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I. HAT I may lay before you a full ftate of the fubject under our confideration, and methodize the feveral particulars that I touched upon in difcourfe with you; I thall firft take notice of fuch Pagan authors, as have given their teftimony to the history of our Saviour; reduce these authors under the refpective claffes, and fhew what authority their teftimonies carry with them. Secondly, I fhall take notice of Jewish authors in the fame light.

II. There are many reafons, why you fhould not expect that matters of fuch a wonderful nature should be taken notice of by those eminent Pagan writers, who were contemporaries with Jefus Chrift, or by those who lived before his difciples had perfonally appeared among them, and afcertained the report which had gone abroad concerning a life fo full of miracles.

Suppofing fuch things had happened at this day in Switzerland, or among the Grifons, who make a greater figure in Europe than Judea did in the Roman empire, would they be immediately believed by those who live at a great distance from them? Or would any certain account of them be transmitted into foreign countries, within fo fhort a space of time as that of our Saviour's public ministry? Such kinds of news, though never so true, feldom gain credit, until fome time after they

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are tranfacted and expofed to the examination of the curious, who by laying together circumstances, atteftations, and characters of those who are concerned in them, either receive or reject what at firft none but eyewitneffes could abfolutely believe or disbelieve. In a cafe of this fort, it was natural for men of fenfe and learning to treat the whole account as fabulous, or at fartheft to suspend their belief of it, until all things stood together in their full light.

III. Befides, the Jews were branded not only for fuperftitions different from all the religions of the Pagan world, but in a particular manner ridiculed for being a credulous people; fo that whatever reports of such a nature came out of that country, were looked upon by the heathen world as false, frivolous, and improbable.

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IV. We further obferve that the ordinary practice of magic in thofe times, with the many pretended prodigies, divinations, apparitions, and local miracles among the heathens, made them lefs attentive to fuch news from Judæa, until they had time to confider the nature, the occafion, and the end of our Saviour's miracles, and were awakened by many furprifing events to allow them any confideration at all.

V. We are indeed told by St. Matthew, that the fame of our Saviour, during his life, went throughout all Syria, and that there followed

followed him great multitudes of people from Galilee, Judæa, Decapolis, Iduinea, from beyond Jordan, and from Tyre and Sidon. Now had there been any hiftorians of those times and places, we might have expected to have feen in them fome account of those wonderful tranfactions in Judæa; but there is not any fingle author extant, in any kind, of that age, in any of those countries.

VI. How many books have perished in which poffibly there might have been mention of our Saviour? Look among the Romans, how few of their writings are come down to our times? In the fpace of two hundred years from our Saviour's birth, when there was fuch a multitude of writers in all kinds, how fmall is the number of authors that have made their way to the prefent age?

VII. One authentic record, and that the most authentic heathen record, we are pretty fure is loft. I mean the account fent by the Governor of Judæa, under whom our Saviour was judged, condemned, and crucified. It was the custom in the Roman empire, as it is to this day in all the governments of the world, for the Præfects and Vice-roys of diftant provinces to tranfmit to their Sovereign a fummary relation of every thing remarkable in their administration. That Pontius Pilate, in his account, would have touched on fo extraordinary an event in Ju

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dæa, is not to be doubted; and that he actually did, we learn from Justin Martyr, who lived about a hundred years after our Saviour's death, refided, made converts, and fuffered martyrdom at Rome, where he was engaged with philofophers, and in a particular manner with Crefcens the Cynic, who could easily have detected, and would not fail to have exposed him, had he quoted a record not in being, or made any falfe citation out of it. Would the great apologist have challenged Crefcens to dispute the cause of christianity with him before the Roman Senate, had he forged fuch an evidence? Or would Crefcens have refused the challenge, could he have triumphed over him in the detection of fuch a forgery? To which we must add, that the apology, which appeals to this record, was prefented to a learned Emperor, and to the whole body of the Roman Senate. This father in his apology, fpeaking of the death and fuffering of our Saviour, refers the Emperor for the truth of what he fays to the acts of Pontius Pilate, which I have here mentioned. Tertullian, who wrote his apology about fifty years after Justin, doubtless referred to the fame record, when he tells the Governor of Rome, that the Emperor Tiberius having received an account out of Palestine in Syria of the divine perfon who had appeared in that country, paid him a particular regard, and threatened

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to punish any who should accuse the chrif tians; nay, that the Emperor would have adopted him among the deities whom they worshipped, had not the Senate refused to come into his propofal. Tertullian, who gives us this history, was not only one of the most learned men of his age, but, what adds a greater weight to his authority in this case, was eminently skilful and well read in the laws of the Roman empire. Nor can it be faid, that Tertullian grounded his quotation upon the authority of Juftin Martyr, becaufe we find he mixes it with matters of fact which are not related by that author. Eufebius mentions the fame ancient record, but as it was not extant in his time, I fhall not infift upon his authority in this point. If it be objected that this particular is not mentioned in any Roman hiftorian, I shall use the fame argument in a parallel cafe, and fee whether it will carry any force with it. Ulpian the great Roman lawyer gathered together all the imperial edicts that had been made against the chriftians. But did any one ever fay that there had been no fuch edicts, because they were not mentioned in the hiftories of thofe Emperors? Befides, who knows but this circumstance of Tiberius was mentioned in other hiftorians that have. been loft, though not to be found in any ftill extant? Has not Suetonius many particulars of this Emperor omitted by Tacitus,

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