bullocks, all of them fatlings of Bashan. And ye shall eat fat till ye be full, and drink blood till ye be drunken, of my facrifice which I have facrificed for you. Thus ye Thall be filled at my table with horfes and chariots, with mighty men, and with all men of war, faith the Lord God.

When, afterwards, this author acknowledges his miftake, as he does in a poftfcript to the abovementioned treatise, he fays, by way of apology for it, but contrary to all common fenfe, that two of the verses which I have recited might have been addreffed to the Jews, as well as to the birds and beafts. What can we think of the fairness and competency of judgment in this most distinguished of modern unbelievers, when he is capable of writing in this very abfurd and unguarded manner...

SECTION III.

Some objections which more nearly affect the proper evidence of revelation, especially refpecting the antient and prefent fate of the belief of it.

T has been faid by fome modern unbelievers, that

IT

the books which were written by the early adversaries of christianity have been fuppreffed by the friends of it, fo that we cannot at this day tell what was written against, or objected to chriftian

ity, at the first promulgation of it. But this is an affertion deftitute of all proof, or probability; for then all chriftian writers must have carefully avoided the mention of fuch books, in their own writings, which are come down to us; whereas, they have been fo far from doing any thing like this, that it is the opinion of critics, that almoft. the whole of Celfus's treatise against christianity is transcribed into Origen's answer to it, and a great part of Julian's into that of Cyril. Eufebius has also preserved large extracts from the writings of Porphyry; and the fame has been the conduct of other chriftian apologifts, with refpect to other opponents of christianity..

No perfons more fincerely regret the lofs of thefe writings than learned chriftians of the prefent age; but in the fame undistinguishing ravages of time, have perifhed what we regret more, namely,, the writings of many early chriftians, and antient lif torians. Befides, how could it, in reason, be expected,, that chriftians fhould take any peculiar care of the writings of their adverfaries. If those fuppofed writings had contained any thing decifive against christianity, they would certainly (confider-ing the very great advantages under which they were written, for the space of three hundred years) have effectually prevented the fpread of christianity, and would have preferved themfelves; whereas the

univerfal

univerfal neglect into which they fell is, if any thing, an argument of their futility, and furnishes a reason why we should comfort ourselves for the lofs of them.

It has been faid, that if Chrift worked fo many miracles as the evangelical hiftory reprefents, healing all the difeafed that applied to him, and in three inftances raifing the dead, he must neceffarily have converted the whole Jewish nation, and all the ftrangers in the country; as it could not but be concluded, that a man who controlled the course of nature must have the concurrence and affiftance of the God of nature, and confequently a fuficient testimony of a divine miffion.

To this it is replied, that the preaching of Chrift feems to have had all the effect that it could be fuppofed to have had, admitting his divine miffion. Great numbers of those who were of an ingenuous difpofition, on whom evidence could produce its proper effect, did become the difciples of Christ, notwithstanding he perfifted in difclaiming all worldly honours, and that character which they imagined to be infeparable from the promised Mesfah; an effect which nothing but the fulleft and beft grounded conviction can be fuppofed to have produced.

With respect to the reft of the Jews, and efpecially the chief priests and rulers, it fhould be confidered how incredulous ftrong prejudices, and

especially

efpecially those which arife from vicious habits, ufually make men. It was with the bulk of the Jews a fixed, though an erroneous perfuafion, that the Meffiah would affume temporal power, and deHiver his country from the yoke of the Romans. This they imagined to be the specific character of the Meffiah, as deduced from prophecies which they were convinced came from God. To the evidence of miracles, therefore, they would oppofe that of the fcriptures, and, confequently, the miracles of Mofes and the prophets, with which they seemed to be irreconcilable; and this, joined to their vicious habits, which rendered them extremely averfe to the pure doctrines of the gospel, (having no idea that repentance was at all neceffary to their being intitled to the bleffings of the Meffiah's kingdom, which they thought belonged to all the children of Abraham) must have rendered them extremely obdurate, with respect to the evi-dence of the divine miffion of Christ; so that it is not to be wondered that fo many of them perfifted in their hatred and oppofition to him, notwithftanding all his miracles.

Unhappily, alfo, the Jews were at that time infected with the notion of the power of demons, and evil fpirits, and thought it poffible, that by a confederacy with them, Chrift might heal those difeafes which were usually afcribed to their power over mankind; and they had probably fome

fimilar

fimilar method of aecounting for the reft of his miracles.

After the Pharifees and rulers of the Jews had obferved how thoroughly exafperated Jefus was against them, how he exposed all their pride and hypocrify, and how little difpofed he was to fhew them any favour, it is no wonder that they were determined to reject him in any character, thinking the Romans better mafters than fuch a Meffiah as he would be with refpect to them. Thus their fears and their intereft together would lead them to oppofe Jefus at all events, whether he was the Meffiah or not. The more reasonable and confiderate among them might, however, be fatisfied that God could not contradict himself, and that it was more probable that they had mifinterpreted the fcriptures, than that the undeniable miracles of Jefus were not proofs of an authority to which they ought to fubmit,

With the modern Jews it should be a fufficient answer to this objection, that their ancestors frequently oppofed Mofes and the prophets, even perfecuting and killing some of them, notwithstanding their allowed character of messengers from God.

To affift us to form a right judgment in this cafe, let us confider what would be the probable effect of preaching against popery, even with the power of working miracles, in Spain or Portugal,

for