Talmud, which was sundry years after his death. But here the Romanists fail us; for although they have given us "heaps upon heaps" of their traditions, by the means afore mentioned, yet they plead that they have still an inexhaustible treasure of them, laid up in their church stores and breast of their holy father, to be drawn forth at all times, as occasion shall require.

And thus have we taken a brief prospect of the consent of both the apostatical churches in that principle which hath been the means of their apostasy, and is the great engine whereby they are rendered incurable therein.

EXERCITATION VIII.

THE FIRST DISSERTATION CONCERNING THE MESSIAH, PROVING HIM TO BE PROMISED OF OLD.

1. Principles presupposed in the apostle's discourse in his Epistle to the HebrewsFirst, a Messiah promised from the foundation of the world. 2, 3. Of the evil that is in the world. 4. Of sin and punishment-Original and entrance of them. 5. Ignorance of mankind about them. 6. The sin and fall of Adam-Their consequents. 7. Jews' opinion about the sin of Adam; also of the curse and corruption of nature. 8-12. Their sense of both at large evinced. 13. God not unjust if all mankind had perished in this condition. 14. Instance of the sin and punishment of angels-Difference between the sin of angels and man -Angels lost, mankind relieved. 15. Evidences of that deliverance. 16. How attainable-Not by men themselves; 17. Not by angels; 18. Nor by the law -That proved against the Jews. 19. Their fable of the law made before the world, with the occasion of it-The patriarchs saved before the giving of the law. 20. Observation of the moral precepts of the law no means of relief; 21. Nor the sacrifices of it. 22. The new covenant-God the author of it -How to be accomplished. 23, 24. The first promise of it, Gen. iii. 15, discussed. 25. Sense of the Jews upon it manifested; 26, 27. Examined. 28. Promise of a deliverer, the foundation of all religion in the world. 29. The promise renewed unto Abraham, Gen. xii. 1-3-Nature of it as given unto him. 30-33. Testified unto and confirmed-Gen. xlix. 10; Num. xxiv. 17, 19; Job xix. 25, opened; with sundry other places-End of the separation of the posterity of Abraham unto a peculiar people and church. 34. This deliverer, the Messiah-Denotation of the word-The person who.

1. WE proceed now unto our principal intendment in all these discourses, which is, the consideration and discussion of those great principles, as of all religion in general, so of the Christian in particular, which the apostle supposeth as a foundation of his whole treaty [reasoning] with the Hebrews, and which are the basis that he stands upon in the management of his whole design. For in all discourses that are parenetical, as this Epistle for the most part is, there are always some principles taken for granted, which give life and efficacy unto the exhortations in them, and whereinto they are resolved. For, as to persuade men unto particulars in faith, opinion, or prac

tice, without a previous conviction of such general principles of truth as from which the persuasions used do naturally flow and arise, is a thing weak and inefficacious; so to be exercised in the demonstration of the principles themselves, when the especial end aimed at is to persuade, would bring confusion into all discourse.

Wherefore, although our apostle do assert and confirm those dogmata and articles of truth which he dealt with the Hebrews in a way of persuasion to embrace, yet he supposeth and takes for granted those more general xupías doğas, or first maxims, which are the foundation both of the doctrines and exhortations insisted on, as all skill in teaching doth require. And these are those which now we aim to draw forth and consider, being these that follow:

First, That there was a Messiah, or Saviour of mankind from sin and punishment, promised upon, and from, the first entrance of sin into the world, in whom all acceptable worship of God was to be founded, and in whom all the religion of the sons of men was to centre.

Secondly, That this Messiah, long before promised, was now actually exhibited in the world, and had finished the work committed unto him, when the apostle wrote this Epistle.

Thirdly, That Jesus of Nazareth was this Messiah, and that what he had done and suffered was the work and duty promised of old concerning him.

There is not a line in the Epistle to the Hebrews that doth not virtually begin and end in these principles,—not an assertion, not a doctrine, not an exhortation, that is not built on this triple foundation. They are also the great verities τῆς ὁμολογίας Χριστιανής, of the Christian profession or religion. A sincere endeavour, therefore, in their explanation and vindication,-especially in these days, wherein as on the one hand there are various thoughts of heart about the Jews, their present condition and expectation, so on the other there are many who are ready with a presumptuous boldness άzívsα XIVE, and to call in question the fundamentals of all religion,—may not be unacceptable. Now, the first of these principles is, at this day, by several vain imaginations, obscured by the Jews, to their utter loss of all benefit by it, and hath been so for many generations; although it was the life and soul of the religion of their forefathers, as shall be demonstrated; and the two latter are by them expressly denied, and maliciously contended against. Here, then, we shall fix and confirm these principles, in the order wherein we have laid them down, declaring on every one of them the conceptions and persuasions of the Jews concerning the promised Messiah; removing, in the close, their objections against the faith of Christians in this matter, in a peculiar Exercitation to that purpose. And the confirmation and vindication of the first of these principles is that which our present discourse is designed unto.

2. Besides the testimony of God himself in his word, we have a concurrent suffrage from the whole creation, that man in the beginning was formed, as in the image, so in the favour of God, and unto his glory. And as he was not liable unto any evil which is the effect of God's displeasure, nor defective in any good necessary to preserve him in the condition wherein he was made, so he was destitute of nothing that was any way requisite to carry him on unto that further enjoyment of God whereunto he was designed, Gen. i. 26, 31, Eccles. vii. 29. For God, being infinitely good, wise, righteous, and powerful, creating man to know, love, honour, and enjoy him, and thereby to glorify those holy properties of his nature which exerted themselves in his creation (which that he did, the nature of those intellectual perfections wherewith he endowed him doth undeniably evince), it was utterly impossible that either he should not delight in the work of his own hands, the effect of his own wisdom and power, or not furnish him with those faculties and abilities by which he might answer the ends of his creation. To suppose a failure in any of these, is contrary to the prime dictates of reason; for infinite wisdom can do nothing in vain, nothing not perfectly suited unto the end whereunto it is designed. Neither can infinite goodness allow of any defect in aught that proceedeth from it: Gen. i. 31, "God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good." Hence many philosophers saw, and granted, that the first cause in the production of all things did id ßadil, proceed by such a certain reason and way as that every thing might, both in itself and with reference unto its own especial end, and also in relation unto the universe, have its proper rectitude and goodness, sufficient unto its station and condition. This idòs the Scripture calls Βουλὴν τοῦ θελήματος τοῦ Θεοῦ, Eph. i. 11,— The counsel of the will of God;" expressing a contemperation of absolute sovereignty and infinite wisdom. And these uncontrollable notions of nature, or reason, cast men of old into their entanglements about the original of evil: for this they plainly saw, that it must be accidental and occasional; but where to fix that occasion they knew not. Those who, to extricate themselves out of this difficulty, fancied two supreme principles or causes, the one author of all good, the other of all evil, were ever exploded, as persons bidding defiance unto all principles of reason, whereby we are distinguished from the beasts that perish. This, I say, men generally discerned, that evil, wherein it now lies, could not have entered into the world without a disturbance of that harmony wherein all things at the beginning were constituted by infinite wisdom and goodness, and some interruption of that dependence on God from whence it did proceed.

The very first apprehensions of the nature of God and the condition of the universe declare that man was formed free from sin,

which is his voluntary subduction of himself from under the government of his Maker; and free from trouble, which is the effect of his displeasure on that subduction or deviation;-in which two the whole nature of evil consisteth: so that it must have some other original.

3. Furthermore; in this first effort of immense power did God glorify himself, as in the wisdom and goodness wherewith it was accompanied, so also in that righteousness whereby, as the supreme rector and governor of all, he allotted unto his rational creatures the law of their obedience, annexing a reward thereunto in a mixture of justice and bounty; for, that obedience should be rewarded is of justice, but that such a reward should be proposed unto the temporary obedience of a creature as is the eternal enjoyment of God, was of mere grace and bounty. And that things should have continued in the state and condition wherein they were created, I mean as unto mankind, supposing an accomplishment of the obedience prescribed unto them, is manifest from the very first notions we have of the nature of God: for we do no sooner conceive that he is, but withal we assent that "he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him," Heb. xi. 6; which is essential unto him, and inseparable from his nature as the sovereign ruler of the works of his hands. And thus was the continuance of this blessed state of the creation of all things provided for, and laid in a tendency unto further glory, being absolutely exclusive of any distance between God and man, besides that which is natural, necessary, and infinite, from their beings. There was no sin on the one side, nor disfavour on the other. And this secured the order of the universe; for what should cause any confusion there whilst the law of its creation was observed, which could not be transgressed by brute and inanimate creatures?

4. That this estate of things hath been altered from time immemorial; that there is a corrupt spring of sin and disorder in the nature of man; that the whole world lieth in ignorance, darkness, evil, and confusion; that there is an alienation and displeasure between God and mankind, God revealing his wrath and judgments from heaven, whence at first nothing might be expected but fruits of goodness and pledges of love, and man naturally dreading the presence of God and trembling at the effects of it, which at first was his life, joy, and refreshment,-reason itself, with prudent observation, will discover; it hath done so unto many contemplative men of old. "The whole creation groaneth" out this complaint, as the apostle witnesseth, Rom. viii. 20, 22; and God makes it manifest in his judgments every day, chap. i. 18. That things were not made at first in that state and condition wherein now they are, that they came not thus immediately from the hand of infinite wisdom and goodness, is easily discernible. God made not man to be at a perpetual quarrel with him, nor to fill the world with tokens of his displeasure

because of sin. This men saw of old by the light of nature; but what it should be that opened the flood-gates unto all that evil and sin which they saw and observed in the world, they could not tell. The springs of it, indeed, they searched after; but with more vanity and disappointment than those who sought for the heads of the Nile. The evils they saw were catholic and unlimited, and therefore not to be assigned unto particular causes; and of any general one proportioned unto their production they were utterly ignorant. And this ignorance filled all their wisdom and science with fatal mistakes, and rendered the best of their discoveries but mere, uncertain, conjectures. Yea, the poets, who followed the confused rumours of old traditions about things whose original was occasional and accidental, give us a better shadow of truth than the philosophers, who would reduce them unto general rules of reason, which they would no way

answer.

"Post ignem ætheria domo

Subductum, Macies et nova Febrium

Terris incubuit cohors;

Semotique prius tarda necessitas

Leti corripuit gradum," Hor. Car. lib. i. Od. iii. 29,

is a better allusion to the original of sin and punishment than all the disputations of the philosophers will afford us.

5. But that which they could not attain unto, and which because they could not attain unto, they wandered in all their apprehensions about God and themselves, without certainty or consistency, we are clearly acquainted withal by divine revelation. The sum of it is briefly proposed by the apostle: Rom. v. 12, "By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin." Sin and death are comprehensive of all that is evil in any kind in the world. All that is morally so is sin; all that is penally so is death. The entrance of both into the world was by the sin of one man, that is, Adam, the common father of us all. This the philosophers knew not, and therefore knew nothing clearly of the condition of mankind in relation unto God. But two things doth the Scripture teach us concerning this entrance of evil into the world:

First, The punishment that was threatened unto and inflicted on the disobedience of Adam. Whatever there is of disorder, darkness, or confusion, in the nature of things here below; whatever is uncertain, irregular, horrid, unequal, destructive, in the universe; whatever is penal unto man, or may be so, in this life or unto eternity; whatever the wrath of the holy, righteous God, revealing itself from heaven, hath brought, or shall ever bring, on the works of his hands, -are to be referred unto this head. Other original of them can no man assign.

Secondly, The moral corruption of the nature of man, the spring of all sin, the other head of evil, proceeded hence also; for by this

VOL. XVIII.

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