us better acquainted with them, and of removing the objections. Many happy illuftrations of paffages of fcripture from travels into the Eaft may be found in an excellent work, intitled, Obfervations on divers pafJages of Scripture from voyages and travels into the Eoft.

Some objections to revelation are founded upon an ignorance of the language of the fcriptures, and of the phrafeology which is almoft peculiar to the oriental nations; and fome unbelievers have been fo exceedingly rash and precipitate in their cenfures, as not to have looked beyond the very words, or verfes to which they have objected, when otherwife a child would have feen no difficulty.

M. Voltaire, in more than one of his pieces, reprefents the Jews as canibals, and pretends to prove from Ez. xxxix. 17--20. that God encourages them with the promise of feeding on the flesh of their enemies *. But if he had read fo much as the verse *Traité fur la Tolerance, p. 118.

preceding,

preceding, he must have seen that the whole paffage was a fine apoftrophe, addreffed to the birds and beafts of prey, and was intended to exprefs, in a very emphatical manner, a very great overthrow of the enemies of the Jews. And thou fon of man, Thus faith the Lord God, Speak unto every feathered fowl, and to every beast of the field, Affemble yourselves, and come, gather yourfelves on every fide to my facrifice, that I do facrifice for you, even a great facrifice upon the mountains of Ifrael, that ye may eat flesh, and drink blood. Ye shall eat the flesh of the mighty, and drink the blood of the princes of the earth, of rams, of lambs, and of goats, of bullocks, all of them fatlings of Bashan. ye shall eat fat till ye be full, and drink blood till ye be drunken, of my facrifice which I bave facrificed for you. Thus ye shall be filled at my table with horfes and chariots, with mighty men, and with all men of war, faith the Lord God.

And

When, afterwards, this author acknowledges his mistake, as he does in a poftfcript to the above-mentioned treatise, he says, by

way of apology for it, but contrary to all common fenfe, that two of the verses which I have recited might have been addreffed to the Jews, as well as to the birds and beafts. What can we think of the fairness and competency of judgment in this moft diftinguished of modern unbelievers, when he is capable of writing in this very abfurd and unguarded manner.

Some objections which more nearly affect the proper evidence of revelation, especially refpecting the antient and prefent state of the belief of it.

T has been faid by fome modern unbe

IT

lievers, that the books which were written by the early adverfaries of chriftianity have been fuppreffed by the friends of it, fo that we cannot at this day tell what was written against, or objected to christianity, at the first promulgation of it. But this is an affertion deftitute of all proof, or pro

bability;

bability; for then all christian writers must have carefully avoided the mention of fuch books, in their own writings, which are come down to us; whereas, they have been fo far from doing any thing like this, that it is the opinion of critics, that almoft the whole of Celfus's treatise against chriftianity is transcribed into Origen's answer to it, and a great part of Julian's into that of Cyril. Eufebius has alfo preferved large extracts from the writings of Porphyry;

and the fame has been the conduct of other

chriftian apologifts, with refpect to other opponents of christianity.

No perfons more fincerely regret the lofs of these writings than learned chriftians of the prefent age; but in the fame undistinguishing ravages of time, have perished what we regret more, namely, the writings of many early chriftians, and antient hiftorians. Befides, how could it, in reafon, be expected, that chriftians fhould take any peculiar care of the writings of their adverfaries. If thofe fuppofed writings had contained any thing decifive against chriftianity,

E 3

tianity, they would certainly (confidering the very great advantages under which they were written, for the space of three hundred years) have effectually prevented the fpread of chriftianity, and would have preferved themselves; whereas the univerfal neglect into which they fell is, if any thing, an argument of their futility, and furnishes a reafon why we fhould comfort ourselves for the lofs of them.

It has been faid, that if Chrift worked fo many miracles as the evangelical hiftory reprefents, healing all the difeafed that applied to him, and in three inftances raifing the dead, he must neceffarily have converted the whole Jewish nation, and all the ftrangers in the country; as it could not but be concluded, that a man who controlled the courfe of nature must have the concurrence and affiftance of the God of nature, and confequently a fufficient teftimony of a divine miffion.

To this it is replied, that the preaching of Chrift feems to have had all the effect

that