&c., which were then in circulation;-and in circulation with a tradition of their being derived from the Apostles. Now, one would have expected, as most probable (humanly speaking), that many compositions of this kind, drawn up by several of the Apostles and their numerous attendants, would have come down to us as a portion of the New Testament.

But that no one of them should have committed to writing anything of the kind, is, according to the ordinary course of nature, quite incredible.

We have here, therefore, in this omission, a standing miracle; -at least, a monument of a miracle. The christian Scriptures, considered in this point of view, are in themselves a proof of their having been composed under superhuman guidance; since they do not contain what we may be certain they would have contained, had the Writers been left to themselves.

And the argument, we should observe, is complete, even though we should be quite unable to perceive the wisdom of this ordinance of Providence, or at all to conjecture why the sacred Writers were thus withheld from doing what they must naturally have been disposed to do. For if the gospel was not from Man, it must have been from GOD. Though we may not be able always to explain why the christian Scriptures are, in each point, just such as they are, still, if we can perceive them to be such as they certainly would not have been if composed by unaided Man, we must conclude that the Writers were divinely overruled.

CHAPTER VIII.

There is satisfactory evidence, that many persons, professing to have been original witnesses of the christian miracles, passed their lives in labours, dangers, and sufferings, voluntarily undergone in attestation of the accounts which they delivered, and solely in consequence of their belief of the truth of those accounts; and that they also submitted, from the same motives, to new rules of conduct.

THAT

HAT the story which we have now is, in the main, the story which the apostles published, is, I think, nearly certain from the considerations which have been proposed. But

whether, when we come to the particulars and the detail of the narrative, the historical books of the New Testament be deserving of credit as histories, so that a fact ought to be accounted true because it is found in them; or whether they are entitled to be considered as representing the accounts, which, true or false, the apostles published; whether their authority, in either of these views, can be trusted to, is a point which necessarily depends upon what we know of the books, and of their authors.

Now, in treating of this part of our argument, the first, and a most material, observation upon the subject is, that such was the situation of the authors to whom the four gospels are ascribed, that, if any one of the four be genuine, it is sufficient for our purpose. The received author of the first was an original apostle and emissary of the religion. The received author of the second was an inhabitant of Jerusalem at the time, to whose house the apostles were wont to resort, and himself an attendant upon one of the most eminent of that number. The received author of the third was a stated companion and fellow traveller of the most active of all the teachers of the religion, and in the course of his travels frequently in the society of the original apostles. The received author of the fourth, as well as of the first, was one of these apostles. No stronger evidence of the truth of a history can arise from the situation of the historian than what is here offered. The authors of all the histories lived at the time, and upon the spot. The authors of two of the histories were present at many of the scenes which they describe; eye-witnesses of the facts, earwitnesses of the discourses; writing from personal knowledge and recollection; and, what strengthens their testimony, writing upon a subject in which their minds were deeply engaged, and in which, as they must have been very frequently repeating the accounts to others, the passages of the history would be kept continually alive in their memory. Whoever reads the gospels (and they ought to be read for this particular purpose) will find in them not merely a general affirmation of miraculous powers, but detailed circumstantial accounts of miracles, with specifications of time, place, and persons; and these accounts many and various. In the gospels, therefore, which bear the name of Matthew and John, these narratives, if they really proceeded

from these men, must either be true, as far as the fidelity of human recollection is usually to be depended upon, that is, must be true in substance, and in their principal parts (which is sufficient for the purpose of proving a supernatural agency), or they must be wilful and meditated falsehoods. Yet the writers who fabricated and uttered these falsehoods, if they be such, are of the number of those who, unless the whole contexture of the christian story be a dream, sacrificed their ease and safety in the cause, and for a purpose the most inconsistent that is possible with dishonest intentions. They were villains for no end but to teach honesty, and martyrs without the least prospect of honour or advantage.

The gospels which bear the name of Mark and Luke, although not the narratives of eye-witnesses, are, if genuine, removed from that only by one degree. They are the narratives of contemporary writers, of writers themselves mixing with the business, one of the two probably living in the place which was the principal scene of action; both living in habits of society and correspondence with those who had been present at the transactions which they relate. The latter of them accordingly tells us (and with apparent sincerity, because he tells it without pretending to personal knowledge, and without claiming for his work greater authority than belonged to it), that the things which were believed amongst Christians, came from those who from the beginning were eye-witnesses and ministers of the word; that he had traced up accounts to their source; and that he was prepared to instruct his reader in the certainty of the things which he related. Very few histories lie so close to their facts; very few historians are so nearly connected with the subject of their narrative, or possess such means of authentic information as these.

The situation of the writers applies to the truth of the facts which they record. But at present we use their testimony to a point somewhat short of this, namely, that the facts recorded in the gospels, whether true or false, are the facts, and the sort

1 Why should not the candid and modest preface of this historian be believed as well as that which Dion Cassius prefixes to his Life of Commodus ? 'These things and the following I write not from the report of others, but from my own knowledge and observation.' I see no reason to doubt but that both passages describe truly enough the situation of the authors.

of facts, which the original preachers of the religion alleged. Strictly speaking, I am concerned only to show, that what the gospels contain is the same as what the apostles preached. Now how stands the proof of this point? A set of men went about the world publishing a story composed of miraculous accounts (for miraculous from the very nature and exigency of the case they must have been), and, upon the strength of these accounts, called upon mankind to quit the religions in which they had been educated, and to take up, from thenceforth, a new system of opinions, and new rules of action. What is more in attestation of these accounts, that is, in support of an institution of which these accounts were the foundation, the same men voluntarily exposed themselves to harassing and perpetual labours, dangers, and sufferings. We want to know what these accounts were. We have the particulars [i.e. many particulars] from two of their own number. We have them from an attendant of one of the number, and who there is reason to believe was an inhabitant of Jerusalem at the time. We have them from

a fourth writer, who accompanied the most laborious missionary of the institution in his travels; who, in the course of these travels, was frequently brought into the society of the rest; and who, let it be observed, begins his narrative by telling us that he is about to relate the things which had been delivered by those who were ministers of the word and eye-witnesses of the fact. I do not know what information can be more satis

factory than this. We may, perhaps, perceive the force and value of it more sensibly, if we reflect how requiring we should have been if we had wanted it. Supposing it to be sufficiently proved, that the religion, now professed amongst us, owed its original to the preaching and ministry of a number of men, who, about eighteen centuries ago, set forth in the world a new system of religious opinions, founded upon certain extraordinary things which they related of a wonderful person who had appeared in Judea; suppose it to be also sufficiently proved, that, in the course and prosecution of their ministry, these men had subjected themselves to extreme hardships, fatigue, and peril; but suppose the accounts which they published had not been committed to writing till some ages after their times, or at least that no histories, but what had been composed some ages afterwards, had reached our hands; we should have said,

and with reason, that we were willing to believe these men under the circumstances in which they delivered their testimony, but that we did not, at this day, know with sufficient evidence what their testimony was. Had we received the particulars of it from any of their own number, from any of those who lived and conversed with them, from any of their hearers, or even from any of their contemporaries, we should have had something to rely upon. Now, if our books be genuine, we have all these. We have the very species of information which, as it appears to me, our imagination would have carved out for us, if it had been wanting.

But I have said, that, if any one of the four gospels be genuine, we have not only direct historical testimony to the point we contend for, but testimony which, so far as that point is concerned, cannot reasonably be rejected. If the first gospel was really written by Matthew, we have the narrative of one of the number from which to judge what were the miracles, and the kind of miracles, which the apostles attributed to Jesus. Although, for argument's sake, and only for argument's sake, we should allow that this gospel had been erroneously ascribed to Matthew; yet, if the gospel of St. John be genuine, the observation holds with no less strength. Again, although the gospels both of Matthew and John could be supposed to be spurious, yet, if the gospel of St. Luke was truly the composition of that person, or of any person, be his name what it might, who was actually in the situation in which the author of that gospel professes himself to have been; or if the gospel which bears the name of Mark really proceeded from him; we still, even upon the lowest supposition, possess the accounts of one writer at least, who was not only contemporary with the apostles, but associated with them in their ministry; which authority seems sufficient, when the question is simply what it was which these apostles advanced.

I think it material to have this well noticed. The New Testament contains a great number of distinct writings, the genuineness of any one of which is almost sufficient to prove the truth of the religion: it contains, however, four distinct histories, the genuineness of any one of which is perfectly sufficient. If, therefore, we must be considered as encountering the risk of error in assigning the authors of our books, we are