without being detected. And as they neither could nor would deceive the world, so they neither could nor would be deceived themselves, for they were days, months, and years, eye and ear witnesses of the things which they relate; and, when they had not the fullest evidence of important facts, they insisted on new proof, and even upon sensible demonstrations; as, for instance, Thomas, in the matter of of our Lord's resurrection (John 20: 25); and to leave us no room to question their sincerity, most of them joyfully sealed the truth of their doctrines with their own blood. Did so many and such marks of veracity ever meet in any other authors?

"But even while they lived they confirmed their testimony by a variety of miracles wrought in divers places, and for a number of years-sometimes before thousands of their enemies, as the miracles of Christ and His disciples-sometimes before hundreds of thousands, as those of Moses.

"Reason itself dictates that nothing but the plainest matter of fact could induce so many thousands of prejudiced and persecuting Jews to embrace the humbling, selfdenying doctrines of the cross which they so much despised and abhorred. Nothing but the clearest evidence arising from undoubted truth could make multitudes of lawless, luxurious heathens receive, follow, and transmit to posterity the doctrines and writings of the apostles; especially at a time when the vanity of their pretensions to miracles and the gift of tongues could be as easily discovered had they been impostors; and when the profession of Christianity exposed persons of all ranks to the greatest contempt and most imminent danger.

"When the authenticity of the miracles was attested by thousands of living witnesses, religious rites were instituted and performed by hundreds of thousands, agreeable to the Scripture injunctions, in order to perpetuate that authenticity; and these solemn ceremonies have ever since been kept up in all parts of the world: the Passover by the Jews, in remembrance of Moses' miracles in Egypt; and the Eucharist by Christians, as a memorial of Christ's death,

and the miracles that accompanied it, some of which are recorded by Phlegon the Trallian, a heathen historian.

"The Scriptures have not only the external sanction of miracles, but the eternal stamp of the omniscient God by a variety of prophecies, some of which have already been most exactly confirmed by the event predicted.

"The scattered, despised people, the Jews, the irreconciliable enemies of the Christians,keep with amazing care the Old Testament, full of the prophetic history of Jesus Christ, and by that means afford the world a striking proof that the New Testament is true; and Christians, in their turn, show that the Old Testament is abundantly confirmed and explained by the New.

"To say nothing of the harmony, venerable antiquity, and wonderful preservation of those books, some of which are by far the most ancient in the world; to pass over the inimitable simplicity and true sublimity of their style; the testimony of the fathers and primitive Christians; they carry with them such characters of truth as command the respect of every unprejudiced reader.

"They open to us the mystery of creation, the nature of God, angels, and men; the immortality of the soul; the end for which we were made; the origin of the moral and natural evil; the vanity of this world, and the glory of the next. There we see inspired shepherds, tradesmen, and fishermen, surpassing as much the greatest philosophers as these did the herd of mankind, both in meekness of wisdom and sublimity of doctrine. There we admire the purest morality in the world, agreeable to the dictates of sound reason, confirmed by the witness which God has placed for himself in our breast, and exemplified in the lives of men of like passions with ourselves. There we discover a vein of ecclesiastical history and theological truth consistently running through a collection of sixty-six different books, written by various authors, in different languages, during the space of above fifteen hundred years. There we find, as in a deep and pure spring, all the genuine drops and streams of spiritual knowledge which can possibly be met with in the largest libraries. There the

workings of the human heart are described in a manner that demonstrates the inspiration of the Searcher of Hearts. There we have a particular account of all our spiritual maladies, with their various symptoms, and the method of a certain cure-cure that has been witnessed by multitudes of martyrs and departed saints, and is now enjoyed by thousands of good men who would account it an honor to seal the truth of the Scriptures with their own blood. There you meet with the noblest strains of penitential and joyous devotion, adapted to the dispositions and states of all travelers to Zion. And there you read those awful threatenings and cheering promises which are daily fulfilled in the consciences of men, to the admiration of believers and the astonishment of attentive infidels.

“The wonderful efficacy of the Scriptures is another proof that they are of God. When they are faithfully opened by His ministers, and powerfully applied by His Spirit, they wound and heal; they kill and make alive; they alarm the careless, direct the lost, support the tempted, strengthen the weak, comfort mourners, and nourish pious souls.

"To conclude: It is exceedingly remarkable, that the more humble and holy people are, the more they read, admire, and value the Scriptures; and, on the contrary, the more self-conceited, worldly-minded, and wicked, the more they neglect, despise, and asperse them. As for the objections which are raised against their perspicuity and consistency, those who are both pious and learned, know that they are generally founded on pre-possession and the want of understanding in spiritual things; or, on our ignorance of several customs, idioms, and circumstances, which were perfectly known when those books were written. Frequently, also, the immaterial error arises merely from a wrong punctuation, or a mistake of copyers, printers, or translators, as the daily discoveries of pious critics, and ingenuous confessions of unprejudiced inquirers, abundantly prove."

In addition to the above brief, but cogent, arguments in favor of the authenticity of the Sacred Scriptures, the writer will add but one other:

If Jesus was, and is, the promised Messiah, there can be no doubt remaining of the truth of both the Old and New Testaments. This is too evident to need demonstration. The prophets of old predicted so clearly, and with such coherence, the advent of the Messiah, and the time and circumstances of His coming, that the Jews, as a nation, and many Gentiles also, who had mingled with or been frequently visited by them, were in confident expectation of His appearing about the time Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea. This fact is fully authenticated both by sacred and profane history. Many of the best informed Jews believed that He was the Christ. Those who rejected Him, looked for the coming of the true Messiah anxiously and constantly, even while He was here; and they have still been, and yet are, waiting for and expecting His appearance on earth. And, having now been in waiting near nineteen centuries in disappointment, or at least in hope deferred, the reasons for believing that Jesus was the Christ are thereby vastly strengthened, and, as it does seem, should be accepted as conclusive to every unprejudiced mind, whether Gentile or Jew.

CHAPTER IV.

Second Proposition-The Heavens Created and Inhabited before this World-Mosaic History Refers alone to this Creation— Consists with Science-Adam Formed— When Eve was MadeAngels Existed before.

"THAT the heavens were created and inhabited by myriads of happy, angelic beings, long before this world was created, as recorded by Moses," is our next subject for investigation.

This, I know, is in conflict with the commonly received opinion of the creation; but, as is true in relation to many other well-authenticated facts connected with natural science, it is one upon which erroneous views are very generally entertained. To those Bible readers who are content to accept the brief and figurative history of the creation of this world, which is contained in the Mosaic account, as a literal and full exposition of all the mighty works of an eternal, all-wise, and omnipotent Being, such conclusion is quite natural, yet we need not go beyond Divine Revelation to prove conclusively that the account given by Moses related alone to the creation of this comparatively small revolving planet on which we live; her appurtenances and inhabitants including man, the crowning work of that week.

Before looking into other sacred authorities for such proof, let us notice the Mosaic account, and see whether it will admit of a construction consistent with this hypothesis.

"In the BEGINNING God CREATED the HEAVEN and the earth."-Gen. 1: 1. The first question arising upon reading this verse is, In what sense is the word “BEGINNING here used?