II. unto them in ALL the scriptures the things con- SERMON cerning himself. The Apostles of Jesus are frequent and large in the same appeal to the spirit of prophecy. Those things, says St. Peter to the Jews, which God had shewed by the mouth of ALL his prophets, that Christ should suffer, he hath so fulfilled. And, again, after quoting the authority of Moses, Yea, and ALL the prophets from Samuel, and those that follow after, as many as have spoken, have likewise foretold of these days 5. St. Paul seems to have composed some entire epistlesh, with a view of shewing that Christ was prefigured in the Law itself, and that He was, in truth, the substance of the whole Jewish dispensation. So thoroughly, according to him, did the spirit of prophecy pervade that system, and so clearly did it bear testimony to Jesus! Whence, in his apology before Agrippa, we find him asserting of the whole Christian doctrine, that he said none g Acts iii. 24. See also Acts x. 43. 1 Pet. i. 10. h See especially the Epistles to the Hebrews, and Gala tians. SERMON other things than those which the prophets and Moses did say should come1. More citations cannot be necessary on so plain a point. And I bring these to shew, not the truth of the principle itself (which is not now under consideration) but the certainty of the interpretation, here given to the text. For I make it say no more (though it says it indeed more precisely) than the scriptures themselves were understood by the Jews to say, and are represented by Jesus and his Apostles, as actually saying, when I affirm its sense to be, "That the scope and end of prophecy was the testimony of Jesus." On this principle, then, we are to regulate all our reasonings on the subject of prophecy. They who maintain, and they who would confute, its pretensions, must equally go on this supposition. If the system of prophecy can be justified, or so far as it can be justified, on these grounds, the defence must be thought solid and satisfactory; because those grounds are not arbitrarily assumed, but are such as that system itself acknowledges. On the con i Acts xxvi. 22. See farther, Acts xxviii. 23. Rom. iii. 21. Eph. ii. 19, &c. trary, whatever advantage may be fairly taken of those grounds to discredit prophecy, must needs be allowed, for the same reason. Again: On the believer's scheme, that prophecy is of divine inspiration, there can be no presumption in arguing from the grounds, here supposed, in favour of prophecy. Because, though all conclusions from a principle of human invention, must be hazardous and rash, yet from a principle of divine authority, many sober and just inferences may be drawn. For it is one thing, to discover a principle, and another, to argue justly and cogently from it. On the other hand, the unbeliever, who regards the whole system of prophecy as of human invention, must yet be allowed to argue pertinently from the same grounds, because they are the proper grounds of that system: his arguments may be rightly formed, though the principle, from which he argues, appear to him of no authority. The rules of logic will indeed oblige him to argue on that principle; for, otherwise, he combats, not his adversary's position, but a phantom of his own raising. SERMON II. SERMON 11. Having premised thus much concerning the right interpretation of the text, and the important relation it bears to the present subject, I should now proceed to inquire what conclusions naturally and fairly result from it. For from this assumption, that Jesus is the end of prophecy, it will, I think, follow very evidently, that the greater part of those objections which make so much noise, and are so confidently urged, on the subject of prophecy, have no force at all in them. But, before we enter on that task, it may be useful to consider more particularly what the ASSUMED PRINCIPLE itself is, and to pause a while in contemplation of this idea. The text, as here interpreted, and in full consonance with the tenor of the sacred writings, implies this fact-that Prophecy in general (that is, all the prophecies of the Old and New Testament) hath its ultimate accomplishment in the history and dispensation of Jesus. But now, if we look into those writings, we find, 1. That prophecy is of a prodigious extent; that it commenced from the fall of man, and reaches to the consummation of all II. things that, for many ages, it was delivered SERMON darkly, to few persons, and with large intervals from the date of one prophecy to that of another; but, at length, became more clear, more frequent, and was uniformly carried on in the line of one people, separated from the rest of the world, among other reasons assigned, for this principally, to be the repository of the divine oracles: that, with some intermission, the spirit of prophecy subsisted among that people, to the coming of Christ: that He himself and his Apostles exercised this power in the most conspicuous manner; and left behind them many predictions, recorded in the books of the New Testament, which profess to respect very distant events, and even run out to the end of time, or, in St. John's expression, to that period, when the mystery of God shall be perfected. 2. Further, besides the extent of this prophetic scheme, the dignity of the Person, whom it concerns, deserves our consideration. He is described in terms, which excite the most august and magnificent ideas. He is spoken of, indeed, sometimes as being the seed of the woman, and as the son of man; yet so as being at the same time of more than mortal k Rev. x. 7. |