the Gospel preached as well as unto them*; making the religion, delivered to us in the New Testament, but a repetition of what had always been delivered to the Church. The Gospel signifies a message from God for the salvation of man; and as such was delivered at sundry times by Moses and the prophets. If the word preached did not profit some, not being mixed with faith in them that heard it, this is no argument against the sense or sufficiency of the word itself; it only shews us, that, in all ages of the world, some there have been and will be, who being carnally minded, and wholly attached to this world, are destitute of that principle, which the scripture calls by the name of faith; and which, as a universal test to the servants of God, is the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever. What I here say leads me to my second general reason, to prove that religion is the same under both Testaments; and this is, that it has the same general characteristic, or mark, by which it is to be distinguished. If we ask, what was the religion of the Jews, who received the law from Moses? The answer is plain; it was a religion which believed things past, and had faith in things to come, expecting the present favour of God from the observation of certain acts of religious worship, as seeing him that is invisible. This principle of faith has been the characteristic of the true religion from the beginning of the world. To Adam the generation of the world was an article of faith; and the effects of the tree of life and the tree of knowledge were no objects of his sight. After the Fall, the expectation of a Saviour, the seed of the woman, who should bruise the * Chap. iv. 2. head of the serpent, was another article of faith; as was also the curse to be executed upon the earth, which the world in the days of Noah had neglected and forgotten. There never was a time when true religion did not believe something past, and expected something to come, and conform itself to ordinances, the effects of which were of a spiritual nature; and it is the trial of man in this life, whether he will observe such ordinances, and depend upon them. Adam's dependence was upon the sacramental Tree of Eden. The Patriarchs and Jews depended on the rites of sacrifices and purifications, imposed on them till the times of reformation; and we are taught, by the example of Abel, that a sacrifice was accepted for the faith of him that offered it. Christians now depend on the sacraments of baptism and the Lord's supper. With regard to the past, they believe that Christ suffered for their sins, and arose from the dead and, with regard to the future, that he shall come again to judge the world. people of God always was, and scheme of faith and dependence: therefore it is an universal doctrine, common to all ages, which a prophet delivered and an apostle hath confirmed, that the just shall live by faith*. Let him be as just as he will, his life is not from his justice, but from his faith: without which, he has nothing of that life which true religion gives; and is dead in the sight of God. To the same effect, our apostle speaking of Enoch, that according to the testimony of the scripture, he pleased God t; draws an inference in favour of Enoch's faith, because without faith it is impossible to please him‡. This general principle of faith, while it reconciles and Chap. x. 38. + Gen. v. 22, and Ecclus. xliv. 16. + Chap. xi. 6. The religion of the always will be, a unites the religion of both Testaments, serves to detect every false religion that has been or can be invented; because in such there can be no faith properly so called; inasmuch as it will either have false objects or none at all. In the religion of the Gentiles, there was a sort of faith, but it was chiefly directed to objects fabulous and false. The Mythology, (by which I mean the religious mysteries) of the Greeks, gave them a traditionary account of the world's original; of its destruction by the flood; of a future paradise (called Elysium) for the virtuous; and a place of torment (called Tartarus) for the punishment of departed souls, after a formal trial and condemnation by the judges of the infernal regions; and they preserved the institution of sacrifice; thereby confessing their dependence on invisible powers for the expiation of sin. They also maintained the doctrine of man's natural blindness and impotence without the assistance and inspiration of their deities, for which they never failed to invoke them in their compositions and great undertakings. Modern times have been refining upon the Reformation, till by degrees they have conceived and brought forth a sort of philosophical religion, distinct from every thing the world has seen before; because it is a religion without faith. The scheme of our Deists, as they call themselves, has nothing in it of things past; no fact or tradition to ground itself upon; it has no sacraments, nor services of any kind, to keep up an intercourse with heaven: it expects no predicted judgment, and has no particular view of any thing after this life. Thus having no objects of faith, it teaches no dependence, which alone renders the most just man acceptable to God. It actually inculcates independ 6 ence, and glories in it: it has neither church nor sacraments, nor religious worship, nor allegiance, nor submission to God or man; and therefore, it comes more nearly up to the wishes of the Devil, the great author and first father of independence, than any religion ever professed in the world before. If dependence upon God be the characteristic of a religious man, then it must be better to believe the labours of Hercules, the future judgment of Rhadamanthus, and to do sacrifice to Jupiter, than to be of this persuasion; because the worst religion, professed in natural ignorance and sincerity, must be preferable to that proud and incorrigible ignorance, which wilfully rejects all the religion in the world. From the two general reasons I have now given you, it appears, that the law and the gospel are the same religion under different forms: for they have the same name, and are distinguished by the same character; that is, by the great principle of faith, which is essential to both. To these two general reasons, I shall now subject as many particular ones as are necessary, from the Epistle under our consideration; in all of which it is required of me to shew, that as the principle of faith is common to both Testaments, so the articles of faith were in general the same. 1. We have seen already, that the Son of God had been revealed to the Hebrews as the Creator of the world, and sitting at the right hand of God, in certain passages, of which the worst of the Jews did not dispute the application; and with all this, that he should yet be partaker of flesh and blood*, and in all things made like unto his brethren; as Moses had before declared in the law; the Lord thy God will raise up unto * Chap. ii. 14. thee a prophet from the midst of thee, of thy brethren, like unto me*. So particular is this prophecy, that it is twice given in the book ofDeuteronomy, and twice reasoned from in the Acts of the Apostles, first by St. Peter, and afterwards by St. Stephen, in their discourses to the Jews t. 2. The necessity of mediation with God on the behalf of man, was signified by the priesthood of the law; to teach the people, that prayer could not be heard, nor sin pardoned without a priest to intercede, and blood to expiate. But then, that this was only a figurative priesthood, a figurative intercession, a figurative atonement, serving for a time, to describe what should come after, and supersede the descriptive services of the law; the apostle here proves from the Old Testament itself, where a prophet pronounces them insufficient: in burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin, thou hast had no pleasure-Then, said he,lo, I come to do thy will, O God. He taketh away the first, that he may establish the second: that is, he taketh away the services of the law, that he may bring in Christ to do the will of God. In the volume of the book, it had been written of him; for the book of the law spoke this language in every part of it, that Christ should come to do the will of God for our sanctification. : 3. The law shewed moreover, how this should be effected for it was dedicated with blood, and its precepts and promises were called a Testament, that is, a Will, such as is made and witnessed amongst men for the conveying and settling an inheritance in a lawful way. Hence it followed, that no service could be accepted without the offering of blood; and that the death of the testator should intervene, before the *Deut. xviii. 15. 18. + Acts iii. 22. and vii. 37. Chap. x. 6. 9. |