But if this were granted, there is still another objection against this religion; and that is, that the rewards therein promised will not avail to make me happy, though I should be partaker of them; for, all the promises made to us in this paradise are but mere sensible pleasures; as, that we shall have all manner of herbs, and fruits, and drinks, and women with exceeding great and black eyes, as in the chapter of the Merciful and of Judgment, and elsewhere; and such pleasures as these, though they may indeed affect my body, yet they cannot be the happiness of my soul. Indeed I know not how this book should promise any higher happiness than that of the body, because it shows no means of attaining to it. It shows no way how my sins may be pardoned, and so my soul made happy. It saith, I confess, that God is gracious and merciful, and therefore will pardon them; but my reason tells me, that as God is gracious and merciful, and therefore will pardon sin, so he is also just and righteous, and therefore must punish it: and how these two can stand together, is not manifested in the Alcoran; and therefore I dare not trust my soul with it.

Thus, upon diligent search, have I found the two religions, that are most generally professed, to have little or nothing of religion in them. I shall therefore, in the next place, take a view of that religion which hath the fewest followers, and that is the Jewish; a religion, not established by any human laws, nor indeed generally professed in any nation, but only by a company of despicable people, scattered up and down the world, which, as the prophet expresses it, are become a proverb of reproach, and a by-word among all nations whither they are driven. The principles of this religion are contained in a book written in the Hebrew tongue, which they call the Torah or Law, composed of several precepts, promises, and threatenings; together with histories of things past, and prophecies of things to come. This book, they say, was written by men inspired by God himself, and therefore they avouch it not to be of human invention, but merely of divine institution.

This book also I have diligently read and examined into, and must ingenuously confess, that, at the very

first glance, methought I read divinity in it; and could not but conclude, from the majesty of its style, the purity of its precepts, the harmony of its parts, the certainty of its promises, and the excellency of its rewards, that it could be derived from no other author but God himself. It is here only that I find my Maker worshipped under the proper notion of a Deity, as he is, JEHOVAH, and that in the right manner; for we are here commanded to love and serve him with all our hearts, with all our souls, our might and mind; which is indeed the perfection of all true worship whatsoever. And as God is here worshipped aright, so is the happiness which is here entailed upon this true worship, the highest that it is possible a creature should be made capable of, being nothing less than the enjoyment of him we worship, so as to have him to be a God to us, and ourselves to be a people to him.

But that which I look upon still as the surest character of the true religion, is its holding forth the way how I, being a sinner, can be invested with this happiness; or how God can show his justice in punishing sin in itself, and yet be so merciful as to pardon and remit it to me, and so receive me to his favor; which the religions I viewed before did not so much as pretend to, nor offer at all at. And this is what this book of the law does likewise discover to me, by showing that God Almightywould not visit our sins upon ourselves, but upon another person; that he would appoint and ordain one to be our Sponsor or Mediator, who, by his infinite merit, should bear and atone for our iniquities, and so show his love and mercy in justifying and acquitting us from our sins, at the same time that he manifests his justice in inflicting the punishment of them upon this person in our stead. A method so deep and mysterious, that if God himself had not revealed it, I am confident no mortal man could ever have discovered or thought of it!

Neither are there any doubts and scruples concerning this great mystery, but what this book does clearly answer and resolve; as will appear more plainly from a distinct consideration of the several objections that are urged against it.

Objection 1. "It does not seem agreeable either to reason or Scripture, that one man should bear the sins of another, because every man has enough to do to bear his own burden; and since sin is committed against an infinite God, and therefore deserves infinite punishment, how can any finite creature bear this infinite punishment; especially it being due to so many thousands of people as there are in the world?"

But this book sufficiently unties this knot for me, by showing me, that it is not a mere man, but God himself, that would bear these my sins; even he, whose name is The Lord our Righteousness, where the essential name of the most high God, which cannot possibly be given to any but to him who is the Being of all beings, is here given to him, who should thus bear my sins, and justify my person; whence David also calleth him Lord; Isaiah calleth him The mighty God; yea, and the Lord of Hosts himself, with his own mouth, calls him his Fellow.

Obj. 2. "But my reason tells me God is a pure act; and, therefore, how can he suffer any punishments? Or, suppose he could, how can one nature satisfy for the offences of another? It was a man that stood guilty, and how can it stand with the justice of God not to punish man for the sins he is guilty of?"

To resolve this doubt, this holy book assures me that this God should become man, expressly telling me, that as his name is Wonderful, Counsellor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace, so should he be born a child, and given as a son. And, therefore, at the same time that the Lord of Hosts calls him his Fellow, he calls him a Mun too; saying, Zech. xiii. 7, Awake O sword against my shepherd, and against the man that is my fellow.

Obj. 3. "But if he be born as other men are, he must needs be a sinner, as other men be; for such as are born by natural generation, must necessarily be born also in natural corruption."

To remove this obstacle, this holy book tells me, that a virgin shall conceive, and bear this son, and his name shall be Immanuel, And so being begotten, but not by a sinful man, himself shall be a man, but not a sinful man.

And so being God and man, he is every way fit to mediate betwixt God and man, to reconcile God to me and me to God, that my sins may be pardoned, God's wrath appeased; and so my soul made happy in the enjoyment of him.

But there is one thing more yet that keeps me from settling upon this religion; and that is, the expiration of the time in which this book promiseth this person should come into the world; for it is expressly said, Dan. ix, 24, that seventy weeks are determined upon thy people and upon thy holy city, to finish the transgression, and to make an end of sins, and to make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness, and to seal up the vision and prophecy, and to anoint the Most Holy. From which anointing, he is, in the next verse, called Messiah, the Anointed, under which name he is, from hence, expected by the Jews; and the beginning of these seventy weeks is expressly said to be at the going forth of the commandment to build and restore Jerusalem. Now, if we understand these seventy weeks in the largest sense, for seventy weeks or sabbaths of years, as it is expressed Lev. xxv, 8, the time of the Messiah's coming must have been but 490 years after the commandment for the building of the city; whereas, whether we understand it of the decree and command that Cyrus made, or that which Darius made, or that Artaxerxes made; I say, whichsoever of these decrees we understand this prophecy of, it is evident that it is above 2000 years since they were all made; and therefore the time of this person's coming hath been expired above 1600 years at least.

So likewise doth this Book of the Law, as they call it, assure us, that the sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh come ; where the Jews themselves, Jonathan and Qukelos, expound the word Shiloh by Messiah; and so doth the Jerusalem Targum too. Now it is plain that there hath been neither sceptre nor lawgiver in Judah, nor any political government at all among the Jews, for above 1600 years; which plainly shows, either that their prophecies and expectations of a Messiah are false, or that he came

into the world so many ages since, as were here prefixed.

So likewise it was expressly foretold in this book, that the glory of the second temple should be greater than the glory of the former. Now the Jews themselves acknowledge, that there were five of the principal things which were in the first, wanting in the second temple; viz. the ark, with the mercy-seat and cherubim-the Shechinah or divine presence-the holy prophetical Spirit-the Urim and Thummim-the heavenly fire: and from the want of these five things, they say the word TN, I will be glorified, Hag. i, 8. wants an at the end, which in numeration denotes five. Yea, and when the very foundation of the second temple was laid, the old men that had seen the first wept to see how far short it was likely to come of the former. To make up therefore the glory of the second temple to be greater than the glory of the first, notwithstanding the want of so many glorious things, they must of necessity understand it of the coming of the Messiah into it, who is called The Desire of all nations. Whereas the Jews themselves cannot but confess that this temple hath been demolished above 1600 years; and therefore it is impossible for the Messiah to come into it, and so for its glory to be greater than the glory of the first temple, and, by consequence, for the word which they profess to believe in to be true.

Indeed the time of the Messiah's coming was so expressly set down in these and the like places, that Elias, one of their great rabbies, gathered from hence, that the world should last 6000 years; 2000 without the law, 2000 under the law, and 2000 under the Messiah; which computation of the Messiah's coming, after 4000 years from the beginning of the world, comes near the time of the sceptre's departing from Judah, and the end of Daniel's seventy weeks; which shows, that this rabbi was fully convinced that it was about that time that the Messiah should come. And therefore it was likewise, that about 1600 years ago the Jews did so generally expect his coming, and that so many did pretend to be the person; as Bar-Cozbah, who, about that time, vaunting himself to be the man, almost the whole nation unanimously con