4. "That our Saviour did promise to the apostles the gift of inspiration, and that they did affirm that they were divinely inspired."

The establishment of this proposition, after what has been said, will put the question of inspiration beyond a doubt. For if the writers of the New Testament were not inspired, their affirming that Christ promised them the gift of inspiration and did actually confer it on them, was a falsehood, and so would destroy the credibility of their testimony concerning all the other great facts they reported. But the credibility of their narrative has been proved, and it has been further shewn that it was fit it should be committed to writing, and that it could not be written so as to answer the ends of its publication without extraordinary divine assistance. It follows therefore that their affirmation that they were inspired, fully and clearly proves the point. All we have to do here then is, to consider what Christ and his apostles have asserted respecting this matter.

(1.) As to Christ, the assurances he gave his apostles upon this head are very clear and explicit.

I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever. Even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him, for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you a.'' The Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you b.'→ When the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, which proceedeth from the Father, he shall testify of me. And ye also shall bear witness, because ye have been with me from the beginning c. Once more,- When the Spirit of truth is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak, and he will shew you things to come. He shall glorify me: for he shall receive of mine, and shall shew it unto you. All

a John xiv. 16, 17..

b Ver. 26.

c John xv. 26, 27,

things that the Father hath, are mine: therefore said I, that he shall take of mine, and shall shew it unto you a.

Now here you observe that Christ describes the Holy Spirit as the Spirit of truth. He tells them that this Spirit should be in them—should dwell with them-and abide with them for ever. That this Spirit should teach them all things-bring all things which he had said to their remembrance-take of the things that were his and shew them unto them-guide them into all truth-testify of him-and shew them things to come. All this variety of expression does he use to convey an idea of what we have shewn is meant by inspiration.

And this influence he expressly declares was to be exerted on their minds, to the end that they who had been with him from the beginning, might bear witness-bear witness of the great facts which they had with their own eyes beheld, and of all those other matters which should be shewn them. Accordingly after his resurrection, having shewn himself to them, and solemnly commissioned them to publish his will to the world, it is said, He breathed on them, and said unto them, Receive ye the Holy Ghost b.

Nor should we forget to take notice here of the mode of expression our Lord used when he sent forth the seventy disciples to preach the gospel, during the course of his own ministry: for though this does not immediately respect the composition of the books of the New Testament, yet it serves to fix the true import of the word inspiration. Ye shall be brought before governors and kings for my sake, for a testimony against them and the Gentiles. But when they deliver you up, take no thought how or what ye shall speak, for it shall be given to you in that same hour what ye shall speak. For it is not ye that speak, but the Spirit of your Father which speaketh in you с. In like manner, The Holy Ghost shall teach you in the same hour what ye ought to say d. And after his resurrection, he bade them tarry in Jerusalem, until they were endued with power from on high; and commanded that they should not depart from thence, but wait for the promise of the Father which

a John xvi. 13-15.
c Matt. x. 18-20.

b John xx. 22.

d Luke xii. 12.

they had heard of him, to wit, that they should be baptized with the Holy Ghost a.

Now though some of these promises of our Saviour might more immediately refer, as we just now observed, to the extraordinary assistance they should receive in preaching the gospel, and to the wonderful effusion of the Spirit on the day of Pentecost; yet it is evident from the manner in which some of them are worded, viz. that the Spirit should abide in them for ever, should guide them into all truth, and shew them things to come, that they respect the penning the New Testament scriptures, as well as their public preaching. And this will more fully appear if we consider,

(2.) What were the claims of the apostles.

Now the terms in which they speak both of their preaching and writings, and the implicit regard they challenge from their hearers and readers both to the one and the other, clearly shew that they were conscious of such inspiration.

To begin with the apostle Paul. The kind of language he holds, of which we shall give you a few specimens, is this. God hath revealed unto us the things of the gospel by his Spirit, even the Spirit which is of God, that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God b.-We speak not in the words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth.-We have the mind of Christ c.-The things that I write unto you are the commandments of the Lord d.Speaking of the Lord's Supper he says, That which I delivered unto you I received of the Lord e.-Those among the Corinthians who had sinned and repented, he tells them, he forgave in the person of Christ f.-And he expressly affirms that Christ spake in him g.-To the Galatians he thus speaks of his divine commission, I certify you, brethren, that the gospel which was preached of me, is not after man. For I neither received it of man, neither was I taught it, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ h.-Speaking to the Ephesians of the dispensation of the grace of God, and of his understanding in

the mystery of Christ, he says, that God had revealed it to him, and not only to him, but also his other holy apostles and prophets a.

Now if to these passages you add those wherein he magnifies his office, commands attention to his instructions as a divine teacher, and threatens the refractory and disobedient with extraordinary expressions of God's displeasure; and at the same time remember what was the genuine, not assumed, character of the apostle, how modest, humble, gentle, and benevolent he was; you cannot doubt but he knew himself to be inspired of God.-To proceed,

The like evidence we have in the apostle Peter's writings, of his considering himself and the other apostles as inspired of God. 6 They preached the gospel of Christ,' he says, with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven b.'-He admonishes Christians in general, to be mindful of the words which were spoken before by the holy prophets, and, (he adds,) of the commandments of us the apostles of the Lord and Saviour c.' -And the following testimony he particularly bears to the inspired authority of all the apostle Paul's epistles. Account,' says he, that the long-suffering of our Lord is salvation, even as our beloved brother Paul also, according to the wisdom given unto him, hath written unto you. As also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to be understood, which they that are unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other Scriptures, unto their own destruction d.'

6

To the testimonies of the apostles Paul and Peter let me only add that of the apostle John, the beloved disciple of Christ, and who was so remarkable for his meekness and modesty. He speaks of the Christians to whom he writ, as having an unction from the Holy One, and knowing all things e. And afterwards thus authoritatively expresses himself, We are of God: he that knoweth God, heareth us; he that is not of God, heareth not us: hereby know we the Spirit of truth, and the spirit of error f. And no one can read the

a Eph. iii. 3, 5.
d Ver. 15, 16.

b 1 Pet. i. 12.
el John ii. 20.

c 2 Epist. iii. 2. f Chap. iv. 6.

book of Revelation without knowing that this apostle, who was the writer of it, asserts in the strongest terms that he was inspired of God; guarding in the most authoritative manner the contents of it against all additions, exceptions, and interpolations.

Thus have we proved our fourth Proposition, "That Christ did promise his apostles the gift of inspiration, and that they did affirm that they were divinely inspired."

But we must not leave this head, on which we have so largely insisted, without making one further observation, which has no small weight to establish the point before us. It is this, Every attentive reader of the New Testament must have observed, that there are many passages in it which speak of the discove ries made in this latter part of divine revelation, as far superior to those of the former. The law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ a. The former was the ministration of the letter, the latter of the Spirit. That was glorious, but this more glorious. That, for wise purposes cast a veil over many important truths, but in this we behold with open face, as in a glass, the glory of the Lord b.' • God then spake unto the fathers by the prophets, but in these last days hath spoken unto us by his Son c.'

If then the Old Testament scriptures (although the discoveries made in them were vastly inferior to those in the New) were, as we shall hereafter shew, the oracles of God and given by inspiration; surely it is most natural to conclude, that the New must have been the fruit of divine inspiration also; and that the writers of the New Testament do, by giving the preference to it, mean hereby to assure us that they were themselves inspired of God.

Having thus largely shewn you that the apostles do plainly and unequivocally claim divine inspiration, it follows as a necessary consequence, that if this claim was without foundation, they must have been bad men, impostors, the worst of imposAnd how such a character of them can consist with the accounts we have of the doctrine they propagated, the kind of lives they lived, and the sufferings they endured in the cause,

tors.

a John i. 17.

b 2 Cor. iii. 6, 11, 18.

c Heb. i. 1, 2.