ON ALL THE BOOKS OF SCRIPTURE, FOR THE USE OF THE PULPIT AND PRIVATE FAMILIES, IN FOUR VOLUMES. VOL. III. BY JOSEPH PRIESTLEY, LL. D. F. R. S. &c. SI juxta apostolum Paulum Gristus Dei virtus est; JEROME IN ESAIAM. NORTHUMBERLAND: PRINTED FOR THE AUTHOR, BY ANDREW KENNEDY, Franklin's Head, QUEEN-STREET. The INTRODUCTION. W E are now entering on the confidera tion of the most important and interesting of all histories, that of Jefus Chrift, from whom, we who be lieve his divine million, and profess ourselves to be his followers, are denominated christians. We cannot, therefore, give too much attention to the incidents of his life, and all his difcourfes; especially as he declared that the words which he fpake were not his own, and that the Father, who was in him, performed the mira culous works by which his divine miffion was attefted. Jefus was a Jew, and the Jewish or Hebrew nation was a people eminently distinguished by Almighty God, as the medium of almost all his communications to mankind; all the prophets, except Balaam, having been of that nation. And the hiftory of Jefus is the more extraordinary, as the Jews had been without any prophet, or any perfon pretending to prophecy, about four hundred years before the appearance of John the Baptift, who announced the coming of Jefus as a prophet greatly fuperior to himself; his own miffion being only introductory to that of Jefus. |