great mifapplication therefore of this Court of the Gentiles, to ufe it for Tables of Money-Changers and for Seats of them that fold Doves, and for Droves of Sheep and Oxen, which St. Fobn iii. 15. tells us were brought in There, and for which no doubt there were Folds and Stalls to inclofe them, and fepa. rate the Cattle of the feveral Proprietors; and if we confider what Prodigious Numbers of all these there must have been in that Court (for Jofephus (t) fays that at one Paffover Ceftius computed near three Millions who came there to celebrate it, exclufive of all thofe Profelytes who came there to Worship only,) it will be eafily conceiv'd how much the Place allotted to the Gentiles for Worship must have been crowded and the Room leffen'd; which furely was a great Indecency: but it was a Profanation of it too, because in the midst of the Bleatings of the Sheep, and the Lowings of the Oxen, and the Hurry and Buftle, neceffarily occafion'd by the other fort of Merchandise, the Gentile Profelytes were fure to meet with no fmall Disturbance in their Devotions; and therefore this Practice of the Jews was a defeating (as far as they could) the accomplishment of Isaiah's Prophecy.

BUT the Cafe was ftill worfe; for it seems Probable, that the Captains of the Temple, who were Officers that had the Care and Charge of it, let out that part of the Court of the Gentiles for Profit and Advantage; and that the Sellers, to make themfelves amends for what they paid for their Shops and Stalls, made an Unjuft and Exorbitant Gain. This however we are Sure of, that there was an Unrighteous Traffick carry'd on there, for our Saviour (as three of the Evangelifts, who relate the Fact, affure us) did not charge them with having made the Temple a Place of Merchants only, but a Den of Thieves. In the former Cafe if there was only an Indecency, yet in This at leaft it must be allowed, that there was a Profanation of the Temple or Court of the Gentiles.

2 §. I proceed then to the 2d Objection, which was, How Jefus (if there was a Profanation) could have executed this work of driving them out of the Temple. It is hard to conceive (fays Mr. W. p. 22.) how any one in the Form of a Man and of a Defpis'd one too, (and we don't read that Jefus chang'd •his Shape,) with a Whip in his Hand, could execute fuch a Work upon a great Multitude of People, who were none of them his Difciples, nor had any Regard for him. And he quotes a Modern Author as thinking This the most ftupendous Miracle that Jefus wrought. He that thought fo, we know, was St. Jerome, juft as much a Modern Author as Mr. W. is one of the Primitive ones, or fpeaks their Sentiments: But I will let him fee, how it may

(t) De Bello Jud. ii. c. 14. §. 3. p. 1078. & vi. c. 9. §. 3. p. 1291.' Edit. Hudson.

be

be conceived, that Jefus was plainly able to do what he is faid to have done, in a Natural way, and without the Help of any Divine Power.

AND here it must be remembred, that Jefus was juft come up from Bethany to Jerufalem in a Solemn Proceffion, in a fort of Royal and Triumphant manner: He was attended on the Road and into the City with a very great Multitude (Matt. xxi. 8.), nay with Multitudes that went before and follow'd, ver. 9. and These went along with him into the Temple (as may be (u) gather'd from ver. 15.), and there proclaim'd as they had done on the Road, Hofanna to the Son of David, which was one of the Names of the Meftah. The Concourfe was fo great, that all the City was moved, ver. 10. and even the Chief Priests were afraid of him and of the People too, because they took him for a Prophet, and were very attentive to hear him, Mat. xxi. 46. Mark xi. 18. Luke xix. 48. and xx. 19. So that in what he did to the Buyers and Sellers in the Temple, he is not to be confider'd as One fingle Man only, but as at the Head of an Infinite Number of People, all acknowledging him at that time for their Meffiah and King, and therefore ready to fupport him in any Reformation that he should attempt. The Traders then might well have retir'd for fear of him whom the Chief Priefts them

(z) The Words are, When the Chief Priefts and Scribes faw the wonderful Works that he did, and the waifas Children crying in the Temple, and faying Hofanna to the Son of David, they were fore dif pleafed. Where by raidas is not meant Children, as we render it, but Fefus's Servants and Followers, thofe of his Train and Retinue. Thus Matt. xiv. z. Herad faid to his Servants masiv, &c. and Luke xii. 45. If that Servant fay in his Heart, My Lord delayeth his com• ing, and fhall begin to beat the men-servants, Tas radas: and fo Luke xv. 26. from which Inftances I gather that wadas here fignifies those who were the Difciples, Servants, or Fellowers of Jefus at that time: And what the Pharifees faid in the following verfe, Heareft thou what these fay ? feems to be the fame with what they say on this occafion in Luke xix. 39. Mafter, rebuke thy Difciples. If the two Evangelifis fpeak of two different times, yet the Pharifees feem to have defir'd him to rebuke the fame Perfons in both the Evangelifts. It is fcarcely to be fuppos'd, that only Children cry'd out Hofanna in the Temple, or that the Pharifees were fo difpleas'd with what Children only were faying. Befides, the word waïdes does never in the New Teftament fignify Children, unless once or twice at moft, and then the Age of them is fpecify'd; the proper word is rasia or raudápie. What led our Tranflators to give the word this fenfe here, is (I conceive) the Anfwer that our Saviour makes, Out of the mouth of Babes and Sucklings thou haft perfected praife; but the meaning of this is, God has chofen for the praifing of him Babes and Sucklings in Knowledge, not with respect to their Years; for Sucklings, that cannot fpeak, cannot perfect praise. See Matt. xi. 25. where Babes are oppos'd to Wife and Prudent.

felves

felves feared, as having fuch Multitudes in his Retinue and at his Command: They did but what was Natural; they gave way to a Superior Force, which it would have been in vain to have Refifted.

IT is Eafy now to conceive, how Jefus could do this: he was not Then in the Form of a Defpis'd man, but rather of a Triumphant Monarch; he was attended with a much greater Multitude of People than there was to oppofe him, a Multitude of People who were all his Difciples and Followers at that time, and who had the greatest Regard for him that men could poffibly have, they looking on him as their Meffiah.

I would not be understood, by what I have faid above, to mean that there was no Miracle in this whole Affair; for tho there may have been none, where Mr. W. and his Modern Aus thor place it, yet there Seems to have been one (tho' the Evan gelifts don't call it fo) in the Unanimous Difpofition of the People at That time to proclaim Jefus by the Title of the Son of David or Meffiab.

THE Fame of his having raised Lazarus from the Dead a little before went a great way, 'tis true, (John xii. 18.) towards filling Mens minds with this Belief; but yet fo Univerfal, fo Sudden, and withal fo Short-liv'd an Acknowledgment of Such a Point, looks more like the Effect of a Divine Impulse than of any Natural Causes.

3 §. THE third Objection was this; If Jefus could do this yet was it not a Needlefs work to be fo Zealous against the Profanation of that Temple which was fo foon to be Deftroy'd? No, because it was not Then Destroy'd; for is not every Place, that is fet apart for Divine Worship, to be kept Sacred and Fit for that Ufe, while it is Subfifting? In fuch a Cafe we are to confider what things are Now, not what they are Hereafter to be: for what would have been a Profanation of the Temple, if it had been always to laft, was equally Profanation of it, tho' it was to be foon Deftroy'd; the Action is the Same under both Events, and is not in the leaft Alter'd by the Fate of the Place where it is done. 'Tis Ridiculous to talk, or think otherwife. If any Man had Profan'd the Parish Church of St Botolph Bishopf gate about four Years ago, and had been Prefented for it by the Church-wardens of that Parish, would it have been thought a Reasonable Question to ask, Why thofe Church-wardens were fo Zealous against the Profanation of that Church, which they were then getting an Act of Parliament to impower them to pull down and Destroy? While a Place ftands appropriated to Divine Worship, it ought not to be Profan'd; This is the Anfwer which every Lawyer and every Man of Common Senfe would give on this occafion. And therefore the Court of the Gentiles, which was a Houfe of Prayer, ought to have been kept Free and Undifturbed

difturbed for that purpofe, as long as it continued to be a House of Prayer, that is, 'till it was Deftroy'd.

I have not here forgot that Mr. W pufhes this matter farther, and fays that Jefus himself came to Deftroy the Temple, and that he permitted, nay commanded it to be filthily Polluted not long after, p. 23. and this he mentions to make the Inconfiftence (as he thinks it) the Greater: But where does he read any thing Like this? which of the Evangelifts told him, that Jefus either came to Deftroy it, or commanded it to be polluted? fefus told the Jews indeed in Mark xiii. 4. that they would fee the Abomination of Defolation, but then he adds, that they would fee it ftanding where it ought not, i. e. in the Holy place. Now this is only a Declaration of what would happen, and it is obfervable that this Declaration is fo far from being in Favour of Polluting the Temple, that it is directly Against it. Befides, if he had commanded it to be done, when the Temple was de ftroy'd, i. e. almost forty Years after his Death, then, when he' commanded it, he must have been Alive again and Rifen from the Dead. Did This Author confider this when he oppos'd Jefus's Refurrection? What? Not Revive, and yet Act? I fee that for the fake of an Objection to One Miracle, he can for a while allow the Truth of another.

I have now answer'd all his Objections, and I hope to the Reader's Satisfaction. As for his Quotations from the Fathers, I have no mind to lengthen this Difcourfe with any Enquiry into them: for tho' it is True, that fome of them affected to give a Spiritual and Mystical Sense to This and almost all our Saviour's Actions; yet it is as True, that not one of them ever Deny'd or Doubted of the Literal Story, except when He makes them fpeak; nay the very thing, which he has brought to prove them Unbelievers of the Letter, fhews the Direct contrary; for to make any Action a Mystical one, you must neceffarily allow it to be a Literal one too; it may as well be faid that there are Properties without a Substance, as that there can be a Figure without the Letter, except in Parables. I fhall therefore pafs by all his Scraps of the Fathers, for every Single one of which an Hundred might be found in the fame Author, that exprefly contradict what he is labouring to prove. He knows it very well, and therefore has all along made ufe of the Unfair and Difhoneft Arts of Mifreprefenting, and Curtailing the Paffages of the Fathers; fometimes leaving out in a Sentence what speaks against him, and fometimes bringing Sentences together which have no Relation to one another. Some Inftances I have given already, and fhall here present the Reader with One more. At the bottom of p. 26. he quotes St. Jerome thus, Juxta fimplicem Intelligentiam

quod penitus abfurdum, &c. and explains them above by making That Father fay, there are abfurdities in the Letter. But let St. Jerome's words be fairly produced, and they will run

thus,

thus, (x) According to the Literal Senfe the Doves were not in the Seats (Chairs) but in Coops; unless perhaps the Sellers of the Doves fat in Chairs, which is wholly abfurd to fay, for Chairs are Marks of Honour to diftinguish Masters and Teachers. This Fa ther, as many Others did on other words, quibbled (poorly enough) upon the word Cathedra, by which is meant in the Gofpels the Seats of them that fold Doves, but which He applied to the Chairs, that the Teachers of the Chriftian Church then us'd, as We do our Pulpits: and the Abfurdity, which St. Jerome finds, is in the fuppofing that the Sellers of Doves fat in fuch Cathedre, as the Teachers of his Days made ufe of. He does not fay a word of any Abfurdity in the Letter, or Literal Account of Jefus's Action; tho' by dropping the Greatest and moft Material part of the Sentence Mr. W. has contriv'd to make the Words which is wholly abfurd to feem understood of the Literal Senfe. If fuch Authors as He did not feek for Truth, if they fought only to eftablish Falfhood, yet methinks they fhould avoid a Fraud fo eafily detected, and (to ufe Archbishop Tillotson's Words) should be Honester than This comes to, out of very Knavery.

BUT before he leaves this Head, he attempts to play the Critick on the Senfe of the words, in which the Evangelifts relate this Action of Jefus: and here he seems to improve in his happy Art of making the Authors he quotes bear False witness, for tho he Miftakes as ufual, he Falfifies rather more.

INSTEAD of them that fold and bought (fays he, p. 30) it fhould be rendred them that fold and preached; for the word ay spálew doth more properly fignify to preach than to buy. It is fo far from fignifying this more properly, that it does not either in the New Teftament, or (I believe) in any Author, fignify fo at all. The word is ufed above thirty times in the New Teftament, and let him fhew where it can once be understood of preaching: When it is faid, Luke xvii. 28. of that wicked Generation, who would not hearken to Noah the Preacher of Righteoufnefs, and upon whom therefore the Flood came, They did eat, they drank, they fold, they nyogo are we to fuppose that they were preaching? or when the Wife Virgins faid to the Foolish ones, Matth. xxv. 9. Go ye to them that fell, and ayorgσATE EQUтais, can we think their Advice to have been, that they fhould preach to themfelves?Is this Criticifm?

BUT then he has found a new Senfe for Κολλυβιςαί, or Mo ney-Changers; the Greek word (fays he p. 31.) imports those who have a Knack to barter away a little Bafe and Brass Money with the Effigies of an Ox or Bull on it, in exchange for good Coin.

(x) Fuxta fimplicem Intelligentiam Columbæ non erant in Cathedris, fed in Caveis; nifi forte Columbarum inftitores fedebant in Cathedris : quod penitus abfurdum eft, quia in Cathedris Magiftrorum magis Dignitas indicatur. Hieron. in Matt. xxi.

And