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The present constitution of the world, with respect to the civilization, the religion, the liberty, or flavery of the different empires which fubfift in it, is but one stage of the completion of the various prophecies, which were of old delivered, concerning the fortunes of individuals, nations and countries. We in our days may fay what Tertullian, speaking of the accomplishment of Scripture prophecy, faid in his Quicquid agitur prænunciabatur, quicquid videtur audiebatur. The reader may find these subjects discussed by Bp. Newton in his Differtations on the Prophecies; by Whiston in his Accomplishment of Scripture Prophecy; by Sharpe in his second Argument in defence of Christianity; by Lardner in his three Ser mons on the Circumstances of the Jewish People, an Argument for the Truth of Chriftianity; by the author of the Principes de la Foi Chrétienne; by the author of an Essay in the Universal History, on The Independency of the Arabs; by Bishops. Hurd, Hallifax, and Bagot, in their Sermons preached at Warburton's Lecture; by Joseph Mede, and Henry More, in their respective works; and by Worthington in his Sermon preached at Boyle's Lecture, 1766, &c.

All the Actions recorded in the Gospels are probable, P. 177.

This Tract is the 4th chap. of the ift book of the Truth of the Gospel History, by Macknight. Young men should render this short tract familiar to them by a frequent perusal of it; they will find in it very concise, but fatisfactory answers to many objections respect ing forme parts of our Saviour's conduct, the possibility and the credibility of miracles, &c. which are, sometimes seriously, oftener in wanton mockery of religion, made subjects of common converfation, and which never fail to leave a bad impreffion on the minds of those who know not how to reply to them.

Of the Argument for the Truth of the Chriftian Religion arifing from the conversion of the world to Chriftianity, taken from the Truth of the Gospel History. By JAMES MACKNIGHT, D. D. 1763. p. 199.

That great multitudes out of every nation in the then known world were converted from Heathenism to Christianity, within a few years after the death of Jesus, is a fact allowed on all hands; the question is, whether this fact can be properly urged as a decisive proof of the divine origin of the Christian religion. And, with but doubt, the fact, abstractedly confidered, cannot. The exten five propagation of a religion, how rapidly foever it may have been made,

made, is a proof of nothing but that the means were adequate to the end, the cause to the effect. A falfe religion may be speedily and widely spread by force or by fraud; or it may, by degrees, gain an extensive establishment in the world, from its being propitious to the follies, the vices, and paffions of mankind; or from its being first introduced in an unenlightened and credulous age; or in a country fitted by peculiar circumstances to foster and support it; or from a concurrence of many other human means. This may be readily granted; but that the Chriftian religion should have been quickly propagated from Judea through the Roman Empire, during the reigns of Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius, &c. by the human abilities of the Apostles, appears to me to be an incredible fact. Those who think otherwise would do well, in addition to the fact itself, to confider the prophecies which were fulfilled when it took place. "What motive, fays Justin Martyr in his Apology (Reeve's Tranf.), could ever poffibly have perfuaded us to believe a crucified man to be the first begotten of the unbegotten God, and that he would come to judge the world, had we not met with those prophetic teftimonies of him proclaimed so long before his incarnation? Were we not eye-witnesses to the fulfilling of them? Did we not fee the defolation of Judea, and men out of all nations proselyted to the faith of his Apofttes, and renouncing the ancient errors they were brought up in? Did we not find the prophecies made good in ourselves, and fee Chriftians in greater numbers, and in greater fincerity, from among the Gentiles, than from the Jews and Samaritans?" - This argument has been infifted upon by Henry More in the first vol. of his works, where there is a chapter intituled, Veritas Evangelii demonArata ex Succeffu; by J. Doane in a discourse printed 1725, intituled, The miraculous Success of the Gofpel, a Proof of its divine Origin; by Lefley in his. Short Method with the Deifts; by Millar in his Hiftory of the Propagation of Christianity, and Overthrow of Paganisin : by. Tillotson in the 12th vol. of his Sermons; by Leng in his Sermons at Boyle's Lecture; by Jortin in his Truth of the Chriftian Religion; by Leland in the 6th chapter of the 2d part of his Defence of Chriftianity by Bp. Atterbury in his two Sermons on the Miraculous Propagation of the Golpel; by Boffuet in his Discourse on Univerfal Hiftory; by Lardner in his Collection of Jewish Testimonies; by Powell in his 10th Discourse; by Benson in his Reafonableness of Chriftianity; and by Young in the 2d vol. of his Differtations, on Idolatrous Corruptions; where, also, there is a compendious view, fupported by proper authorities, of the countries through which the Apostles travelled in propagating the Gospel.

An Essay on the Man of Sin, from Benfon's Paraphrafe and Notes on St. Paul's Epistles. p. 268.

That the Popish religion is the Chriftian religion, is a false pofition; and therefore Chriftianity may be true, though the religion

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of the Church of Rome be, in many of its parts, an imposture. This observation should be always kept in mind by such of our young men of fashion, as are fent to finish their education by travelling in Catholic countries. It may feem paradoxical to affert, that the corruptions of any religion can be proofs of its truth; yet the corruptions of the Christian religion, as practised by the Church of Rome, are certain proofs of the truth of the Chriftian religion; inasmuch as they are exact completions of the prophecies which were delivered by Daniel, St. Paul, and St. John, concerning that apostasy from the faith, which was to take place, in the latter times. I have known the infidelity of more than one young man happily removed, by shewing him the characters of Popery delineated by St. Paul in his prophecy concerning the Man of Sin (2 Thef. ii. 1.), and in that concerning the apoftafy of the latter times (1 Tim. iv. 1). Bp. Hurd, in his 7th fermon at Warburton's Lecture, has given a concife history of the charge of Antichriftianism, which has, at different times, been brought against the Church of Rome. Dr. Whitaker, Regius Profeffor of Divinity at Cambridge, in his exercise for his degree at the ComInencement in 1582, supported this Thesis-Pontifex Romanus eft ille Antichriftus quem futurum Scriptura prædixit. He had, before that time, refuted the forty arguments by which Nicholas Sander boasted that he had demonftrated that the Pope was not Antichrift. Whitaker's works are very well worth being looked into by those who would know what can be faid for and against the other prineipal points in controversy between Proteftants and Papifts, as well as against this primary pillar of the reformed faith-That the Hierarchy of the Church of Rome is the Little Horn of Daniel, the Man of Sin of St. Paul, and the Antichrift of St. John. The evidence arifing from the completion of the prophecies relative to the Rife, Character, and Fall of the Man of Sin, is an increasing evidence: it strikes us with more force than it struck our ancestors before the Reformation; and it will strike our pofterity, who shall observe the different gradations of his decline, and his final catastrophe, with more force than it now ftrikes us.

Obfervations on the History and Evidence of the Refurrection of Jesus Christ. By GILBERT WEST, Efq. Lond. 1767. 6th. Ed. p. 289.

The Refurrection of Christ is the very corner-stone on which the hope of a Chriftian is built; for, if Chrift be not risen, Chriftianity is an imposture; and if Christ be risen, Chriftianity is true, and Deifm is a delusion. Whether Christ be, or be not rifen from the dead, is a question of fact, and must be decided (not by metaphyfical dif quisitions concerning the power of God to work a miracle, nor by nice fubtilties concerning the sufficiency of human teftimony to ef tablish the credibility of miracles, but) by fainly eftimating the weight of evidence for and against the fact. The main arguments which are brought to invalidate the fact of the Resurrection are des duced from the real, or feeming, differences in the accounts which the Evangelifts have given of the circumstances which attended it; and much labour has been employed in harmonizing the feveral ac counts. But what if it should be admitted (I do not fay that the conceffion is neceffary), that the accounts cannot in every little point be made to agree? Will you for that reason disbelieve the fact itself? As well might you have disbelieved the report of those who should have faid, that they had seen the body of Cæfar dead, because you would have found them disagreeing, probably, in some minute points, relative to the number or situation of his wounds; to the time or manner of his being stabbed in the Capitol. A flight difagreement between the writers of the New Testament, in their res lations of matters of fact, is entirely analogous to what may be ob servéd every day in courts of justice; no one, on account of a triffing difference in the testimonies of the witnesses, ever thinks of queltioning the existence of the fact in which they all agree, or of im peaching either their integrity, or competency to establish the fact. If the Evangelists do really differ from each other in their accounts of the Resurrection of Jesus, it is a proof that they did not write in concert, were not combined to impose a fable on the world'; and it is a proof, alfo, that what they wrote was not inspired in the manner which some, with more piety than judginent, have supposed it to have been. Let the Deifts make the most they can of the variations which they think may be found in the Evangelifts; yet will they never be able to prove, that the facts mentioned by these writers respecting the Birth, Life, Death, Refurrection, and Afcenfion of Jesus Chrift, are not true : let them fasten upon the writers of the New Testament as much human infirmity as they can; yet will they never be able to prove that they were not divinely inspired in what they delivered concerning the doctrines necessary to be believed, and the duties neceffary to be performed, by all true disciples of Jefus Chrift.-The book which is here printed has been much esteemed; it has been tranflated both into German and French, and may be of great ufe to those whose religious principles are unfettled. Macknight, in his Harmony, has endeavoured to reconcile the seeming inconfiftencies in the Evangelists relative to the refurrection. Lardner published some judicious observations on Macknight's plan. Benson has given his fentiments on the subject of the Resurrection in his Life of Christ, and has answered the objections usually made to it. Bp. Newcome, in his Harmony, may be confulted on the fubject with great advantage. A pamphlet, published many years ago, intituled, The Trial of the Witnefles of the Refurrection of Jesus, has been well received in the world; but the most solid reasoning on the subject may be met with in a discourse concerning the Resurrection of Jesus Chrift, by Humphrey Ditton, 5th ed. 1749. Fabricius, in the 44th chap. of his Delectus Argumentorum, mentions 28 different authors on the Refurrection, and in the 9th chap. of his Lux Evangelica he adds above 20 more, nor would it be a difficult taik greatly to enlarge his catalogue.

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TO O believe the Christian religion, is to believe that Mofes and the prophets, Chrift and his apostles, were endued with divine authority, that they had a commission from God to act and teach as they did, and that he will verify their declarations concerning future things, and especially those concerning a future life, by the event: or, in other words, it is to receive the scriptures as our rule of life, and the foundation of all our hopes and fears. And as all those who regulate their faith and practice by the scriptures are Christians; so all those who disclaim that name, and pass under the general title of unbelievers, do also disavow this regard to the scriptures. But there are various classes of unbelievers. Some appear to treat the fcriptures as mere forgeries; others allow them to be the genuine writings of those whose names they bear, but suppose them to abound with fictions, not only in the miraculous, but also in the common part of the history; others again allow this part, but reject that; and, lastly, there are others who seem to allow the truth of the principal facts, both common and miraculous, contained in the scriptures, and yet still call in question its divine authority, as a rule of life, and an evidence of a happy futurity under Chrift our faviour and king. He, therefore, that would fatisfy himself or others in the truth of the Christian religion, as opposed by these several classes of unbelievers, must inquire into these three things :

First, The genuineness of the books of the Old and New Testa

ment.

Secondly, The truth of the principal facts contained in them, both common and miraculous. And,

Thirdly, Their divine authority.

I will endeavour, therefore, to state some of the chief evidences for each of these important points, having first premised three preparatory propositions, or lemmas, whereby the evidence for any one of them may be transferred upon the other two.

VOL. V.

B

PROP.

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