another in the fame manner, by which means the fucceffion was continued in an uninterrupted line. Irenæus informs us, that every church preferved a catalogue of its bifhops in the order that they fucceeded one another; and (for an example) produces the catalogue of thofe who governed the church of Rome in that character, which contains eight or nine perfons, though but a very small remove from the times of the Apostles. Indeed the lifts of bishops, which are come down to us in other churches, are generally filled with greater numbers than one would expect. But the fucceffion was quick in the three first centuries, because the bishop very often ended in the martyr; for when a persecution rofe in any place, the firft fury of it fell upon this order of holy men, who abundantly teftified, by their deaths and fufferings, that they did not undertake thefe offices out of any temporal views, that they were fincere and fatisfied in the belief of what they taught, and that they firmly adhered to what they had received from the Apoftles, as laying down their lives in the fame hope, and upon the fame principles. None can be fuppofed fo utterly regardless of their own happiness as to expire in torment, and hazard their eternity, to fupport any fables and inventions of their own, or any forgeries of their predeceffors who had prefided in the fame church, and which might have been eafily detected by the tradition of that particular church, as well as by the concurring teftimony of others. To this purpose, I think it is very remarkable, that there was not a fingle martyr among thofe many heretics who difagreed with the apoftolical church, and introduced feveral wild and abfurd notions into the doctrines of Chriftianity. They durft not ftake their prefent and future happiness on their own chimerical operations, and did not only fhun perfecution, but affirmed that it was unneceffary for their followers to bear their religion through fuch fiery trials. VII. We may fairly reckon, that this first state of Apostles and Difciples, with that fecond generation of many who were their immediate converts, extended itself to the middle of the fecond century, and that several of the third generation from these last mentioned, which was but the fifth from Chrift, continued to the end of the third century. Did we know the ages and numbers of the members. in every particular church which was planted by the Apoftles, I doubt not but in most of them there might be found five perfons who in a continued feries would reach through thefe three centuries of years, that is, till the 265th from the death of our Saviour. VIII. Among the accounts of those very few out of innumerable multitudes who had embraced Chriftianity, I fhall fingle out four perfons eminent for their lives, their writings, and their fufferings, that were, fucceffively, contemporaries, and bring us down as far as to the year of our Lord 254. St. John, who was the beloved Difciple, and converfed the most intimately with our Saviour, lived till Anno Dom. 100; Polycarp, who was the difciple of St. John, lived till Anno Dom. 167, though his life was fhortened by martyrdom; Irenæus, who was the difciple of Polycarp, and had conversed with with many of the immediate difciples of the Apoftles, lived, at the lowest computation of his age, till the year 202, when he was likewife cut off by martyrdom; in which year the great Origen was appointed regent of the catechetick school in Alexandria; and as he was the miracle of that age, for induftry, learning, and philofophy, he was looked upon as the champion of Chriftianity, till the year 254, when, if he did not fuffer martyrdom, as fome think he did, he was certainly actuated by the fpirit of it, as appears in the whole course of his life and writings; nay, he had often been put to the torture, and had undergone trials worse than death. As he converfed with the most eminent Chriftians of his time in Ægypt, and in the East, brought over multitudes both from herefy and heathenifm, and left behind him feveral difciples of great fame and learning, there is no queftion but there were confiderable numbers of those who knew him, and had been his hearers, fcholars, or profelytes, that lived till the end of the third century, and to the reign of Conftantine the Great. IX. It is evident to thofe who read the lives and writings of Polycarp, Irenæus, and Origen, that thefe three fathers believed the accounts which are given of our Saviour in the four Evangelifts, and had undoubted arguments that not only St. John, but many others of our Saviour's difciples, publifhed the fame accounts of him. To which we muft fubjoin this further remark, that what was believed by thefe fathers on this fubject was likewife the belief of the main body of Chriftians in thofe fucceffive ages when they flourished fince Polycarp cannot but be looked upon, if we confider the refpect that was paid him, as the reprefentative of the Eaftern churches in this particular, Irenæus of the Western upon the fame account, and Origen of thofe cftablished in Egypt. X. To thefe I might add Paul the famous hermit, who retired from the Decian perfecution five or fix years before Origen's death, and lived till the year 343. I have only discovered one of those channels by which the hiftory of our Saviour might be conveyed pure and unadulterated through thofe feveral ages that produced thofe Pagan philofophers, whole teftimonies I make ufe of for the truth of our Saviour's hiftory. Some or other of thefe philofophers came into the Chriftian faith during its infancy, in the feveral periods of thefe three first centuries, when they had fuch means of informing themfelves in all the particulars of our Saviour's history. I muft further add, that though I have here only chofen this fingle link of martyrs, I might find out others among thofe names which are ftill extant, that delivered down this account of our Saviour in a fucceffive tradition, til the whole Roman empire became Chriftian; as there is no queftion but numberlefs feries of witneffes might follow one another in the fame order, and in as fhort a chain, and that perhaps in every fingle church, had the names and ages of the most eminent primitive Chriftians been tranfmitted to us with the like certainty. XI. But, to give this confideration more force, we must take notice, that the tradition of the firft ages of Chriftianity had feveral circumstances circumftances peculiar to it, which made it more authentic than any other tradition in any other age of the world. The Chriftians, who carried their religion through to many general and particular persecutions, were inceffantly comforting and fupporting one another with the example and hiftory of our Saviour and his Apoftles. It was the fubject not only of their folemn afiemblies, but of their private visits and converfations. "Our virgins," fays Tatian, who lived in the fecond century, "difcourfe over their diftaffs on divine fubje&ts." Indeed when religion was woven into the civil government, and flourifhed under the protection of the emperors, men's thoughts and difcourfes were, as they are now, full of fecular affairs; but in the three first centuries of Chriftianity, men who embraced this religion, had given up all their interefts in this world, and lived in a perpetual preparation for the next, as not knowing how foon they might be called to it fo that they had little elfe to talk of but the life and doctrines of that Divine Perfon which was their hope, their encouragement, and their glory. We cannot therefore imagine that there was a fingle perfon arrived at any degree of age or confideration, who had not heard and repeated, above a thoufand times in his life, all the particulars of our Saviour's birth, life, death, refurrection, and afcenfion. XII. Especially if we confider, that they could not then be received as Chriftians till they had undergone feveral examinations. Perfons of riper years, who flocked daily into the church during the three first centuries, were obliged to pafs through many repeated inftructions, and give a ftrict account of their proficiency, before they were admitted to baptifm. And as for those who were born of Chriftian parents, and had been baptifed in their infancy, they were with the like care prepared and difciplined for confirmation, which they could not arrive at till they were found, upon examination, to have made a fufficient progress in the knowledge of Christianity. XIII. We muft further obferve, that there was not only in those times this religious conversation among private Chriftians, but a conftant correfpondence between the churches that were eftablished by the Apostles, or their fucceffors, in the feveral parts of the world. If any new doctrine was started, or any fact reported of our Saviour, a ftrict inquiry was made among the churches, efpecially those planted by the Apoftles themselves, whether they had received any fuch doctrine or account of our Saviour, from the mouths of the Apoftles, or the tradition of thofe Chriftians who had preceded the prefent members of the churches which were thus confulted. By this means, when any novelty was published, it was immediately detected and cenfured. XIV. St. John, who lived fo many years after our Saviour, was appealed to in thefe emergencies as the living oracle of the church; and, as his oral teftimony lafted the firft century, many have obferved that, by a particular providence of God, feveral of our Saviour's difciples, and of the early converts of his religion, lived to a very great age, that they might perfonally convey the truth of the Gofpel to to thofe times which were very remote from the firft publication of it. Of these, befides St. John, we have a remarkable inftance in Simeon, who was one of the feventy fent forth by our Saviour to pubJifh the Gospel before his crucifixion, and a near kinsman of the Lord. This venerable perfon, who had probably heard with his own ears our Saviour's prophecy of the deftruction of Jerufalem, prefided over the church established in that city, during the time of its memorable fiege, and drew his congregation out of those dreadful and unparalleled calamities which befell his countrymen, by following the advice our Saviour had given, when they fhould fee Jerufalem encompaffed with armies, and the Roman standards, or abomination of defolation, set up. He lived till the year of our Lord 107, when he was martyred under the emperor Trajan. I. The tradition of the Apofiles fecured by other excellent inftitutions; III. The diligence of the Difciples and firft Chriftian converts, to send abroad thefe writings. IV. That the written account of our Saviour was the fame with that delivered by tradition: V. Proved from the reception of the Gospel by thofe Churches which were eftablished before it was written; VI. From the uniformity of what was believed in the feveral Churches ; VII. From a remarkable paffage in Irenæus. VIII. Records which are now left, of use to the three first centuries, for confirming the history of our Saviour. IX. Inftances of fuch records. 1. THUS far we fee how the learned Pagans might apprife themfelves from oral information of the particulars of our Saviour's hiftory. They could hear, in every church planted in every diftant part of the earth, the account which was there received and preferved among them of the hiftory of our Saviour. They could learn the names and characters of thofe first miffionaries that brought to them these accounts, and the miracles by which God Almighty attefted their reports. But the Apostles, and Difciples of Chrift, to preserve the hiftory of his life, and to fecure their accounts of him from error and oblivion, did not only set aside certain perfons for that purpose, as has been already fhewn, but appropriated certain days to the commemoration of thofe facts which they had related concerning him. The first day in the week was in all its returns a perpetual memorial of his refurrection, as the devotional exercifes adapted to Friday and Saturday were to denote to all ages that he was crucified on the one of those days, and that he refted in the grave on the other. You may apply the fame remark to several of the annual feftivals inftituted by the Apoftles themfelves, or at furtheft, by their immediate fucceffors, in memory of the most important particulars in our Saviour's hiftory; to which we must add the Sacraments Sacraments inftituted by our Lord himself, and many of thofe rites. and ceremonies which obtained in the moft early times of the church. These are to be regarded as standing marks of fuch facts as were delivered by those who were eye-witneffes to them, and which were contrived with great wifdom to laft till time fhould be no more. These, without any other means, might have, in fome measure, conveyed to pofterity the memory of feveral transactions in the hiftory of our Saviour, as they were related by his Difciples. At leaft, the reafon of these inftitutions, though they might be forgotten, and obfcured by a long courfe of years, could not but be very well known by thofe who lived in the three firft centuries, and a means of informing the inquifitive Pagans in the truth of our Saviour's hiftory, that being the view in which I am to confider them. II. But left fuch a tradition, though guarded by fo many expedients, fhould wear out by the length of time, the four Evangelifts within about fifty, or, as Theodoret affirms, thirty years, after our Saviour's death, while the memory of his actions were fresh among them, configned to writing that hiftory, which for fome years had been publithed only by the mouths of the Apoftles and Difciples. The further coufideration of these holy penmen will fall under another part of this difcourfe. III. It will be fufficient to obferve here, that in the age which fucceeded the Apostles, many of their immediate Difciples fent or carried in perfon the books of the four Evangelifts, which had been written by the Apoftles, or at least approved by them, to most of the churches which they had planted in the different parts of the world. This was done with fo much diligence, that when Pantænus, a man of great learning and piety, had travelled into India for the propa gation of Christianity, about the year of our Lord 200, he found among that remote people the Gofpel of St. Matthew, which upon his return from that country he brought with him to Alexandria. This Gofpel is generally fuppofed to have been left in those parts by St. Bartholomew, the Apoftle of the Indies, who probably carried it with him before the writings of the three other Evangelifts were publifhed. IV. That the hiftory of our Saviour, as recorded by the Evangelifts, was the fame with that which had been before delivered by the Apoftles and Difciples, will further appear in the profecution of this difcourfe, and may be gathered from the following confidera tions. V. Had these writings differed from the fermons of the first planters of Chriftianity, either in history or doctrine, there is no queftion but they would have been rejected by thofe churches which they had already formed. But fo confiftent and uniform was the relation of the Apoftles, that thefe hiftories appeared to be nothing elfe but their tradition and oral atteftations made fixed and permanent. Thus was the fame of our Saviour, which in fo few years had gone through the whole earth, confirmed and perpetuated by fuch re cords |