was crucified is the same with the Jesus who rose from the grave, and that the Jesus who rose from the grave did actually ascend into heaven, and will thence hereafter return to raise the dead, and to confer eternal happiness on his faithful followers. This divine gift, which will enable you to work miracles and speak with unknown tongues, shall come down upon you in a visible form, that all might see whence you derived it, that all might see you did not derive it from intercourse with demons, or from the base arts of magic. As it is intended to identify my person, and prove the reality of my as cension, it shall be attached to, and display its effects only in the name of Jesus. And as you are the faithful witnesses of all I said and did, and especially of my resurrection, this power shall be communicated to you, and you alone, though through you it shall be extended to such converts among the Jews and Gentiles, as the holy spirit shall deem worthy to receive it."

This was the promise which Christ made to his apostles, with the request that they should wait in Jerusalem till its fulfilment. They did wait, and it was fulfilled. With this seal of heaven, as it were, in their hands, the apostles went forth preaching, in opposition to the impostors, the simple humanity of Christ, his ascension to heaven, and his certain return to raise the dead, and to reward the righteous. By virtue of these few simple truths, they called upon all men to repent, to leave their former evil ways, however depraved and sinful, and to lead a new life of virtue and holiness, as the indispensable condition of being finally saved. And if they did this with sincerity, they should receive the holy spirit, which they were to consider as the signature of God himself to the truth of what they had been taught. By these means a multitude of men in every country, at ́Antioch, in Alexandria, in Rome, as well as in Jerusalem, saw in others, and in fact felt in themselves, sensible proofs of the real resurrection and ascension of our Lord

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Jesus Christ. The effect corresponded with the wisdom and efficacy of the means. Peter immediately preached on the spot, and in the face of his enemies and several thousands became converts, delivering up their property, and consecrating the remainder of their lives to that Saviour whom, a few days before, they hurried away to crucifixion.

To the question, then, How came Matthew and John to omit to say that Jesus ascended to heaven? the answer is, They were apostles, and, as such, they had no need to say it for they were among the honoured instruments in the hands of God, of proving that fact every day by the communication of the holy spirit, which implied and sealed its truth. Mark and Luke, being not apostles, did the only thing which remained for them to do ; -as they were not qualified to prove the ascension of their Divine Master by deeds, they assert it in words.

CHAPTER VI.

Christianity the same with the religion of Moses and the Prophets refined and perfected by Jesus Christ.-Philo and Josephus historians and apologists of the Gospel under the name of Judaism.

I HAVE already observed that the new method adopted by our Lord, of interpreting the Jewish Scriptures, divided the whole nation into two distinct parties. Judaism, as embraced by the Priests and Pharisees, comprehended the form without the substance of godliness, such as the perpetuity of the temple service; the immutable obligation of the ceremonial law; a temporal

Messiah, and universal dominion, with the total neglect of the great duties of morality. On the other hand, Judaism, as taught by Jesus Christ, inculcated holiness with the practice of virtue in all its branches, from a regard to the will of God and the hope of eternal life.

The Pharisaical teachers are said to have encompassed sea and land to make proselytes; but this probably meant an anxiety to enlarge their own sect among the Jews, and not a wish to make converts of the Gentiles. At all events, their notion of Judaism in opposition to the Gospel, must have put an end to the spirit of proselytism, if any such ever existed. For what motives could they hold out that might induce any Pagan in his senses to become a Jew? Could the rite of circumcision, or other ceremonies, attract any among the Heathens? These appeared to the whole world odious and oppressive. Could a temporal Messiah gain converts among the nations? This Messiah was to be a conqueror marching forth to destroy, not to save the world. Was the moral character of these teachers such as to overcome the aversion of those who had hitherto abhorred their peculiar rites? Far from it: they were universally detested for their hypocrisy, their spiritual pride and cruelty, wherever they were known. Those men were in principle apostates from the God of their fathers; and the prophets whom he sent to warn them, they derided and even killed. What could have rendered men like these desirous to proselyte the rest of mankind? In reality they felt no such wish: nay, they strenuously endeavoured to defeat the efforts made on the part of the apostles to enlighten the Heathen world. And they insisted on compliance with the ritual law, only from the hope of arresting the Gospel in its march among the surrounding nations. When, therefore, we read in writings subsequent to the Christian æra, of Pagan converts to Judaism, we are always to understand Judaism as purified and sublimated by Jesus Christ. Judaism in this

sense had nothing to repel, and every thing to attract, the acceptance of mankind. It held forth a benign Saviour, who came not to destroy but to save the world. It abolished those repulsive rites which had hitherto separated the Jews from other nations. It proclaimed the Almighty no longer to be the God of the Jews, but to be the Father and Friend of all mankind: and invited all the children of Adam, without distinction, to share with the Israelites in the privileges of the Gospel on the simple terms of repentance and reformation.

As the Hebrew believers, with the apostles at their head, considered the religion of Jesus but as the religion of their fathers refined and perfected, the dispute between them and the Pharisees was not whether Judaism or Christianity was true, but whether the literal or metaphorical interpretation of their Scriptures constituted the law of Moses. And by continuing to speak of the Gospel in those terms in which they had been accustomed to speak of the Jewish religion, they secured to their cause many great and important advantages. For after they became the disciples of Christ, they were still the disciples, and the only true disciples, of Moses; they were still the children, and the only true children, of Abraham. By this means also they excluded all just grounds for the charge so often urged against them, that Christianity was a heresy or a new religion, which could not be true, because it had not been revealed at an earlier period of the world. Moreover, they thus established the correspondence between the predictions of the prophets, and the character of Christ, and fortified it with all the evidence emanating from the unity of God, the identity of his government, though changing his dispensations so as to keep pace with every successive change and improvement in the condition of his people. Finally, by adopting this plan, the followers of Jesus raised an effectual mound against the influx of Heathen superstition. For the gentile converts, howev er sincere and

enlightened, necessarily brought over to the new faith some portion of the prejudices in which they had been educated. Hence the divinity and miraculous birth of Jesus, original sin, the depravity of human nature, the atonement, &c., which, though the genuine offspring of Heathenism, became in after days essential articles of the Christian faith, were all excluded from the church of God, which Christ and his apostles erected in Judea.

Of these advantages the Gnostics were fully sensible, and the direct object of their system was to set them aside. Availing themselves of the popular belief in the plurality of Gods, and the general ignorance of the laws of nature, they sought, under pretence of teaching the Gospel, to defeat its end by referring Christ to a higher order of beings, and thus accounting for his miracles and resurrection on principles peculiar to his divine nature. In proportion as this system prevailed, the necessity of repentance and reformation was lost sight of; and questions respecting the person of Christ, with other metaphysical points borrowed from the Pagan mysteries, were introduced as essential to Christianity.

Soon after the descent of the spirit, a great multitude of the priests, we are told in the Acts, became obedient to the faith. In that age no convert considered himself at liberty to remain an useless and inactive member, but was bound to use all the means in his power to promote the common cause. Let us suppose that any two of these priests were eminently qualified to write in defence of the Gospel, or to give a history of the events produced by it, so as to verify its divine origin. They saw that the most formidable enemies which the apostles encountered, were the Gnostics, who threatened to undermine Christianity by the very means which, in the eyes of enlightened reason, infallibly established its truth. Now, in order to defeat the end which the impostors had in view, these supposed writers would have had recourse to a mode of defence and attack, which to us in