that there should be superior and subordinate of- being sent out to water and refresh the dry, ficers, as there were superior and inferior orders thirsty world with the knowledge of the truth; by under the Mosaic dispensation; but that herein the twelve precious stones in Aaron's breast-plate, he had an eye to some usage and custom common to illuminate the church, the garment which among them. Now, among the Jews, as all mes-Christ our great high-priest has put on; by the sengers were called apostles; so were they wont to despatch some with peculiar letters of authority and commission, whereby they acted as proxies and deputies of those that sent them: thence their proverb "Every man's apostle is as himself;" that is, whatever he does is looked upon to be as firm and valid as if the person himself had done it. Thus, when Saul was sent by the Sanhedrim to Damascus to apprehend the Jewish converts, he was furnished with letters from the high-priest, enabling him to act as his commissary in that matter. Indeed Epiphanius tells us of a sort of persons called apostles, who were assessors and counsellors to the Jewish patriarch; constantly attending upon him, to advise him in matters pertaining to the law; and sent by him (as he intimates) sometimes to inspect and reform the manners of the priests and Jewish clergy, and the irregularities of country synagogues, with commission to gather the tenths and first-fruits due in all the provinces under his jurisdiction. Such apostles we find mentioned both by Julian the emperor,* in an epistle to the Jews, and in a law of the emperor Honorious, employed by the patriarch to gather once a year the aurum coronarium, or crown gold, a tribute annually paid by them to the Roman emperors. But these apostles could not, under that notion, be extant in our Saviour's time; though sure we are there was then something like it. Philo the Jew, more than once mentioning the ιερόπομποι καθ' εκαςον ενιαυτον χρυσον κι αργυρον πλείςον κομίζοντες ιες το ιερόν, τον αθροισθέντα εκ των anapxwv, "The sacred messengers annually sent to collect the holy treasure paid by way of first-fruits, and to carry it to the temple at Jerusalem." However, our Lord in conformity to the general custom of those times, of appointing apostles or messengers, as their proxies and deputies to act in their names, called and denominated those apostles, whom he peculiarly chose to represent his person, to communicate his mind and will to the world, and to act as ambassadors or commissioners in his room and stead. 4. Secondly, we observe that the persons thus deputed by our Saviour were not left uncertain, but reduced to a fixed definite number, confined to the just number of twelve; "he ordained twelve that they should be with him." A number that seems to carry something of mystery and peculiar design in it, as appears in that the apostles were so careful upon the fall of Judas immediately to supply it. The fathers are very wide and different in their conjectures about the reason of it. St. Augustine thinks our Lord herein had respect to the four quarters of the world, which were to be called by the preaching of the gospel, which being multiplied by three (to denote the Trinity, in whose name they were to be called) make twelve. Tertullian will have them typified by the twelve fountains in Elim; the apostles twelve stones which Joshua chose out of Jordan, to lay up within the ark of the testament, respecting the firmness and solidity of the apostles' faith, their being chosen by the true Jesus or Joshua at their baptism in Jordan, and their being admitted into the inner sanctuary of his covenant. By others we are told, that it was shadowed out by the twelve spies taken out of every tribe, and sent to discover the land of promise; or by the twelve gates of the city in Ezekial's vision: or by the twelve bells appendent to Aaron's garment, "their sound going out into all the world, and their words unto the ends of the earth." But it were endless, and to very little purpose, to reckon up all the conjectures of this nature, there being scarce any one number of twelve mentioned in the Scripture, which is not by some of the ancients adapted and applied to this of the twelve apostles, wherein an ordinary fancy might easily enough pick out a mystery. That which seems to put in the most rational plea is, that our Lord, being now about to form a new spiritual commonwealth, a kind of mystical Israel, pitched upon this number in conformity either to the twelve patriarchs, as founders of the twelve tribes of Israel, or to the twelve puλapxa, or chief heads, as standing rulers of those tribes among the Jews; as we shall afterwards possibly more particularly remark. Thirdly, these apostles were immediately called and sent by Christ himself, elected out of the body of his disciples and followers, and received their commission from his own mouth. Indeed, Matthias was not one of the first election, being taken in upon Judas's apostacy, after our Lord's ascension into heaven. But besides that he had been one of the seventy disciples, called and sent out by our Saviour, that extraordinary declaration of the divine will and pleasure that appeared in determining his election, was in a manner equivalent to the first election. As for St. Paul, he was not one of the twelve, taken in as a supernumerary apostle; but yet an apostle as well as they, and that "not of men, neither by man, but by Jesus Christ;" as he pleads his own cause against the insinuations of those impostors who traduced him as an apostle only at the second hand; whereas he was immediately called by Christ as well as they, and in a more extraordinary manner; they were called by him while he was yet in his state of meanness and humiliation; he, when Christ was now advanced upon the throne, and appeared to him encircled with those glorious emanations of brightness and majesty which he was not able to endure. I observe no more concerning this, than that an immediate call has ever been accounted so necessary to give credit and reputation to their doctrine, that the most notorious impostors have pretended to it. Thus Manes the founder of the Manichæan sect, was wont in his epistles to style himself the apostle of Jesus Christ, as pretending himself to be the person whom our Lord had promised to * See St. Peter's Life, sec. 3, num. 2. ↑ Gal. i. l. ther churches and the originals of the faith;" because here the Christian doctrine was first sown, and hence planted and propagated to the countries round about; "Ecclesias apud unamquamque civitatem condiderunt, à quibus traducem fidei et semina doctrina, cætera exinde ecclesiæ mutuatæ sunt," as his own words are. send into the world, and that accordingly the all quarters of the world; "their sound going out Holy Ghost was actually sent in him; and there-into all the earth, and their words unto the ends of fore he constituted twelve disciples always to at- the world." It is true, for the more prudent and tend his person, in imitation of the number of the orderly management of things, they are generally apostolic college. And how often the Turkish said by the ancients to have divided the world into impostor does upon this account call himself the so many quarters and portions, to which they were apostle of God, every one that has but once seen severally to betake themselves; Peter to Pontus, the Alcoran is able to tell. Galatia, Cappadocia, &c.; St. John to Asia; St. 5. Fourthly, the main work and employment of Andrew to Scythia, &c. But they did not strictly these apostles was to preach the gospel, to estab- tie themselves to those particular provinces that lish Christianity, and to govern the church that were assigned them, but, as occasion was, made was to be founded, as Christ's immediate deputies excursions into other parts; though for the main and vicegerents: they were to instruct men in the they had a more peculiar inspection over those doctrines of the gospel, to disciple the world, and parts that were allotted to them, usually residing to baptize and initiate men into the faith of Christ; at some principal city of the province; as St. John and to constitute and ordain guides and ministers at Ephesus, St. Philip at Hierapolis, &c.; whence of religion, persons peculiarly set apart for holy they might have a more convenient prospect of ministrations, to censure and punish obstinate and affairs round about them; and hence it was that contumacious offenders, to compose and overrule these places more peculiarly got the title of aposdisorders and divisions, to command or counter-tolical churches, because first planted, or eminently mand as occasion was, being vested with an ex-watered and cultivated by some apostles, matrices traordinary authority and power of disposing things et originales fidei, as Tertullian calls them; "mofor the edification of the church. This office the apostles never exercised in its full extent and latitude during Christ's residence upon earth; for though upon their election he sent them forth to preach and to baptize, yet this was only a narrow and temporary employment, and they quickly returned to their private stations; the main power being still executed and administered by Christ himself, the complete exercise whereof was not actually devolved upon them till he was ready to leave the world: for then it was that he told them, "As my Father hath sent me, even so send I you; receive ye the Holy Ghost; whose soever sins ye remit, they are remitted; and whose soever sins ye retain, they are retained." Whereby he conferred in some proportion the same authority upon them which he himself had derived from his Father. Fifthly, this commission given to the apostles was unlimited and universal, not only in respect of power, as enabling them to discharge all acts of religion, relating either to ministry or government; but in respect of place, not confining them to this or that particular province, but leaving them the whole world as their diocess to preach in, they being destinati nationibus magistri, in Tertullian's phrase, designed to be the masters and instructors of all nations: so runs their commission, "Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature ;" that is, to all men, the naoa Krios of the Evangelist answering to the 6. In pursuance of this general commission, we find the apostles, not long after our Lord's ascension, traversing almost all parts of the then known world: St. Andrew in Scythia, and those northern countries; St. Thomas and Bartholomew in India; St. Simon and St. Mark in Africa, Egypt, and the parts of Libya and Mauritania; St. Paul, and probably Peter, and some others, in the farthest regions of the west; and all this done in the space of less than forty years; viz., before the destruction of the Jewish state, by Titus and the Roman army. For so our Lord had expressly foretold, that "the gospel of the kingdom should be preached in all the world, for a witness unto all nations, before the end came ;"* that is, the end of the Jewish state, which the apostles, a little before, had called "the end of the world," uvredeca Tou alwvos, the shutting up or consummation of the age, the putting a final period to that present state and dispensation that the Jews were under. And indeed strange it is to consider, that in so few years these evangelical messengers should overrun all countries: with what an incredible swiftamongst the Jews, "to all creatures;" whereby ness did the Christian faith, like lightning, pierce they used to denote all men in general, but espe- from east to west, and diffuse itself over all quarcially the Gentiles in opposition to the Jews. In- ters of the world; and that not only unassisted by deed, while our Saviour lived, the apostolical mi- any secular advantages, but in defiance of the nistry extended no farther than Judea ; but he be-most fierce and potent opposition, which every ing gone to heaven, the partition wall was broken down, and their way was open into all places and countries. And herein how admirably did the Christian economy transcend the Jewish dispensation! The preaching of the prophets, like the light that comes in at the window, was confined only to the house of Israel; while the doctrine of the gospel preached by the apostles, was like the light of the sun in the firmament, that diffused its beams and propagated its heat and influence into where set itself against it! It is true, the impostors of Mahomet in a very little time gained a great part of the East; but besides that this was not comparable to the universal spreading of Christianity, his doctrine was calculated on purpose to gratify men's lusts, and especially to comply with the loose and wanton manners of the East; and, which is above all, had the sword to hew out its way before it; and we know how ready, even without force, in all changes and revolutions of the world, the conquered have been to follow the religion of the conquerors. Whereas the apostles had no visible advantages, nay, had all the enraged powers of the world to contend against them. And yet, in despite of all, went on in triumph, and quickly made their way into those places where for so many ages no other conquest ever came: "Those parts of Britain," as Tertullian observes, "which were unconquerable and unapproachable by the power of the Roman armies, submitting their necks to the yoke of Christ." A mighty evidence (as he there argues) of Christ's divinity, and that he was the true Messiah. And, indeed, no reasonable account can be given of the strange and successful progress of the Christian religion in those first ages of it, but that it was the birth of heaven, and had a divine and invisible power going along with it to succeed and prosper it. St. Chrysostom discourses this argument at large, some of whose elegant reasonings I shall here transcribe. He tells the Gentile (with whom he was disputing) that he would not prove Christ's Deity by a demonstration from heaven, by his creation of the world, his great and stupendous miracles, his raising the dead, curing the blind, expelling devils, nor from the mighty promises of a future state, and the resurrection of the dead, (which an infidel might easily not only question but deny,) but from what was sufficiently evident and obvious to the meanest idiot,-his planting and propagating Christianity in the wor.d. For it is not, says he, in the power of a mere man, in so short a time to encircle the world, to compass sea and land, and in matters of so great importance, to rescue mankind from the slavery of absurd and unreasonable customs, and the powerful tyranny of evil habits; and these not Romans only, but Persians, and the most barbarous nations of the world. A reformation which he wrought, not by force and the power of the sword, nor by pouring into the world numerous legions and armies; but by a few inconsiderable men, (no more at first than eleven,) a company of obscure and mean, simple and illiterate, poor and helpless, nak ed and unarmed persons, who had scarce a shoe to tread on, or a coat to cover them. And yet by these he persuaded so great a part of mankind to be able freely to reason, not only of things of the present, but of a future state; to renounce the laws of their country, and throw off those ancient and inveterate customs which had taken root for so many ages, and planted others in their room; and reduced men from those easy ways, whereinto they were hurried, into the more rugged and difficult paths of virtue, All which he did while he had to contend with opposite powers, and when he himself had undergone the most ignominious death, even the death of the cross. Afterwards he addresses himself to the Jew, and discourses with him much after the same rate. Consider, says he, and bethink thyself, what it is in so short a time to fill the whole world with so many famous churches, to convert so many nations to the faith, to prevail with men to forsake the religion of their country, to root up their rites and customs, to shake off the empire of lust and pleasure, and the laws of vice, like dust; to abolish and abominate their temples and their altars, their idols and their sacrifices, their profane and impious festivals, as dirt and dung; and instead hereof to set up Christian altars in all places, among the Romans, Persians, Scythians, Moors, and Indians: and not there only, but in the countries beyond this world of ours. For even the British islands that lie beyond the ocean, and those that are in it, have felt the power of the Christian faith; churches and altars being erected there to the service of Christ. A matter truly great and admirable, and which would clearly have demonstrated a divine and supereminent power, although there had been no opposition in the case, but that all things had run on calmly and smoothly; to think that in so few years the Christian faith should be able to reclaim the whole world from its vicious customs, and to win them over to other manners, more laborious and difficult, repugnant both to their native inclinations and to the laws and principles of their edu cation, and such as obliged them to a more strict and accurate course of life; and these persons not one or two, not twenty or an hundred, but in a manner all mankind; and this brought about by no other instruments than a few rude and unlearned, private and unknown tradesmen, who had neither estate nor reputation, learning nor eloquence, kindred nor country, to recommend them to the world; a few fishermen and tent-makers, and whom, distinguished by their language, as well as their religion, the rest of the world scorned as barbarous. And yet these were the men by whom our Lord built up his church, and extended it from one end of the world unto the other. Other considerations there are, with which the father does urge and illustrate this argument, which I forbear to insist on in this place. 7. Sixthly; the power and authority conveyed by this commission to the apostles was equally conferred upon all of them. They were all chosen at the same time, all equally empowered to preach and baptize, all equally intrusted with the power of binding and loosing, all invested with the same mission, and equally furnished with the same gifts and powers of the Holy Ghost. Indeed the advocates of the church of Rome do, with a mighty zeal and fierceness, contend for St. Peter's being head and prince of the apostles, advanced by Christ to a supremacy and prerogative not only above, but over the rest of the apostles; and not without reason, the fortunes of that church being concerned in the supremacy of St. Peter. No wonder, therefore, they ransack all corners, press and force in whatever may but seem to give countenance to it. Witness those thin and miserable shifts, which Bellarmine calls arguments, to prove and make it good: so utterly devoid of all rational conviction, so unable to justify themselves to sober and considering men, that a man would think they had been contrived for no other purpose than to cheat fools, and make wise men laugh. And the truth is, nothing with me more shakes the reputation of the wisdom of that learned man, than his making use of such weak and trifling arguments in so important, and concerning an article, so vital and essential to the constitution of that church. when he argues Peter's superiority from the mere changing of his name, (for what is this to supremacy? besides that it was not done to him alone, the same being done to James and John,) from his being first reckoned up in the catalogue of apostles, As his walking with Christ upon the water, his paying Peter often named first among the apostles? tribute for his master and himself, his being com- elsewhere others; sometimes James, somemanded to let down the net, and Christ's teaching times Paul and Apollos are placed before him. in Peter's ship, (and this ship must denote the Did Christ honor him with some singular comchurch, and Peter's being owner of it, entitle him mendations? An honorable eulogium conveys no to be supreme ruler and governor of the church; supereminent power and sovereignty. Was he so Bellarmine, in terms as plain as he could well dear to Christ? We know another that was the express it,) from Christ's first washing Peter's feet, "beloved disciple." So little warrant is there to (though the story recorded by the evangelist says exalt one above the rest, where Christ made all no such thing,) and his foretelling only his death: alike. If from Scripture we descend to the anall which, and many more prerogatives of St. Peter, cient writers of the church, we shall find that to the number of no less than twenty-eight, are though the fathers bestow very great and honorasummoned in to give evidence in this cause; and ble titles upon Peter, yet they give the same, or many of these too drawn out of apocryphal and what are equivalent, to others of the apostles. supposititious authors, and not only uncertain, but Hesychius styles St. James the great, "the brother absurd and fabulous; and yet upon such argu- of our Lord, the commander of the new Jerusalem, ments as these do they found his paramount au- the prince of priests, the exarch (or chief) of the thority. A plain evidence of a desperate and sink-apostles, v kepadais kopudny, the top (or crown) ing cause, when such twigs must be laid hold on amongst the heads, the great light amongst the to support and keep it above water. Had they lamps, the most illustrious and resplendent amongst suffered Peter to be content with a primacy of the stars: it was Peter that preached, but it was order, (which his age and gravity seemed to chal- James that made the determination," &c. Of St. lenge for him,) no wise and peaceable man would Andrew he gives this encomium; that "he was the have denied it, as being a thing ordinarily prac- sacerdotal trumpet, the first-born of the apostolical tised among equals, and necessary to the well choir, πρωτοπαγης της εκκλησίας ςυλος, the prime and governing of a society: but when nothing but a firm pillar of the church, Peter before Peter, the primacy of power will serve the turn, as if the rest foundation of the foundation, the first fruits of the of the apostles had been inferior to him, this may beginning." Peter and John are said to be ισότιμοι by no means be granted, as being expressly con- anos, equally honorable." by St. Cyril, with trary to the positive determination of our Saviour, his whole synod of Alexandria. "St. John," says when the apostles were contending about this very Chrysostom, "was Christ's beloved, the pillar of thing, "Which of them should be accounted the all the churches in the world, who had the keys greatest;"* he thus quickly decides the case: of heaven, drank of the Lord's cup, was washed The kings of the Gentiles exercise lordship over with his baptism, and with confidence lay in his them, and they that are great, exercise authority bosom." And of St. Paul he tells us, that "he upon them. But ye shall not be so: but whosoever was the most excellent of all men, the teacher of will be great among you, let him be your minister; the world, the bridegroom of Christ, the planter of and whosoever will be chief among you, let him be the church, the wise master-builder, greater than your servant." Than which nothing could have the apostles ;" and much more to the same purbeen more peremptorily spoken, to rebuke this pose. Elsewhere he says, that "the care of the naughty spirit of pre-eminence. Nor do we ever whole world was committed to him; that nothing find St. Peter himself laying claim to any such pow- could be more noble or illustrious: yea, that (his er, or the apostles giving him the least shadow of miracles considered) he was more excellent than it. In the whole course of his affairs there are no kings themselves." And a little after he calls him intimations of this matter: in his epistle he styles" the tongue of the earth, the light of the churches, himself but their " fellow presbyter ;” and express- τον θεμέλιον της πιστεως, τον ξύλον κι εδραίωμα τηστ αληθείας. ly forbids the governors of the church to "lord it the foundation of the faith, the pillar and ground over God's heritage." When despatched by the of truth." And in a discourse on purpose, wherein rest of the apostles upon a message to Samaria, he compares Peter and Paul together, he makes he never disputes their authority to do it: when them of equal esteem and virtue; τι Πετρου μείζον ; accused by them for going in unto the Gentiles, Ti de Пavλov 'Gov; What greater than Peter? What does he stand upon his prerogative? no, but sub-equal to Paul? a blessed pair! Grubiga Day TOV missively apologizes for himself: nay, when smart-Kopov ras Yuxas, who had the souls of the whole ly reproved by St. Paul at Antioch, (when, if ever, world committed to their charge." But instances his credit lay at stake,) do we find him excepting against it as an affront to his supremacy, and a saucy controling his superior? Surely quite the contrary: he quietly submitted to the reproof, as one that was sensible how justly he had deserved it. Nor can it be supposed but that St. Paul would have carried it towards him with a greater reverence, had any such peculiar sovereignty been then known to the world. How confidently does St. Paul assert himself to be no whit "inferior to the chiefest apostles," not to Peter himself? "the gospel of the uncircumcision being committed to him, as that of the circumcision was to Peter." Is of this nature were endless and infinite. If the fathers at any time style Peter prince of the apostles, they mean no more by it than the best and purest Latin writers mean by princeps; the first or chief person of the number, more considerable than the rest, either for his age or zeal. Thus Eusebius tells us, "Peter was Tv λonwy aжAVTWV onyopos, the prolocutor of all the rest, aperηs Eveka for the greatness and generosity of his mind :" that is, in Chrysostom's language, he was "the mouth and chief of the apostles, o navraxov Sepμos, because eager and forward at every turn, and ready to answer those questions which were put to others." In short, as he had no prerogative above the rest, besides his being the chairman and pre sident of the assembly; so was it granted to him upon no other considerations than those of his age, zeal, and gravity, for which he was more eminent than the rest. they were as competent judges as the acutest philosopher in the world. Nor could there be any just reason to suspect that they imposed upon men in what they delivered; for besides their naked 8. We proceed next to inquire into the fitness plainness and simplicity in all other passages of and qualification of the persons commissioned for their lives, they cheerfully submitted to the most this employment; and we shall find them admira- exquisite hardships, tortures, and sufferings, merely bly qualified to discharge it, if we consider this to attest the truth of what they published to the following account. First, they immediately receiv- world. Next to the evidence of our own senses, ed the doctrine of the gospel from the mouth of no testimony is more valid and forcible than his Christ himself: he intended them for legati à who relates what himself has seen. Upon this aclatere, his peculiar ambassadors to the world, and count our Lord told his apostles, "that they should therefore furnished them with instructions from his be witnesses to him both in Judea and Samaria, own mouth; and in order hereunto he trained and to the uttermost parts of the earth."* And so them up for some years under his own discipline necessary a qualification of an apostle was this and institution; he made them to understand the thought to be, that it was almost the only condition "mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, when to propounded in the choice of a new apostle, after others it was not given;" treated them with the the fall of Judas: "Wherefore," says Peter, "of affection of a father, and the freedom and famili- these men which have companied with us all the arity of a friend. "Henceforth I call you not ser- time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us, vants; for the servant knoweth not what his Lord beginning from the baptism of John, unto the same doeth: but I have called you friends; for all things day that he was taken up from us, must one be that I have heard of my Father I have made ordained to be a witness with us of his resurrec known unto you."* They heard all his sermons, tion." Accordingly we find the apostles constantly were privy both to his public and private dis- making use of this argument as the most rational courses; what he preached abroad he expounded evidence to convince those whom they had to deal to them at home: he gradually instructed them in with. "We are witnesses of all things which the knowledge of divine things, and imparted to Jesus did, both in the land of the Jews and in Jerusathem the notions and mysteries of the gospel, not lem; whom they slew and hanged on a tree: him all at once, but as they were able to bear them. God raised up the third day, and showed him openBy which means they were sufficiently capable of ly, not to all the people, but unto witnesses chosen giving a satisfactory account of that doctrine to before of God, even to us, who did eat and drink others, which had been so immediately, so frequent- with him after he rose from the dead; and he comly communicated to themselves. Secondly, they manded us to preach unto the people, and to testify were infallibly secure from error in delivering the that it is he that is ordained of God to be judge of doctrines and principles of Christianity: for though the quick and dead." Thus St. John after the they were not absolutely privileged from failures same way of arguing, appeals to sensib.e demonand miscarriages in their lives, (these being of stration: "That which was from the beginning, more personal and private consideration,) yet were which we have heard, which we have seen with our they infallible in their doctrine, this being a matter eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands whereupon the salvation and eternal interests of have handled, of the word of life: (for the life was men did depend. And for this end they had the manifested, and we have seen it, and bear witness, "spirit of truth" promised to them, who should and show unto you that eternal life which was with "guide them into all truth." Under the conduct the Father, and was manifested unto us :) that of this unerring guide they all steered the same which we have seen and heard declare we unto course, and taught and spake the same things, you, that ye also might have fellowship with us."|| though at different times, and in distant places: This, to name no more, St. Peter thought a suffiand for what was consigned to writing, "all Scrip- cient vindication of the apostolical doctrine from ture was given by inspiration of God, and the holy the suspicion of forgery and imposture: "We men spake not but as they were moved by the have not followed cunningly devised fables, when Holy Ghost." Hence that exact and admirable we made known unto you the power and coming harmony that is in all their writings and relations, of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eye-witnesses as being all equally dictated by the same spirit of of his majesty." God had frequently given testruth. Thirdly, they had been eye-witnesses of timony to the divinity of our blessed Saviour, by all the material passages of our Saviour's life, con- visible manifestations and appearances from heatinually conversant with him from the commenc-ven, and particularly by an audible voice: "This ing of his public ministry till his ascension into hea- is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." ven: they had surveyed all his actions, seen all his Now "this voice which came from heaven," says miracles, observed the whole method of his con- he, "we heard when we were with him in the versation, and some of them attended him in his holy mount." most private solitudes and retirements. And this could not but be a very rational satisfaction to the minds of men, when the publishers of the gospel solemnly declared to the world, that they reported nothing concerning our Saviour but what they had seen with their own eyes, and of the truth whereof * John xv. 15. + Ibid. xvi. 13. 9. Fourthly; the apostles were invested with a power of working miracles, as the readiest means to procure their religion a firm belief and entertainment in the minds of men. For the miracles are the great confirmation of the truth of any doctrine, and the most rational evidence of a divine |