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probably known what it is to doubt; and has perhaps been offended at certain writers, who are incapable of owning or of feeling a difficulty, and who convince none, except those that stand in no need of conviction, and to some of whom it might be said, "Urbem proditis, dum castella defenditis :' but here is a prophecy, and here is a completion, to which if we can make no reasonable objection, we ought to admit the gospel of Jesus Christ, and to endeavour to know and to do his sacred will, accounting this to be the best foundation of our present hopes, and of our future happiness.

If the illustrious and most important prophecy which I have considered, and some others which shall be mentioned, have been evidently delivered, and evidently accomplished; and if the miracles of Christ and of his apostles may be proved, as I shall endeavour to show; it is a fair consequence, that Christianity is a true religion, and that it cannot be made false or ambiguous by any arguments drawn from the notions, or from the behaviour of believers after the times of the apostles.

Much may be said, and something shall be offered in behalf of the Fathers and Christians of the three first centuries, who suffered so greatly for so good a cause; and whose abilities, if they are overvalued by some, are as much depreciated by others. No Christian would willingly give them up in any point, where there is room to defend them but the imperfections and mistakes from which they were not free, (and who is free?) and their credulity in some things, and in ages which were not critical,-and a kind of credulity, to which an honest man, as such, is more liable than a crafty impostor, can never invalidate the proofs internal and external of the truth of Christianity.

The confirming and settling these great points, upon which our faith is founded, without a view to any particular systems and controversies, as it is the most agreeable employment to an ingenuous mind, so is it usually the most disinterested of all occupations. Whosoever is resolved to employ his hours and his labour in this manner, should consider himself as one who lays out his fortunes in mending the highways: many are benefited, and few are obliged. If he escape obloquy it is very well:

-Triumpho, si licet me latere tecto abscedere.

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I have only this to add concerning the present subject, that Christ having said of the city and temple, one stone shall not be left upon another,' learned men have taken pains to show that this was exactly and literally fulfilled, either under Vespasian, or under Adrian, or in the time of Julian.

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If any one should be of opinion that they have not proved this point, I desire he would observe that the words are proverbial and figurative, and only denote utter ruin and desolation, and would have been truly accomplished, though every single stone had not been overturned; as a house or city is said κατασκαφῆναι, when it is destroyed, though its foundations be not digged up.

Malachi, foretelling the destruction of Jerusalem, says, The day cometh that shall burn as an oven, and all the proud, yea and all that do wickedly shall be stubble: and the day that cometh shall burn them up, saith the Lord of hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branch." iv. 1.

This was truly accomplished, though every unconverted Jew did not perish in that general calamity. Proverbial sayings are not mathematical axioms.

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δύναται

Eusebius, mentioning the prophecy of Micah, Zion shall be ploughed as a field,' iii. 12. says, Ei yev Ti duvara καὶ ἡ ἡμετέρα ἱτορία, καθ ̓ ἡμᾶς αὐτὲς τὴν πάλαι βιωμένην Σιὼν ζεύγεσι βοῶν ὑπὸ Ῥωμαίων ἀνδρῶν ἀρεμένην ὀφθαλμοῖς παρειλήφαμεν, καὶ τήν γε Ἱερεσαλήμ, ὡς αὐτό γέ φησι τὸ λόγιον, οπωροφυλακίε δίκην ἀπολειφθέντος, ἐν παντελεῖ κατασᾶσαν ἐρημία. "Quod si quidquam nostra quoque historia valet, nostris ipsorum temporibus, illam antiquitus celebratam Sion junctis bubus a Romanis viris arari, nostris oculis inspeximus, et ipsam Hierusalem, quemadmodum ipsum hoc ait oraculum, instar pomorum custodia desertæ, ad extremam redactam solitudinem.' Dem. Evang. v. 273.

Eusebius was bishop of Cæsarea, and lived near enough to have frequent opportunities of viewing the ruins of Jeru salem, and in them the completion of Christ's predictions.

The wordsμrga isogía mean, the knowledge and the testimony of what we have seen ourselves;' and the Latin tongue has no single word which exactly answers to this sense of isogía.

Herodotus begins his book thus, Ηροδότε Αλικαρνασ σκος ιςορίης απόδεξις ήδε which James Gronovius translates, 'Herodoti Halicarnassensis cura demonstratio hæc est.' But this interpretation stands in need of another. Kuster thus explains the place: Notandum est isogíny non solum denotare historiam, sive rerum gestarum narrationem, vel descriptionem; sed etiam, et quidem proprie, cognitionem rerum quas vel oculis ipsi lustravimus, vel ex aliis sciscitando didicimus; vel studium res varias, eo quo diximus, modo cognoscendi. Et quoniam primi et antiquissimi historici vix alias res memoriæ prodere poterant, quam quas vel ipsi vidissent, vel ex aliis sciscitati essent, hinc recte et proprio sensu dicebantur isognoí. Postea vero latius, ut fieri solet, extensâ vocis ejus significatione, etiam quicumque alii rerum gestarum scriptores eodem nomine simplici ter appellari cœperunt. Prooemium Historia Herodoteæ Latine sic verterim: Rerum ab Herodoto Halicarnassensi curiose observatarum specimen hoc est.' Vel per longiorem periphrasin Curiositatis, quam Herodotus adhibuit, in rebus, quas narrat, vel lustrandis, vel sciscitandis, specimen, vel argumentum, hoc est.'

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Le Clerc thinks that ἱςορίης απόδεξις may be rendered: "Quod in historiâ præstitit. But, however, the observations of Kuster upon the word isogin are just and true. See Le Clerc, Bibl. A. & M. V. 385. 'Heodórs isogins απόδεξις ήδε, ὡς μήτε— Herodotus res a se observatas et investigatas edidit, ut neque' &c.

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I Now proceed to make some remarks on prophecy in general; and then on the prophecies of the Old Testament relating to our Saviour.

That God foreknows even all the future actions of men, is what the holy scriptures most evidently suppose and prove, and what the bulk of mankind in all ages have believed.

This opinion arose probably, not so much from arguments drawn from the divine perfections, as from experience, tradition, and revelation.

It appears in sacred history, that God almighty from the most antient times revealed himself to men by foretelling future events; which is prophecy.

The uses of prophecy, besides gradually opening and unfolding the things relating to the Messias, and the blessings which by him should be conferred upon mankind, are many, and great, and manifest.

1. It served to secure the belief of a God and of a Providence.

As God is invisible and spiritual, there was cause to fear that in the first and ruder ages of the world, when men were busier in cultivating the earth than in cultivating arts and sciences, and in seeking the necessaries of life than in the study of morality, they might forget their Creator and governor; and therefore God maintained amongst them the great article of faith in him, by manifestations of himself; by sending angels to declare his will; by miracles, and by prophecies.

These were barriers against atheism.

2. It was intended to give men the profoundest veneration for that amazing knowledge from which nothing was concealed, not even the future actions of creatures, and the things which as yet were not. How could a man hope to hide any counsel, any design, or thought, from such a being?

3. It contributed to keep up devotion and true religion, the religion of the heart, which consists partly in entertaining just and honourable notions of God and of his perfections, and which is a more rational and a more acceptable service than rites and ceremonies.

4. It excited men to rely upon God, and to love him, who condescended to hold this mutual intercourse with his creatures, and to permit them to consult him, as one friend asks advice of another.

5. It was intended to keep the people, to whom God revealed himself, from idolatry: a sin to which the Jews would be inclined, both from the disposition to it which they had acquired in Egypt, and from the contagion of bad example.

The people of Israel were strictly forbidden to consult the diviners, and the gods of other nations, and to use any enchantments and wicked arts; and that they might have no temptation to it, God permitted them to apply to him and to his prophets, even upon small occasions; and he

raised up amongst them a succession of prophets, to wh they might have resort for advice and direction. These prophets were reverenced abroad as well as at home, and consulted by foreign princes; and in the times of the сарtivity they were honoured by great kings, and advanced to high stations.

Man has a strong desire to look forward, and to know things to come. This desire, if it be discreetly governed, is natural and innocent; and there are several things which it would be of great temporal benefit and advantage to foresee. For example:

Man would be glad to know how he may shun a future evil.

Thus, Noah was warned to build an ark, in which he and his family should be saved from the flood: thus Lot was commanded to flee from Sodom, with his wife and daughters thus David was told to escape from a strong hold where he dwelt, and afterwards from Keilah: thus, in the pagan world, Socrates, as his disciples Plato and Xenophon affirm, had a dæmon, or good genius, who never exhorted him to any thing, but dissuaded him from such things as would prove hurtful; by which secret warning he is said often to have preserved himself and his friends, and to have given them advice, which if they followed not, they constantly found cause to repent.

See a Dissertation of Olearius in Stanley's Historia Philosophiæ, and Le Clerc Bibl. Chois. xxii. p. 426. xxiii. p. 226. and Silv. Philol. c. iii. Olearius and Le Clerc believed that Socrates had such a dæmon; and I confess myself so far a fanatic as to incline to the same opinion, but without blaming those who are of another mind. When Socrates, just before he expired, ordered his friend to offer up a cock to Esculapius, it is possible that he was delirious through the poison which he had taken, as a learned and ingenious physician observed to me.

Scribonius Largus says, • Cicutam ergo potam caligo, mentisque alienatio, et artuum gelatio insequitur: ultimoque præfocantur, qui eam sumserunt, nihilque sentiunt.' Compos. 179.

To this head belong sundry prophecies containing a double fate, if you will permit the expression, which should

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