Edifice, the Work of Ages, low in the SERM. I. Duft; at the fame Time that they forefaw they should be buried in it's Ruins: and like him, deftroyed more Enemies to the true Religion at and by their Deaths, than they did in their Lives.

Out of a numberlefs Lift of Martyrs let us fingle out St. Simeon Bishop of Jerufalem, laying down, at the Age of one hundred and twenty Years, that Life, for the Truth of Chriftianity, which he had conducted by the Precepts of it; whofe extreme old Age was of the lowest Confideration to make him venerable. Was this Perfon a deluded Zealot? No; he who was a near Relation of our Saviour, and intimately converfant with him and the Apoftles, could not be ignorant of their Characters, Views and Actions; this admits of no Difpute, and needs no laboured Proof. Was he then an artful Deluder? But could he, conscious that Chrift and his Apostles were Deceivers, profefs his Faith in him to the laft, when he was three Days, as Hegefippus (an early Writer of the fame Church) informs us, in dying by Piecemeal, under the most exquifite Tortures; while Death advanced by Degrees, in it's moft ghaftly Form? How could he, I fay, profefs his Faith to the laft, and rejoice in his Sufferings with fuch determined Chearfulness as furprised his Tormentors?

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Yes,

SERM. I. Yes, fome will fay, Vain-glory is a very d ftrong Paffion. Vain-glorious Wretch beyond Example! To be expanding all his Sails, and ftriving to gather in every Blaft of Applaufe, at the fame Time that his weak Veffel, decayed by Age, was finking irretrievably in the Deep, by a moft violent Storm! Was this all he had in View, to make one fhort-lived Blaze, juft as the Candle was finking in the Socket, and then go out in everlasting Night? Certainly when Pain preffed rudely in, and boifterously, for a long Time, demanded to be heard; it would at laft awaken him, however profound his Repofe might be, from an airy Dream, of an imaginary Existence after Death. Hopes of immortal Blifs, in Cafe he were a Deceiver, he could have none, but rather a fearful looking for of Judgment to come. The Defire of pofthumous Applaufe is artificially raifed; and those Paffions, which are introduced by Art, must always at length give way to those that are inborn (efpecially to fo invincible a one as that of Happinefs) and throw off the incumbent Weight of long-uninterrupted Mifery. It is not a Plant which our heavenly Father bath planted, it is not the native Growth of the Soil, and therefore it must come to nought, and die away by the rigorous Inclemency of the Seafon. Idle and empty Reflections upon

leaving

leaving a Name behind us, cannot ftand SERM. I. their Ground against unintermitting uneafy Senfations of three Days Continuance; but muft vanish before them, like as Wax melteth at the Fire.

Those who refolve fuch Effects into Pride, ought to produce fome Inftances from Hiftory, when and where Pride has had fuch an effect. Afk now of the Days that are past, which were before Thee, fince the Day that God created Man on the Earth; and afk from the one Side of the Heaven to the other, whether there hath been any fuch Thing as this, or hath been heard like it? viz. that several thousands, in the early Perfecutions of Nero, Domitian and Trajan, should lay down their Lives not for a falfe Religion, independent on certain Facts (for that is a very poffible Cafe;) but for a falfe Religion, whofe pretended Bafis was certain Matters of Fact faid to be lately done: and when they must have known whether they were done or not, without a moft unheard-of and unexampled Neglect to enquire into the Foundation on which they rested.

God cannot, confiftently with his Goodnefs and Veracity, reduce his Creatures to fuch a Cafe (efpecially if a Cafe of Importance) that they cannot act reasonably without yielding their Affent to a FalfhoodThey cannot act reasonably without yielding their Affent to Christianity Therefore C 2 Chrif

SERM. I. Chriftianity is no Falfhood. They cannot act but in a Manner, which would be deemed unreasonable in any other Affair.

For, to put the Matter at the loweft; does any Man, whether Believer or Un--believer, doubt or pretend to doubt, that' there was fuch a Man as Mahomet, who propagated his Impofture by the Force of Arms? Certainly there are at least as ftrong Proofs that the Apoftles propagated Chriftianity by Miracles, as that Mahomet in a dark and unenlightened Age established his false Religion by Violence, Rapine, and the Power of the Sword. And if the Apostles did several Miracles by the Power of God; then they spoke and wrote with Authority from God; and confequently the Belief of their Doctrines is obligatory upon us.

In a Word, if there be any Moral Certainty for Matter of Fact, it is morally certain, that our Saviour and his Apoftles wrought many Miracles;-It is morally certain, that God would not fuffer many Miracles to be wrought to confirm an Impofture.. -It is morally certain therefore that Chriftianity is no Impofture. And as for all the Objections against this Religion, they are of no Avail for this plain Reason, because they are Arguments against Matter of Fact. For when once it is morally certain, that a Thing has been, viz. that feveral Miracles have been wrought, all the Arguments and Objections

in the World cannot prove that it has not SERM. I. been.

The Deifts have never offered any rational Scheme or tolerable Hypothesis to account for all the Marks of Credibility and ftrong Appearances of Truth and Divinity in the Chriftian Revelation (fuppofing nothing more than Human concerned in the Publication, Propagation and Establishment of it) any more than the Atheists have offered any plaufible Scheme to folve all the Appearances of Goodness, Wisdom and Defign in the Creation, without fuppofing an infinitely wife and good God, the Author and Preferver of it. They are obliged to admit of a Fact, viz. the speedy and amazing Progress of the Gofpel, of which it is impoffible for them to give any Account, when not only a poffible, but an easy and fatisfactory Account may be given of it. They are obliged to allow that an Effect was brought about without a Cause, or what is the fame Thing, without a Cause proportionate to it, when a Caufe equal to the Effect may be easily affigned. Our Saviour's Command to the Apoftles, Go and teach all Nations, would have been as ridiculous without a Certainty of Divine Affiftance, as if he had bid them, Go, and fubdue all Nations by the Force of Arms. Nor could it have been done without a proper Furniture of a great Variety of Languages, fo as to enable them to converfe

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