Empire, and made Men know, that the Arm of Flesh was a very inconsiderable Weapon to controul, or dethrone the Rulers of the Darkness of this World, and fcorned to give fuch a cowardly Oracle, as he did to Auguftus Cafar; Me Puer Hebræus, &c. The Hebrew Boy doth drive me out, and commands me Silence.

I find, where-ever this Gospel came, the Devil fled away; this deftroyed his Service, Priests, and Altars, and the Gates of Hell could not withstand it; nor can I fee which way the Gofpel could have effected all this, without its Power and Efficacy had been Divine.

I read, what ftrange alterations it made upon all Peoples Tempers, Difpofitions, and Affections,who embraced it; what fhould make fo many great Men, fo many fubtil Philofophers, fo many learned Men, fo many Sages, Men of the greatest Wit, and Judgment,and Apprehenfion, both in the Eastern and Western Empire, yield and submit to it, and throw away their vain Philofophical Learning, and humble themselves to the Cross of Chrift, except they had seen the Stamp of God upon it? I find, that the greatest Orators, and Logicians, and the ableft Difputants, that came with an intent to deride it, were captivated, and conquered by it, and fubmitted to its Laws and Doctrines; and as unlearned, and unskilful, as the Men were that defended it against their Subtilty, yet they were forced to yield to them; and to cry out, That they were overcome, and baffled. The change it wrought upon Peoples Spirits, was wondrous ftrange; the Cholerick, the Envious, the Drunk

S 4

Drunkard, the Fornicator, the Adulterer, the Worldling, the Oppreffor, the Timorous, the Pufilanimous, were on a fudden transformed into Love, Meeknefs, Sobriety, Chastity, Tempe rance, Charity, Liberality, Fortitude, and Magnanimity; and they that before trembled at the thoughts of Fire and wild Beafts, offered themfelves to Flames, and took it ill, if they were put by, and deprived of the Honour of Riding in fuch Fiery Chariots to Heaven.

Nay, I fee at this day, how wonderfully it works on the Souls of Men, makes them act against their natural Inclinations, without any profpect of temporal Intereft, go against the Biafs of their Corruptions, and ftop in their Career to Hell; which they were running to with most eager appetite. I fee how it makes them hate that evil company they formerly delighted in, and how infipid it renders all the Jefts of their old Affociates; how it makes them love their Enemies, do good to them that hate them, pray for them that perfecute them, and defpitefully ufe them; how it makes them live above Senfe, and feek their greatest fatisfaction in the Ways and Ordinances of God. In a word, how from Beafts it changes them into Men; and from Men into more than Men. And what can I afcribe all this to, but to a Divine Spirit, that by this Gospel fubdues the Hearts, and brings the Lufts and AffeAtions of Men into Obedience to Chrift Jefus: And tho' there be Religious Men among other Sects, as Jews, Heathens and Mahometans, yet is their Piety rather outward than inward; and whatever fhew they may make

of

of Self-denials and Mortifications, their Hearts are not changed all the while by force of their Doctrines, which yet we fee daily practised in our Chriftian Congregations, whereof none can give fo good an account as Divines that difcourfe People about their Spiritual Concerns.

He that shall take fuch Arguments as thefe into ferious Confideration, may eafily fatisfie himfelf, that in these Volumes is contained the true Will of God; at least, that this, of all things extant, is most likely to be the Will of God, nothing in Nature having thofe Circumftances, and Characters, and Teftimonies of a Divine Original, as the Rules contained in thefe Books we call the Bible have; and whatever feeming Contradictions and Tautologies may be found there, to a confiderate Man it would appear, that as long as the main thing, the true way to Happiness, is fecured, fuch accidental things, as frequency of the fame Expreffions, and Chronological Mistakes, committed by the various Transcribers, may be paffed by without offence: That many things which have feem'd Contradictions, upon examination of the Customs and Circumftances of the Age thefe Books were written in, have been found no Contradictions; and that thus it may be in all the reft, if we knew all thofe ways of speaking and reckoning, and naming things, and all the Proverbial Expreffions then in ufe; That in the fubftantial things of these Books there hath been no alteration or corruption, for fo many Ages together; and that the plain way of Writing ufed here, and repeating the fame things often, doth but argue honest

Simplicity, and want of Guile, and Unwillingnefs, to impose upon the World in those that have written thofe Books; and that though fome Paffages recorded in them seem to us fuperfluous, and needlefs, as that of Jacob, and Rachel, and Leah, yet the Sacred Writer might have peculiar and very weighty Reasons for it, and design it as an Allegory, to represent fome other Mystery, as we fee St. Paul affirms of Abraham, and Sarah, and Hagar, Gal. 4.24.

And as Confideration would chase away Infidelity of this nature, fo the want of it, we find, makes Men Sots and Beafts, and talk against things they understand not, and cavil at things moft Sacred, and full of Reason, and Majesty. This is it makes them break Jefts on that which they ought to bow to, and fpeak lightly of those Mysteries which require and challenge their greatest Veneration,

This, 2dly, is the Reafon which makes the fenfual Man queftion another World. He confiders not what a Divine Angelical Spirit is within him, nor how improbable it is that the Rational part of himself (a thing certainly diftin&t from his Body, and which confifts not of Matter capable of Čorruption, and can voluntarily move it self, and think, which Matter cannot do) should perish as the Beasts of the Field, would he but confider how this Notion of an After-retribution is spread all the foberer World over; and tho' all do not agree in the manner of the Souls furviving, fome being for Tranfmigration, as Pythagoras, and the Brachmanes

in the Indies; others, for its acting in an airy Vehicle during the ftate of Separation; yet moft agree in this, whatever doubtful Expreffions might drop from Socrates, Seneca, and others, That it's fenfible either of God's Love, or heavy Displeasure, and its Nature immortal: And certainly this Notion must have a begin ning; fomething or other did occafion it in Mens Minds; the ufual Plea, that Politicians did invent it to reftrain Men from fecret Villanies which they faw prefent Punishments would not do, feems to be ftrangely impertinent; for not to mention that there was never any Hiftory in the World that we could hear of, that gave us an account of fuch a thing, or of the beginning of it, we cannot fuppofe that thefe Politicians, if they were wife Men, and expected to fee the Fruit of their Labours, would ever have adventured to plant this Notion of a future Judgment in Mens Underftandings, had not they either believed, and been perfwaded that there was a poffibility of fuch an After-retribution, and that the Notion was very fuitable and agreeable to Man's Reafon; or obferved, that there was in moft Men a very great inclination to believe it, else they might as well have perfwaded the World that Black is White, or that it's better to be blind than to fee; Maxims, which would have expofed them to fcorn and contempt. And whence fhould this fuitablénefs of the Notion to Man's Reason, or that eafie clofing of the Soul with the Notion, or Mens readiness to embrace the Notion upon the first hearing of it, come?