predictions concerning Messiah, some others that were local and peculiar, in order that the prophecies, concerning Messiah, might not be without some other evidence; and that the local predictions might have their use in the system.

We have no king but Caesar, said the Jews. Then Jesus was the Messiah. For their avowed king was an alien, and they recognized no other.

A doubt hangs on the beginning of the seventy weeks of Daniel, on account of the wording of the prophecy itself; and also on the termination of that period, owing to the differences among chronologists. But the utmost limits of the difference is not more than 200 years.

The prophecies which tell of Messiah's poverty, describe him also as lord of all nations.

The prophecies which announce the time of his advent, only speak of him as the king of the Gentiles, and as a sufferer; not as a judge coming in the clouds of heaven; and those which describe him as judging the nations on his throne of his glory, say nothing of the precise period of his coming.

When they speak of Messiah's advent in glory, it is evidently his coming to judge the world, not to redeem it. Isaiah lxvi, 15, 16,

CHAPTER XVI.

OTHER PROOFS OF JESUS CHRIST.

If we do not give credit to the apostles, we must hold either that they are deceived or deceivers. But either alternative has its difficulties. In the first case, it is scarcely possible to be cheated into a belief, that a dead man had risen again; and in the other, the supposition that they were themselves impostors, is very absurd. Let us follow out the case. Let us suppose that these twelve men assembling after the

death of Christ, and conspiring together to maintain that he had risen from the dead. We know, that by this doctrine, they attacked all the powers of this world. The heart of man also is strongly disposed to levity and to change, and easily influenced by promises and gifts. Now, if in these circumstances of risk, but one of them had been shaken by those allurements, or what is more likely, by imprisonment, torture, or the pain of death, they were all lost.

While Jesus Christ was with them, he could sustain them; but afterwards, if he did not appear to them, who did encourage them to action?

2. The style of the gospel is admirable in many respects; and, amongst others, there is not a single invective indulged by the historians against Judas or Pilate, or any of the enemies or murderers of Jesus Christ.

Had this delicacy on the part of the evangelical historians been only assumed, together with all the other features of their amiable character; and they only assumed it, that it might be observed, then, even though they had not dared in some way or other to point the attention to it themselves, they could not have failed to procure some friend to notice it to their advantage. But as they were quite unaffected and disinterested, they never provided any one to make such a comment. In fact, I know not that the remark was ever made till now; and this is a strong proof of the simplicity of their conduct.

3. Jesus Christ wrought miracles; so did his apos

So also did the primitive saints; because, as the prophecies were not fulfilled, and were in fact only fulfilling in them, there was as yet no testimony to the truth but miracles. It was foretold that Messiah should convert the nations. How could this prophecy be fulfilled but by the conversion of nations; and how were the first nations to be converted to Messiah, not seeing this conclusive result of the prophetic testimony in support of his mission? Till his death and resurrection, then, and even till some nations had been

converted, the whole evidence was not complete; and hence miracles were necessary during the whole of that time. Now, however, they are no longer needed. Prophecy fulfilled is a standing miracle.

4. The state of the Jews strikingly proves the truth of our religion. It is wonderful to see this people, subsisting for so many centuries, and to see them always wretched it being essential to the evidence in support of Jesus Christ, that they should subsist as witnesses to him; and that they should be miserable, because they slew him. And though their misery presses against their existence, they exist still, in spite of their misery.

But were they not almost in the same state at the time of the captivity? No. The continuance of the . sceptre was not interrupted by the captivity in Babylon; because their return was promised and predicted. When Nebuchadnezzar led them captive, lest it should be supposed that the sceptre had departed from Judah, it was previously declared to them, that they should be there for a short time only, and that they should be re-established. They had still the consolation of their prophets, and their kings were not taken away. But the second destruction of their polity, is without any promise of restoration, without prophets, without kings, without comfort, and without hope; for the sceptre is removed for ever.

That was scarcely a captivity which was alleviated by the promise of deliverance in seventy years; but now they are captive without hope.

God had promised them, that even though he scattered them to the ends of the earth, yet if they were faithful to his law, he would bring them back again. They are faithful to the law, and yet remain in oppression. It follows, then, that Messiah must be come, and that the law which contained these promises had been superseded by the establishment of a new law.

4. Had the Jews been all converted to the faith of Christ, we should have had none but suspected wit

nesses, and had they been extirpated, we should have had no witnesses at all.

The Jews rejected Christ, yet not all of them.— Those who were holy received him; those who were carnal did not and so far is this from militating against his glory, that it gives to it the finishing touch. The reason of their rejection, and the only one which is found in their writings, in the Talmud, and in the Rabbins, is that Jesus Christ did not subdue the nations by force of arms. "Jesus Christ," they say, "has been slain; he has fallen; he has not subdued the heathen by his might; he has not given us their spoils; he has given no wealth." Is that all they can say? It is for this that I love him. A Messiah such as they describe, I have no wish for.

8. How delightful it is to see with the eye of faith, Darius, Cyrus, Alexander, the Romans, Pompey, and Herod, laboring unwittingly for the glory of the gospel.

7. The Mohammedan religion has for its foundation the Koran and Mohammed. But has this man, who was said to be the last prophet expected in the world, been at all the subject of prediction? And what mark has he to accredit him, more than any other man who chooses to set up for a prophet? What miracles does he himself affirm that he performed? What mystery has he taught, even by his own account?— What morality did he teach, and what blessedness did he promise.

Mohammed is unsupported by any authority. His reasons then had need to be powerful indeed, since they rest solely on their own strength.

8. If two men utter things which appear of a common place and popular kind, but the discourse of one has a twofold sense understood by his disciples, whilst the discourses of the other have but one meaning; then any one, not in the secret, hearing the two persons saying similar things, would judge in a similar way of both. But if, in conclusion, the one utters heaver ly things, whilst the other still brings forward only

common-place, and mean notions, and even fooleries, he would then conceive that the one spoke with a mystic meaning, and the other did not; the one having sufficiently proved himself to be incapable of absurdity, but capable of having á mystic sense; the other, that he can be absurd, but not a setter forth of mysteries.

9. It is not by the obscurities in the writings of Mohammed, and which they may pretend have a mystic sense, that I would wish him to be judged, but by his plain statements, as his account of paradise, and such like. Even in these things he is ridiculons. Now, it is not so with the Holy Scriptures. They also have their obscurities; but then there are many clear and lucid statements, and many prophecies in direct terms which have been accomplished. The cases then are not parallel. We must not put on an equal footing, books which only resemble each other in the existence of obscurities, and not in those brilliancies, which substantiate their own divine origin, and justly claim a due reverence also for the obscurities, by which they are accompanied

The Koran itself says that Matthew was a good man. Then Mohammed was a false prophet, either in calling good men wicked, or in rejecting as untrue, what they affirm of Jesus Christ.

10. Any man may do what Mohammed did; for he wrought no miracles, he fulfilled no previous prophecy. No man can do what Jesus Christ did.

Mohammed established his system by killing others; Jesus Christ by exposing his disciples to death; Mohammed by forbidding to read; Jesus by enjoining it. In fact, so opposite were their plans, that, if according to human calculation, Mohammed took the way to succeed-Jesus Christ certainly took the way of fail

ure.

And instead of arguing, that because Mohammed succeeded, therefore Jesus Christ might; it follows rather, that since Mohammed succeeded, Christianity must have failed, if it had not been supported by an energy purely Divine.