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Opinion of them, when, in the very beginning of his Prophefy, we find him lamenting them, and their Captivity, in thefe, Words; Ah finful Nation! a People laden with Iniquity, a Seed of Evil-doers, Children that are Corrupters, they have forfaken the Lord, they are gone away backwards; wherefore your Country is defolate, fays he, your Cities are burnt with Fire; your Land, Strangers devour it in your Prefence, and it is defolate, as overthrown by Strangers.

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After this, we need go no farther, I think, to prove the Falfity of this Affertion. That the Proofs, ta"ken out of the Old, and urg'd in the "New Teftament, are either not to "be found in the Old, or not urg'd "in the New, according to their literal "and obvious Senfe, because it is pof"fible, (without any Violence to the "Text,) to adapt them to fome other "Person and Event, befides Jefus and "the Things relating to him". But, to bring this Matter to a final Iffue: Why we will fuppofe, that there really were Chrift and his Apoftles more Grounds, than what have hitherto in their appeared, to dispute the Juftness of the ApplicaApplication of any Prophefy; yet, ftill tion of we contend, that the Application of phefies

Ifai. i. 4.
Religion. p. 39, 44.

K 4

the Pro

Chrift were infallible

Vid. Grounds of the Chriftian

Chrift and his Apoftles is to be preferr'd before that of any other, because it was attended with such irresistible Proofs of its Fidelity, as muft over-bear all the Scruples and Objections, that any other may be liable to. For, upon the Competition of two different Senfes of the fame Paffage, can any thing in Nature be more decifive, than the Teftimony of God? And can the Teftimony of God appear by any ftronger Evidence, than by the Power of Miracles fupporting the Allegation? God certainly knew the Intention of every Prophesy deliver'd by his Spirit; and therefore if Chrift and his Apoftles, when they applied any Prophefy to the Meffas, gave the best Proof, that could be given, of their being fent by God, and of their fpeaking and acting by his Commiffion, God himself muft be understood to affirm their Application. The Authority of the Expofition muft, in fuch a Cafe, be equal to that of the Prophefy; for there cannot be a better Proof, that the Prophet was fent from God, than the Expofitor gives of his Miffion, and the reafon for affenting to the one, as well as the other, is on both Sides the fanie.

But

Rogers's Neceffity of Revel.

d

no

But this is not all, our Bleffed Saviour was not only a Worker of Miracles, whereby he demonftrated that God was with him, but he was a Prophet likewife, & Mighty in Word, as well as Deed, before God and all the People; and, confequently, his Determination of the Senfe of any Prophefy could not but be true, because it proceeded from the fame Spirit, from which the Prophefy it felf originally came: And, as Prophefy came in ald Time by the Will of Man, but holy Men of God fpake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost; fo that Interpretation cannot fail of Certainty, which is not the Refult of private Guess or Reasoning, but directed by the first mover of the Prophefy it felf; because no fingle Man is better able to explain the Senfe of his own Thoughts and Words, nor any Prophet, the Meaning of his own Prophefy, than the Holy Spirit is to interpret his own Infpirations. But this is not all ftill. Our Bleffed Saviour was not only a Prophet, but he was that very Prophet, whose Office it was to explain the Senfe of the Jewish Scriptures, and to remove the Obfcurity, which was to remain on many Prophefies, until his coming. For, as the Penmen of old frequently declared

Luk. xxiv. 19. 2 Pet. i. 21.

clared concerning feveral of their prophetical Discourses, that they were dark as yet, and in a manner unintelligible; that their Predictions were clofed up, and f their Vifions become as the Words of a Book, that is fealed; fo they affure us withal, that a time would come, when the Deaf fhould hear the Words of the Book, and the Eyes of the Blind fee out of Obfcurity; and that time is no other, than the Days of the Meffias, "When the deep and hidden "Things of the Law, faysh Maimonides, "fhall be made known unto all"; for i I know that the Meffias cometh, fays the Woman of Samaria (and herein the fpake the Senfe of the Jews, as well Samaritans) and when he is come, be will teach us all Things. If then our Lord and Saviour was a Teacher fent from God, to reveal the hidden Things of God, and to explain the Scripture to us; 'tis impious, I think, to imagine, that he did not understand the true, and blafphemous to fay, that he obtruded falfe Senfes upon us.

But to fatisfy our felves more fully in this Matter, let us follow him a little thro' some of the Prophefies, than unfulfill'd, which he quotes and applies to him

'Ifai. xxviii. 10. de Reg. cap. ult.

■ Ifai. xxxii. 1, 3. Joh. iv. 75.

felf,

h Maim.

felf, and obferve, as we go along, whether,in the Event, they were not accom- . plifh'd according to his Intention and Application of them; for this will fhew the Skill of the Interpreter, and juftify our reliance on the Senfe, which he gives of them. He that eateth with me, hath lift up his Heel against me, is a Prophefy, taken k from the Pfalmift, and applied by our Saviour to the Traytor Judas, then at the Table with him; and yet who would have thought that an Apoftle who had liv'd fo long with him, and receiv'd all poffible Affurance of his divine Miffion, heard the Excellency of his Doctrine, and feen the Wonders of his Works, and Innocence of his Life, would have ever enter'd into a wicked Combination to betray him to Death? But fo it was in the Event.

I will fmite the Shepherd, and the Sheep of the Flock fhall be fcatter'd abroad, is a Text he cites fromm Zechariah,and applies " it to the Desertion of his Difciples; but who could imagine, that such a Number of Men, closely attach'd to him by Duty and Intereft, and who, that very Night, had made fuch warm Proteftations to the contrary, fhould prove fo weak and ungrateful, as all to forfake

* Pfal. xli. 9. Joh. xiii. 18. ↑ Matr. xxvi. 31.

him

Ch. xiii. 7.

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