virtue, on the one hand, or to relieve predestined mifery, on the other; to adapt itself, in fhort, to our neceffities by a clear discovery of its will in those many intricate fituations, which perplex human prudence, elude human forefight, and, but for this previous admonition, would bear too hard on the natural force, or infirmity of the human mind? Some fuch idea, as this, was plainly entertained by those of the Pagan philofophers who concluded, from the existence of a divine power, that there must needs be fuch a thing as divination [c]. They thought the attributes of their gods, any fuch there were, concerned in giving fome notice of futurity to mankind.

if

2. Others, again, encouraged in this con jectural ingenuity by partial views of fcripture, come to persuade themselves that prophecy is an act of Special grace and favour, not to this or that ftate, or individuals, indifcriminately, as either may seem to stand in need of it; but to one peculiar and

[c] Si dii funt, eft divinatio.

chofen

chofen people, who, on fome account or other, had merited this extraordinary dif tinction.

Self-love feems to have fuggefted this idea to the antient and modern Jews; and many others, I doubt, are ready enough to fuppofe with them, that prophecy, under the Mofaic difpenfation, had no other reafonable use, or end.

3. Laftly, there are those who erect their thoughts to nobler contemplations, and conclude that this intercourfe between heaven and earth can only be carried on with the fublime view of preferving an awful sense of providence in an impious and careless world.

of

Vanity, or fuperftition, may they say, has fuggested to particular men, or to focieties men, that their personal or civil concerns are of moment enough to be the subject of divine prophecies, vouchfafed merely for their own proper relief or fatisfaction. But nothing less than the maintenance of God's fupreme authority over his moral creation.

could

could be an object worthy of his interpofing in the affairs of men, in fo remarkable a manner. To keep alive in their

minds a prevailing fenfe of their dependance upon him, is, then, the ultimate end of prophecy and what more fuitable (will they perhaps add, when warmed with this moral enthusiasm,) to the best ideas we can form of divine wisdom, than that this celeftial light fhould be afforded to fuch ages or nations as are most in want of that great and falutary principle?

There is reafon to believe, that many of the antient fpeculatifts reasoned thus on the fubject of divination. For, as they argued from the existence of their gods, to the neceffity of divination; fo, again, they turned the argument the other way, and from the reality of divination, inferred the existence and providence of their gods [d]. In drawing the former conclufion, they fhewed themselves to be in the system of those who maintain, that the end of pro- . [d] Si divinatio fit, dii funt,

phecy

phecy is the inftruction of men in their civib or perfonal concerns: when they drew the latter, they seemed to efpoufe the more enlarged fentiments of fuch as make the end of prophecy to be, The inftruction of men in the general concerns of religion.

I omit other inftances, that might be given; and concern myself no further with thefe, than just to obferve from them; That the foundation of all fuch fyftems is laid in the prejudices of their respective patrons; conjecturing rather what use might be made of this faculty, and to what purpose men, according to their different views or capacities, would probably apply it, than regarding it, with due reverence, as directed by the fpirit of God. For then they would fee, that not one of those ends, nor any other of human conjecture, could be fafely relied upon, as being that of prophetic infpiration. Not that all these ends need be rejected as manifeftly unworthy of the divine intention; perhaps, each of them, in a certain

fense,

fenfe, and with fome proper limitation, might without impiety, be conceived to enter into it. But neither could it be prefumed, if none of thofe ends could have been pointed out, that therefore there was no reasonable end of divine prophecy; nor could it with modefty be affirmed that the nobleft of these ends was certainly that, which the wifdom of God propofed chiefly and untimately to accomplish by it, unless the information had been given by himself.

III. But this folly of commenting on prophecy by the falfe lights of the imagi nation is never more confpicuous, than when the DISPENSATION of this gift, I meah the mode of its conveyance, comes to exercise the curiofity of prefumptuous men.

"If it be true, will some fay, that the Supreme Being hath at any time condefcended to enlighten human ignorance by a dif covery of future events, thefe divine notices, whatever the end or subject of them