ful Prophet, or perifh; we must hearken to his Voice, or forfeit all Hopes of the Deliverance which he promises. For what will become of us, if the best Inftitution in the World, God's laft attempt for our Welfare, his ultimate Offer of Mercy, the bleffed Gofpel of the Son of God, be not fufficient to make us good, and fit to be partakers of the Inheritance of the Saints? If the Word Spoken by Angels, if the Law of Mofes was stedfaft, and every Tranfgreffion and Difobedience received a juft Recompence of Reward; how Shall we efcape, what Poffibility is there of Mercy, what Source of Hope, or Refuge from Defpair, if we neglect fo great Salvation, which at first began to be Spoken by the Lord, and was confirmed unto us by them that heard him, God also bearing them Witness, with Signs and Wonders, and with divers Miracles, and Gifts of the Holy Ghost? May the bleffed and glorious God, the Father, Son, and Holy Ghoft, afford us Grace not to neglect it, and enable us to give the most carneft Heed to the Things we have heard, and to work out our Salvation with Fear and Trembling.

SER

THE

THE great Expectation of the Meffiah at the Time when our Lord Jefus Chrift appeared in the World fhews undeniably, that there must have been some exprefs Revelation from God foretelling this great Event, and limiting the Time of his Appearance, which by their Manner of computing the Jews understood to be almost expired at that Fulness of Time, when, as the Gofpels inform us, God fent forth his Son born of a Woman. As this Expectation must have arisen from the Prophecies concerning F 2

the

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the Meffiah, and cannot otherwife be accounted for than by supposing fuch Predictions given in the facred Writings of the Jews, and univerfally understood to defign and foretel his Coming, it may be no unfeafonable, and, I hope, no unuseful: Subject of Meditation to confider

---How general thefe Hopes and Expectations were at the Time of our bleffed Saviour's first Appearance: And

2---What awful Reafons we have to expect likewife, that the fame Jefus, who once came into the World to redeem, shall come again to judge it.

For indeed this was not the vain Belief of a few warm Enthufiafts, nor the Perfuafion only of those devout Perfons, who spake of dour bleffed Lord to fuch as looked for Redemption in Ifrael. It was not a Notion that prevailed only among the lowest of the People, who believed that the Kingdom of God,

by

by which they meant the Kingdom of the Meffiah, fhould immediately appear. It was,

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din truth, the mature Judgment of those, who were believed to be the wifeft and beft. The chief Priefts, the Scribes, the learned in their Law, they who had made the Scriptures their Study, and were held in the highest Estimation for their Knowledge and Skill in them, all these were unanimoufly in the fame Hope; an Hope, that was univerfally cherifhed by the whole Jewish Nation. Unto this Promife the twelve Tribes, inftantly ferving God Day and Night, in full Belief of it's future Verification, and with earnest Prayers for it's Accomplishment, hoped to come, as St. Paul told Agrippa, who wanted neither Ability, nor Inclination to contradict him, had he told him untruly.

The Samaritans likewife, how much foever at variance with the Jews in other Points of Religion, agreed with them however in this common Expectation of a ReAdeemer, and that his Advent was at hand. I know

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I know that Meffias cometh, who is called Christ, faid the Woman of Sichar, in which she expressed, no doubt, both her own Hopes, and the Expectation of her Nation. An Expectation not confined to the Jews and Samaritans, but spread moreover wide among the Gentiles, and diffeminated as far as the. People of the Eaft, from which Quarter the wife Men, or Magi, at the Sight of an unusual Star reforted to Jerufalem to worship him!-Nor were they of the Roman Empire Strangers to this Expectation, however derived to them. In the most celebrated of their Poets you have a Defcription of the happy Times, that fhould follow the Birth of this expected Perfon, in Words and Images that bear a moft ftriking Refemblance to thofe, which we read in the Prophets of the Jewish Nation. Suetonius, one of their Hifto

+ Percrebucrat Oriente toto vetus et conftans Opinio; effe in Fatis ut eo tempore Judea profecti rerum potirentur. C. Suet. Tranq. in Vespas. Lib. 8. Sect. 4. Page 735. Edit. Var

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Fata doth often fignify xa's on the Refponfes of the Sybils, which he elfewhere calls Libri Fatales.