consider its most eminent parts distinctly.
   Now the parts of Holy Writ seem to branch themselves into these severals:
   First, the Historical; secondly, the Prophetick; thirdly, the Doctrinal;
   fourthly, the Preceptive; fifthly, the Minatory; sixthly, the Promissory.
   These are the several veins in this rich Mine, in which he who industriously
   labours, will find the Psalmist was not out in his estimate, when he
   pronounces them more to be desir’d than gold, yea, than much fine gold,
   Psal. 19. 10.

   2. To speak first of the Historical part; the things which chiefly recommend
   a History, are the dignity of the subject, the truth of the relation, and
   those pleasant or profitable observations which are interwoven with it. And
   first, for the dignity of the subject, the History of the Bible must be
   acknowledged to excell all others: those shew the rise and progress of some
   one people or Empire; this shews us the original of the whole Universe; and
   particularly of man, for whose use and benefit the whole Creation was
   design’d. By this mankind is brought into acquaintance with it self; made to
   know the elements of its constitution, and taught to put a differing value
   upon that Spirit which was breath’d into it by God, Gen. 2. 7. and the flesh
   whose foundation is in the dust, Job 4. 19. And when this Historical part of
   Scripture contracts and draws into a narrow channel, when it records the
   concerns but of one Nation, yet it was that which God had dignified above
   all the rest of the world, mark’d out for his own peculiar; made it the
   repository of his truth, and the visible stock from whence the Messias
   should come, in whom all the Nations of the earth were to be blessed, Gen.
   18. 18. so that in this one people of the Jews, was virtually infolded the
   highest and most important interests of the whole world; and it must be
   acknowledg’d, no Story could have a nobler subject to treat of.

   3. SECONDLY, as to the truth of the relation, tho’ to those who own it Gods
   Word there needs no other proof; yet it wants not human Arguments to confirm
   it. The most undoubted symptom of sincerity in an Historian is impartiality.
   Now this is very eminent in Scripture writers: they do not record others
   faults, and baulk their own; but indifferently accuse themselves as well as
   others. Moses mentions his own diffidence and unwillingness to go on Gods
   message, Ex. 4. 14. his provocation of God at the waters of Meribah, Numb.
   20. Jonah records his own sullen behaviour towards God, with as great
   aggravations as any of his enemies could have done. Peter in his dictating
   Saint Marks Gospel, neither omits nor extenuates his sin; all he seems to
   speak short in, is his repentance, Saint Paul registers himself as the
   greatest of sinners.

   4. AND as they were not indulgent to their own personal faults, so neither
   did any nearness of relation, any respect of quality bribe them to a
   concealment: Moses relates the offence of his Sister Miriam in mutining.
   Numb. 12. 1. of his Brother Aaron in the matter of the Calf, Exod. 32. 4,
   with as little disguise as that of Korah and his Company. David, tho’ a
   King, hath his adultery and murder display’d in the blackest Characters: and
   King Hezekiahs little vanity of shewing his treasures do’s not escape a
   remark. Nay, even the reputation of their Nation could not biass the Sacred
   Writers; but they freely tax their crimes: the Israelites murmurings in the
   wilderness, their Idolatries in Canaan, are set down without any palliation
   or excuse. And they are as frequently branded for their stubborness and
   ingratitude, as the Canaanites are for their abominations. So that certainly
   no History in the world do’s better attest it’s truth by this evidence of
   impartiality.

   5. IN the last place it commends it self both by the pleasure and profit it
   yields. The rarity of those events it records, surprizes the mind with a
   delightful admiration; and that mixture of sage Discourses, and
   well-couch’d Parables wherewith it abounds, do’s at once please and
   instruct. How ingeniously apt was Nathans Apologue to David, whereby with
   Holy artifice he ensnar’d him into repentance? And it remains still matter
   of instruction to us, to shew us with what unequal scales we are apt to
   weigh the same crime in others and our selves. So also that long train of
   smart calamities which succeeded his sin, is set out with such
   particularity, that it seems to be exactly the crime reverst. His own lust
   with Bathsheba was answer’d with Amnons towards Thamar; his murder of Uriah
   with that of Amnon; his treacherous contrivance of that murder, with
   Absoloms traitorous conspiracy against him. So that every circumstance of
   his punishment was the very Echo and reverberation of his guilt. A multitude
   of the like instances might be produc’d out of Holy Writ; all concurring to
   admonish us, that God exactly marks, and will repay our crimes; and that
   commonly with such propriety, that we need no other clue to guide us to the
   cause of our sufferings, than the very sufferings themselves. Indeed
   innumerable are the profitable observations arising from the Historical part
   of Scripture, that flow so easily and unconstrain’d, that nothing but a
   stupid inadvertence in the reader can make him baulk them: therefore ’twould
   be impertinent here multiply instances.

   6. LET us next consider the Prophetick part of Scripture, and we shall find
   it no less excellent in its kind. The Prophetick Books are for the most part
   made up (as the Prophetick Office was) of two parts: prediction and
   instruction. When God rais’d up Prophets, ’twas not only to acquaint men
   with future events, but to reform their present manners: and therefore as
   they are called Seers in one respect, so they are Watch-men and Sheepherds
   in another. Nay, indeed the former was often subservient to the other as to
   the nobler end; their gift of fore-telling was to gain them authority, to be
   as it were the seal of their commission, to convince men that they were sent
   from God: and so to render them the more pliant to their reproofs and
   admonitions. And the very matter of their prophecies was usually adapted to
   this end: the denouncing of judgements being the most frequent Theme, and
   that design’d to bring men to repentance; as appears experimentally in the
   case of Nineveh. And in this latter part of their office, the Prophets acted
   with the greatest incitation and vehemence.

   7. WITH what liberty and zeal do’s Elijah arraign Ahab of Naboth’s murder,
   and foretell the fatal event of it, without any fear of his power, or
   reverence of his greatness? And Samuel, when he delivers Saul the fatal
   message of his rejection, do’s passionately and convincingly expostulate
   with him concerning his sin, 1 Sam. 15. 17. Now the very same Spirit still
   breaths in all the prophetick Writings, the same truth of prediction, and
   the same zeal against vice.

   8. FIRST for the predictions, what signal completions do we find? How
   exactly are all the denunciations of judgments fulfill’d, where repentance
   has not interven’d? He that reads the 28. chap. of Deut. and compares it
   with the Jews calamities, both under the Assyrians and Babylonians, and
   especially under the Romans, would think their oppressors had consulted it,
   and transcrib’d their severities thence. And even these Nations, who were
   the instruments of accomplishing those dismal presages, had their own ruins
   foretold, and as punctually executed. And as in Kingdoms and Nations, so to
   private persons none of the prophetick threatnings ever return’d empty. The
   sentence pronounc’d against Ahab, Jezebel, and their posterity, was
   fulfill’d even to the most minute circumstances of place and manner; as is
   evident by comparing the denunciation of Elijah, 1 Kings 21. 19. 23. with
   their tragical ends recorded in the following chapters. And as for Jehu,
   whose service God was pleased to use in that execution, tho’ he rewarded it
   with entailing the Crown of Israel on him for four descents, yet he
   fore-told those should be the limits: and accordingly we find Zachariah, the
   fourth descendent of his line, was the last of it that fate on that throne,
   2 Kings 15. 10. So also the destruction of Achitophel and Judas, the one
   immediate, the other many hundred years remote, are foretold by David, Psal.
   109. and we find exactly answer’d in the event.

   9. NOR was this exactness confin’d only to the severe predictions, but as
   eminent in the more gracious. All the blessings which God by himself, or the
   Ministry of his Prophets promis’d, were still infallibly made good. At the
   time of life God return’d and visited Sarah with conception, notwithstanding
   those natural improbabilities which made her not only distrust, but even
   deride and laugh at the promise, Gen. 18. The posterity of that Son of
   Promise, the whole race of Abraham was deliver’d from the Egyptian bondage,
   and possess’d of Canaan, at the precise time which God had long before
   signified to Abrabam, Gen. 15. So likewise the return of the Jews from the
   Babylonish captivity was fore-told many years before their deportation, and
   Cyrus named for their restorer, before he had either name or being save only
   in Gods prescience, Is. 44. 28. But I need not multiply instances of
   national or personal promises. The earliest and most comprehensive promise
   of all was that of the Messiah, in whom all persons and Nations of the world
   were to be blest, Gen. 22. 11. that seed of the woman that should bruise the
   Serpents head, Gen. 3. 15. To him give all the Prophets witness, as Saint
   Peter observes, Acts 10. And he who was the subject, made himself also the
   expounder of those prophecies in his walk to Emmaus with the two Disciples,
   Luk. 24. 13. beginning at Moses, and all the Prophets, he expounded to them
   in all the Scriptures, the things concerning himself.

   10. THIS as it was infinitely the greatest blessing afforded mankind, so was
   it the most frequently and eminently predicted; and that with the most exact
   particularity as to all the circumstances. His immaculate conception, the
   union of his two natures implied in his name Immanuel; Behold a Virgin shall
   conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel; is most plainly
   fore-told by Isaiah chap. 7. 14. Nay, the very place of his birth so
   punctually fore-told, that the Priests and Scribes could readily resolve
   Herods Question upon the strength of the Prophecy, and assure him Christ
   must be born in Bethlehem, Mat. 2. 5. As for the whole business and design
   of his life, we find it so describ’d by Isaiah, chap. 61. as Christ himself
   owns it, Luke 4. 18. The spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath
   appointed me to preach good tidings to the meek; hath sent me to bind up the
   broken hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and recovering of sight
   to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, to preach the
   acceptable year of the Lord.

   11. IF we look farther to his death, the greatest part of the Old Testament
   has a direct aspect on it. All the Levitical œconomy of Sacrifices and
   Ablutions were but prophetick Rites, and ocular Predictions of that one
   expiatory Oblation. Nay most of Gods providential dispensations to the Jews,
   carried in them types and prefigurations of this. Their rescue from Egypt,
   the sprinkling of blood to secure them from the destroying Angel; the Manna
   with which they were fed, the Rock which supplied them water: these and many
   more referr’d to Christ, as their final and highest signification.

   12. BUT besides these darker adumbrations, we have (as the Apostle speaks) a
   more sure word of prophecy. Saint Peter in his calculation begins with
   Moses, takes in Samuel, and the whole succession of Prophets after him, as
   bearing witness to this great event of Christs passion, Acts 4. 22. 24. And
   indeed he that reads the Prophets consideringly, shall find it so punctually
   describ’d, that the Evangelists do not much more fully instruct him in the
   circumstances of it. Daniel tells us his death, as to the kind of it, was to
   be violent: The Messiah shall be cut off; and as to the design of it ’twas
   not for himself; Dan. 9. 26. But the Prophet Isaiah gives us more than a
   bare negative account of it; and expressly saies, he was wounded for our
   transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement of our
   peace was on him, and by his stripes we were healed, chap. 53. 5. And again,
   ver. 10. Thou shalt make his Soul an offering for sin; and ver. 11. my
   righteous Servant shall justify many, for he shall bear their iniquities.
   Nor is Job, an Idumean, much short of even this Evangelical Prophet; in that
   short Creed of his, wherein he owns him as his Redeemer, I know that my
   Redeemer liveth, &c. Job. 19. 25.

   13. AND as the end, so the circumstances of his sufferings are most of them
   under prediction: His extention upon the Cross is mention’d by the Psalmist:
   They pierced my hands, and my feet; I may tell all my bones, Psal. 22. 16,
   17. As for his inward dolours, they are in that Psalm so pathetically
   describ’d that Christ chose that very form to breath them out in: My God, my
   God, why hast thou forsaken me? ver. 1. So his revilers did also transcribe
   part of their reproaches from ver. 8. He trusted in God, let him deliver him
   now if he will have him, Matt. 27. 43. That Vinegar which was offered him on
   the Cross, was a completion of a Prophecy; In my thirst they gave me Vinegar
   to drink, Psal. 69. 21. the piercing of his side was expressly fore-told by
   Zachary: they shall look on him whom they have pierced, Zach. 10. 12. The
   company in which he suffer’d, and the interment be had, are also intimated
   by lsaiah, He made his Grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his
   death, Isai. 53. 9. Nay even the disposal of his Garments was not without a
   Prophecy: they parted my Garments among them, and upon my Vesture did they
   cast Lots Psalm 22. 18. Here are a cloud of witsnesses which as they serve
   eminently to attest the truth of the Christian Religion; so do they to
   evince the excellency of the Sacred Scripture, as to the verity of the
   Prophetick part.

   14. AS to the admonitory part of the Prophetick Writings, they are in their
   kind no way inferiour to the other. The reproofs are authoritative and
   convincing. What piercing exprobations do we find of Israels ingratitude?
   How often are they upbraided with the better examples of the brute
   Creatures? with the Ox and the Ass by Isaiah Chap. 1. 3. with the Stork, and
   the Crane and the Swallow, by Jeremiah, Chap. 8. 7. Nay the constancy of the
   Heathen to their false Gods is instanc’d to reproach their revolt from the
   true. Hath a Nation chang’d their Gods which yet are no Gods? but my People
   have chang’d their Glory for that which doth not profit, Jer. 2. 11. What
   awful, what Majestick representations do we find of Gods power, to awake
   their dread! Fear ye not me saith the Lord? will ye not tremble at my
   presence who have plac’d the Sands for the bounds of the Sea by a perpetual
   decree, that it cannot pass over? and tho’ the Waves thereof toss
   themselves, yet can they not prevail; tho’ they roar, yet can they not pass
   over it, Jer. 22. And again; Thus saith the High and lofty one that
   inhabiteth Eternity, whose name is Holy: I dwell in the High and Holy Place,
   Is. 57. 15. So we find him describ’d as a God Glorious in Holiness, fearful
   in Praises, doing Wonders, Exod. 15. 11. These and many other the like
   heights of Divine eloquence we meet with in the Prophetick Writings: which
   cannot but strike us with an awful reverence of the Divine Power.

   15. NOR are they less Pathetick in the gentler strains. What instance is
   there of the greatest tenderness and love, which God has not adopted to
   express his by? He personates all the nearest and most endearing relations:
   that of a Husband; I will Marry thee to my self, Hos. 2. 19. of a Father; I
   am a Father to Israel, and Ephraim is my first Born: nay, he vies Bowels
   with the tender Sex, and makes it more possible for a Mother to renounce her
   compassions towards the Son of her Womb, than for him to with-draw his, Isa.
   49. 15. By all these endearments, these cords of a man, these bands of love,
   as himself stiles them, Hos. 11. 4. endeavouring to draw his people to their
   duty, and their happiness. And when their perversness frustrates all this
   his Holy Artifice; how passionately do’s he expostulate with them? how
   solemnly protest his aversness to their ruin? Why will ye die O House of
   Israel? for I have no pleasure in the death of him that dieth, saith the
   Lord God, Ezek. 18. 31, 32. with what regrets and relenting do’s he think of
   abandoning them? How shall I give thee up Ephraim? How shall I deliver thee
   Israel? How shall I make thee as Admah? How shall I set thee as Zeboim? my
   Heart is turn’d within me, my repentings are kindled together; Hos. 11. 8.
   In short, ’twere endless to cite the places in these Prophetick Books,
   wherein God do’s thus condescend to solicit even the sensitive part of man;
   and that with such moving Rhetorick, that I cannot but wonder at the
   exception some of our late Criticks make against the Bible, for its defect
   in that particular; for Oratory is nothing but a dextrous application to the
   affections and passions of men. And certainty we find not that done with
   greater advantage any where than in Sacred Writ.

   16. YET it was not the design of the Prophets (no more than of the Apostle)
   to take men with guile; 2 Cor. 12. 16. to inveigle their affections unawares
   to their understandings; but they address as well to their reasons, make
   solemn appeals to their judicative faculties. And now judge I pray between
   me and my Vineyard, says Isa. 5. 3. Nay, God by the Prophet Ezekiel solemnly
   pleads his own cause before them, vindicates the equity of his proceedings
   from the aspersions they had cast on them; and by most irrefragable
   Arguments refutes that injurious Proverb which went current among them; and
   in the close appeals to themselves, O House of Israel are not my ways equal?
   are not your ways unequal? Ezek. 18. the evidences were so clear that he
   remits the matter to their own determination. And generally we shall find
   that among all the Topicks of disswasion from sin, there is none more
   closely prest, than that of the folly of it. Idolatry was a sin to which
   Israel had a great propension, and against which most of the Prophets
   admonitions were directed. And certainly it can never be more expos’d, and
   the sottish unreasonableness of it better display’d, than we find it in the
   44. Chap. of Isaiah. In like manner we may read the Prophet Jeremy
   disswading from the same sin by Arguments of the most irrefragable
   conviction, Jer. 10.

   17. AND as the Prophets omitted nothing as to the manner of their address,
   to render their exhortations effectual, the matter of them was likewise so
   considerable as to command attention. It was commonly either the recalling
   them from their revolts and Apostacies from God by Idolatry, or else to
   convince them of the insignificancy of all those legal Ceremonial
   performances they so much confided in, when taken up as a supersedens to
   moral duties. Upon this account it is, that they often depreciate, and in a
   manner prohibit the solemnest of their Worships. To what purpose are the
   multitude of your Sacrifices unto me? bring no more vain Oblations: incense
   is an abomination to me; the new Moons and sabbaths, the calling of
   Assemblies I cannot away with: if Iniquity even your solemn meetings, &c.
   Is. 1. 11. 13. Not that these things were in themselves reprovable; for they
   were all commanded by God; but because the Jews depended so much on these
   external observances that they thought by them to commute for the weightier
   matters of the Law (as our Saviour after stiles them) Judgement, Mercy and
   Faith, Mat. 23. 23. look’d on these rites which discriminated them from
   other Nations, as dispensations from the universal obligations of nature and
   common justice.

   18. THIS deceit of theirs is sharply upbraided to them by the Prophet
   Jeremy; where he calls their boasts of the Temple of the Lord, the Temple of
   the Lord, lying words; and on the contrary, lays the whole stress of their
   obedience, and expectation of their happiness on the justice and innocence
   of their conversation, Ch. 7. 4. And after do’s smartly reproach their
   insolence in boldly resorting to that house, which by bringing their sins
   along with them, they made but an Asylum, and Sanctuary for those crimes.
   Will ye steal, murder and commit adultery, and swear falsely, and burn
   incense to Baal, and walk after other Gods whom ye know not, and come and
   stand before me in this house? Is this house which is called by my name
   become a Den of robbers in your eyes? Chap. 7. 9, 10, 11. Indeed all the
   Prophets seem to conspire in this one design, of making them look thro’
   shadows and ceremonies, to that inward purity, Justice and Honesty, which
   they were design’d to inculcate, not to supplant. And this design as it is
   in it self most excellent, most worthy the command of God, and the nature of
   man; so we have seen that it has been pursued by all the most apt, and most
   powerful mediums, that the thing or persons addrest to were capable of; and
   so that the Prophets are no less eminent for the discharge of this
   exhortatory part of their office, than they were in the former, of the
   predicting.

   19. THE next part of Scripture we are to consider, is the Doctrinal; by
   which I shall not in this place understand the whole complex of Faith and
   Manners together; but restrain it only to those Revelations which are the
   object of our Belief; and these are so sublime, as shews flesh and blood
   never reveal’d them. Those great mysteries of our Faith, The Trinity, the
   Incarnation, the Hypostatical union, the Redemption of the world by making
   the offended party the Sacrifice for the offence, are things of so high and
   abstruse speculation, as no finite understanding can fully fathom. I know
   their being so is by some made an Argument for disbelief; but doubtless very
   injustly for (not to insist upon the different natures of Faith and Science,
   by which that becomes a proper object of the one which is not of the other)
   our noncomprehension is rather an indication that they have a higher rise,
   and renders it infinitely improbable that they could spring from mans
   invention. For ’twere to suppose too great a disproportion between human
   faculties to think men could invent what themselves could not understand.
   Indeed these things lye so much out of the road of human imagination, that I
   dare appeal to the breasts of the most perverse gain-sayers, whether ever
   they could have fallen into their thoughts without suggestion from without.
   And therefore ’tis a malicious contradiction to reject these truths because
   of their dissonancy from human reason, and yet at the same time to ascribe
   their original to man. But certainly there can be nothing more inconsistent
   with mere natural reason, than to think God can be, or do no more than man
   can comprehend. Never any Nation or person that own’d a Deity, did ever
   attempt so to circumscribe him: and it is proportionable only to the
   licentious profaneness of these latter days, thus to measure immensity and
   omnipotence by our narrow scantling.

   20. THE more genuine and proper effect of these supernatural truths is, to
   raise our admiration of that Divine Wisdom, whose ways are so past finding
   out; and to give us a just sense of that infinite distance which is between
   it, and the highest of that reason wherein we so pride our selves. And the
   great propriety these Doctrines have to that end may well be reckon’d as one
   part of their excellency.

   21. INDEED there is no part of our holy Faith, but is naturally productive
   of some peculiar virtue; as the whole Scheme together engages us to be
   universally Holy in all manner of conversation. 1 Pet. 1. 15. And it is the
   supereminent advantage true Religion hath over all false ones, that it tends
   to so laudable an end.

   22. THE Theology of the Heathens was in many instances an extract and
   quintessence of vice. Their most solemn Rites, and Sacred’st Mysteries were
   of such a nature, that instead of refining and elevating, they corrupted and
   debased their Votaries; immers’d them in all those abominable pollutions
   which sober nature abhorr’d. Whereas the principles of our Faith serve to
   spiritualize and rectifie us, to raise us as much above mere manhood as
   theirs cast them below it.

   23. AND as they are of this vast advantage to us, so also are they just to
   God, in giving us right notions of him. What vile unworthy apprehensions had
   the Heathen of their Deities, intitling them not only to the passions but
   even to the crimes of men, making Jupiter an adulterer, Mercury a thief,
   Bacchus a drunkard, &c, proportionably of the rest? Whereas our God is
   represented to us as an essence, so spiritual, and incorporeal, that we must
   be unbodied our selves before we can perfectly conceive what he is: so far
   from the impotent affections and inclinations of men, that he has neither
   parts, nor passions; and is fain to veil himself under that disguise, to
   speak sometimes as if he had, merely in condescention to our grosser
   faculties. And again, so far from being an example, a patron of vice, that
   his eyes are too pure to behold iniquity, Hab. 1. 13. Holiness is an
   essential part of his nature, and he must deny himself to put it off.

   24. THE greatest descent that ever he made to humanity was in the
   incarnation of the second person: yet even in that, tho’ he was linked with
   a sinful nature, yet he preserv’d the person immaculate; and while he had
   all the sins of the world upon him by imputation, suffer’d not any one to be
   inherent in him.

   To conclude, the Scripture describes our God to us by all those glorious
   Attributes of infinity, Power and Justice, which may render him the proper
   object of our Adorations and Reverence and it describes him also in those
   gentler Attributes of Goodness, Mercy and Truth, which may excite our love
   of, and dependence on him. These are representations something worthy of
   God, and such as impress upon our mind great thoughts of him.

   26. BUT never did the Divine Attributes so concur to exert themselves, as in
   the mystery of our Redemption: where his Justice was satisfied without
   diminution to his Mercy; and his Mercy without entrenching on his Justice:
   his Holiness most eminent in his indignation against sin, and yet his Love
   no less so in sparing sinners: these contradictions being reconcil’d, this
   discord compos’d into harmony by his infinite Wisdom. This is that
   stupendous Mystery into which the Angels desir’d to look, 1 Pet. 1. 12. And
   this is it which by the Gospel is preach’d unto us; as it follows, vers. 25.

   27. AND as the Scripture gives us this knowledge of God, so it do’s also of
   our selves; in which two, all profitable knowledge is comprised. It teaches
   us how vile we were in our original dust; and how much viler yet in our
   fall, which would have sunk us below our first principles, sent us not only
   to earth, but hell. It shews the impotence of our lapsed estate; that we are
   not able of our selves so much as to think a good thought: and it shews us
   also the dignity of our renovated estate, that we are heirs of God, and
   fellow heirs with Christ, Rom. 8. 17. yet lest this might puff us up with
   mistaken hopes, it plainly acquaints us with the condition on which this
   depends; that it must be our obedience both alive and passive, which is to
   intitle us to it: that we must be faithful to death, if we mean to inherit a
   crown of Life, Rev. 2. 10. and that we must suffer with Christ, if we will
   be glorified with him, Rom. 8. 17. And upon supposition that we perform our
   parts of the condition, it gives us the most certain assurance, engages Gods
   veracity that he will not fail on his. By this it gives us support against
   all the adversities of life assuring us the sufferings of it are not worthy
   to be compared with the glory we expect, Rom. 8. 18. yea, and against the
   terrors of death too; by assuring us that what we look on as a dissolution,
   is but a temporary parting and we only put off our bodies, that they may put
   off corruption, and be cloathed with immortality.

   28. THESE and the like are the Doctrines the Holy Scripture offers to us:
   and we may certainly say, they are faithful sayings, and worthy of all
   acceptation, 1 Tim. 4. 9. The notions it gives us of God are so sublime and
   great, that they cannot but affect us with reverence, and admiration; and
   yet withal, so amiable and endearing that they cannot but raise love and
   gratitude, affiance and delight.

   29. AND, which is yet more, the milder Attributes are apt to inspirit us
   with a generous ambition of assimilation; excite us to transcribe all his
   imitable excellencies in which the very Heathens could discern consisted the
   accomplishment of human felicity.

   30. AND then the knowledge it gives us of our selves do’s us the kindest
   office imaginable; keeps us from those swelling thoughts we are too apt to
   entertain, and shews us the necessity of bottoming our hopes upon a firmer
   foundation: and then again keeps us from being lazy or secure, by shewing us
   the necessity of our own endeavours. In a word, it teaches us to be humble
   and industrious, and whoever is so ballasted can hardly be shipwrack’d.

   31. THESE are the excellencies of the Doctrinal part of the Scriptures,
   which also renders them most aptly preparative for the preceptive. And
   indeed, so they were design’d: the Credenda and the Agenda being such
   inseparable relations, that whoever parts them, forfeits the advantage of
   both. The most solemn profession of Christ, the most importunate
   invocations, Lord, Lord, will signifie nothing to them which do not the
   things which he says, Mat. 7. And how excellent, how rational those precepts
   are which the Scripture proposes to us from him is our next point of
   consideration.

   32. THE first Law which God gave to mankind was that of nature. And tho’ the
   impressions of it upon the mind be by Adams fall exceedingly dimm’d and
   defac’d; yet that derogates nothing from the dignity and worth of that Law,
   which God has been so far from cancelling, that he seems to have made it the
   rule and square of his subsequent Laws so that nothing is injoin’d in those,
   but what is consonant and agreeable to that. The Moral Law given in the
   Decalogue to the Jews, the Evangelical Law given in the Gospel to
   Christians, have this natural Law for their basis and foundation. They
   licence nothing which that prohibits, and very rarely prohibit any thing
   which it licences.

   33. ’TIS true, Christ in his Sermon on the Mount, raises Christians to a
   greater strictness than the Jews thought themselves oblig’d to; but that was
   not by contradicting either the natural, or moral Law, but by rescuing the
   latter from those corruptions which the false glosses of the Scribes and
   Pharisees had mix’d with it; and reducing it to its primitive integrity, and
   extent. In a word, as the Decalogue was given to repair the Defacings, and
   renew the impressions of the natural Law: so the precepts of the Gospel were
   design’d to revive and illustrate both. And accordingly we find Christ, in
   the matter of Divorce, calls them back to this natural Law; In the beginning
   it was not so Mat. 19. 8; I say not but that even thee natural notions are
   in some instances refin’d and elevated by Christ; the second Adam being to
   repair the fall of the first with advantage but yet he still builds upon
   that ground-work, introduces nothing that is inconsistent with it.

   34. AND this accordance between there several Laws is a circumstance that
   highly recommends Scripture precepts to us. We cannot imagine but that God
   who made man for no other end but to be an instrument of his glory, and a
   recipient of all communicable parts of his happiness, would assign him such
   rules and measures as were most conducive to those ends. And therefore since
   the Scripture injunctions are of the same mould, we must conclude them to be
   such as tend to the perfection of our being; the making us what God
   originally intended us; and he that would not be that, will certainly chuse
   much worse for himself.

   31. I know there have been prejudices taken up against the precepts of
   Christ, as if they impos’d unreasonable, unsupportable strictnesses upon
   men: and some have assum’d liberty to argue mutinously against them; nay,
   against God too for putting such natural appetites into men, and then
   forbidding them to satisfie them.

   36. BUT the ground of this cavil is the not rightly distinguishing of
   natural appetites, which are to be differenc’d according to the two states
   of rectitude and depravation: those of the first rank are the appetites God
   put into man; and those were all regular and innocent, such as tended to the
   preservation of his being: nature in its first integrity measuring its
   desires by its needs. Now Christs prohibitions are not directed against
   these, he forbids no one kind of these desires. And tho’ the precept of
   self-denial may sometimes restrain us in some particular acts; yet that is
   but proportionable to that restraint Adam was under in relation to the
   forbidden Tree, a particular instance of his obedience, and fence of his
   safety. So that if men would consider nature under this its first and best
   notion, they cannot accuse Christ of being severe to it.

   37. BUT ’tis manifest they take it in another acceptation, and mean that
   corruption of nature which inordinately inclines to sensitive things; and on
   this account they call their riots, their luxuries, appetites put into them
   by God: whereas ’tis manifest these were superinduced from another coast:
   The wise man gives us its true pedigree in what he says of death, which is
   its twin-sister: By the envy of the devil came death into the world, Wisd.
   2. 24. And can they expect that Christ who came to destroy the works of the
   devil, 1 Joh. 3. 8. should frame Laws in their favour, make Acts of
   toleration and indulgence for them? This were to annul the whole design of
   his coming into the world, which was to restore us from our laps’d estate,
   and elevate us to those higher degrees of purity which he came not only to
   prescribe, but to exemplifie to us.

   38. BUT in this affair men often take nature in a yet wider and worse
   notion; and under natural desires comprehend whatever upon any sort of
   motive they have a mind to do. The awe of a Superior, the importunity of a
   companion, custom, and example, make men do many ill things, to which their
   nature would never prompt them; nay, many times such as their nature relucts
   to, and abhors. ’Tis certainly thus in all debauchery and excess. ’Tis
   evident, it gratifies no mans nature to be drunk, or to lie under undigested
   loads of meats: these are out-rages and violences upon nature, take it only
   in the most sensitive notion, such as the struggles to avert: and yet men
   make her bear, not only the oppression, but the blame too.

   39. BUT besides to be consider’d, that the nature of a man includes reason
   as well as sense; and to t