captivity the destruction of their city, a fictitious oracle might have held out the promise, that a time would come when their restoration should take place. But when was it heard that any voice but the voice of God could anticipate, by two hundred years, the course of time, and declare the very person who should perform the prediction. But it is the voice of God" that saith of Cyrus, He is my shepherd and shall perform all my pleasure: even saying to Jerusalem, Thou shalt be built; and to the temple, Thy foundations shall be laid."m Prophecies such as these could have proceeded from Him only, with whom one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day." He it is, who has given us his Holy Scriptures for our learning: and thus indelibly marked them for his own. Having then, in the Old and New Testament, full proof that they exist now as they ever did; and that they are given by inspiration of God; we have reason to conclude with David, "The testimony of the Lord is sure." II. Still it may be said with truth, that the principal object of religion is to regulate the lives of all men; and to prepare them for m Isaiah xliv. 28. n 2 Pet. iii. 3. eternal happiness: and that comparatively few have leisure, or opportunity, or ability, to pursue for their own conviction those intricate investigations, which are sometimes required, in tracing, through all its branches, the evidence of our religion's truth. That, besides, the precepts of that religion, when firmly established, should be so plain and simple, that the most unlearned should be able to be thereby made wise unto salvation. How requisite this is may be collected from the excuse which so many make for their neglect of religion. When a man is questioned upon this important point, the very first answer, which he frequently makes, is that he has been deprived of the benefit of sufficient education. And he conceives this a satisfactory plea for not thinking at all upon a subject, which he affects to consider so difficult of comprehension. Now if this excuse be founded in mistake, it is surely a very dangerous mistake: for religion can have no influence upon a mind, which rejects the very thoughts of religion as too high for its attainment. And that it is a mistake we may learn from the words of David; who after he has declared that "the testimony of the Lord is sure," adds also, that it maketh wise the simple. The Psalmist still carries on the contrast which he began, between the evidence of the Deity as obtained from the contemplation of his works, and from meditating upon his word. The truths of natural religion, especially those which are to be obtained from observation upon the great phenomena of the universe, require much study in order to comprehend them. Whereas the pure doctrines of Christianity are easy to be understood, although most difficult to practise. They are contained in a few precepts most comprehensive and plain, illustrated by narratives which attract the attention of the most uncultivated mind. We are required to love the Lord our God with all our heart, and with all our soul, and with all our mind, and with all our strength, and our neighbour as ourselves. To abstain from all appearance of evil; to have fervent charity among ourselves.q We are assured that not every one that saith Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of our Father which is in heaven; and that "pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this: to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world."" • Mark xii. 30, 31. James 1. 27. P 1 Thess. v. 22. Matth. vii. 21. Precepts such as these the most unlearned can comprehend, the most simple can remember. And if there be found in holy Scripture some things hard to be understood, they should teach us that humility which religion requires. God has not left himself without witness; for there is contained in his Scriptures evidence enough to satisfy the most scrupulous enquirer. But it is the humble, meek, self-abased spirit, the unobtrusive and pious mind, the simple in heart made wise unto salvation by the practical application of his doctrines to the regulation and comfort of his soul, that is in the sight of God of the greatest price. The pride of man must be brought low, the vanity of "science falsely so called " must be humbled, before a man can be induced to rely with implicit confidence upon the sacrifice of Christ alone as the efficient means of his salvation. Yet it is this humility which the Scriptures require, and which the diligent study of them will not fail by the grace of God to produce. t The word of God, then, which thus claims our continual meditation, unlike all other laws, unites two essential qualifications usually incompatible. It speaks at once to the learned and to the unlearned; to the man of science and to the unlettered peasant; to all men in all ages and t 1 Tim. vi. 20. |