I mean the lives and manners of thofe holy men, who believed in Chrift during the first ages of Chriftianity. I fhould be thought to advance a paradox, fhould I affirm that there were more Chriftians in the world, during those times of perfecution, than there are at present in these which we call the flourishing times of Christianity. But this will be found an indifputable truth, if we form our calculation upon the opinions which prevailed in those days, that every one who lives in the habitual practice of any voluntary fin, actually cuts himself off from the benefits and profeffion of Christianity, and whatever he may call himself, is in reality no Chriftian, nor ought to be efteemed as fuch.

II. In the times we are now furveying, the Christian religion fhowed its full force and efficacy on the minds of men, and by many examples demonftrated what great and generous fouls it was capable of producing. It exalted and refined its profelytes to a very high degree of perfection, and set them far above the pleafures, and even the pains, of this life. It ftrengthened the infirmity, and broke the fierceness of human nature. It lifted up

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the minds of the ignorant to the knowledge and worship of him that made them, and infpired the vicious with a rational devotion, a ftrict purity of heart, and an unbounded love to their fellowcreatures. In proportion as it fpread through the world, it feemed to change mankind into another fpecies of Beings. No fooner was a convert initiated into it, but by an eafy figure he became a New Man, and both acted and looked upon himself as one regenerated and born a fecond time into another state of exiftence.

III. It is not my bufinefs to be more particular in the accounts of primitive Chriftianity, which have been exhibited fo well by others, but rather to observe, that the Pagan converts, of whom I am now fpeaking, mention this great reformation, of those who had been the greateft finners, with that fudden and furprifing change which it made in the lives of the moft profligate, as having fomething in it fupernatural, miraculous, and more than human. Origen reprefents this power in the Chriftian religion, as no lefs wonderful than that of curing the lame and blind, or cleanfing the leper.

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Many others reprefent it in the fame light, and looked upon it as an argument that there was a certain divinity in that religion, which showed itself in fuch strange and glorious effects.

IV. This therefore was a great means not only of recommending Christianity to honeft and learned heathens, but of confirming them in the belief of our Sa viour's history, when they faw multitudes of virtuous men daily forming themselves upon his example, animated by his precepts, and actuated by that fpirit which he had promifed to fend among his Difciples.

V. But I find no argument made a ftronger impreffion on the minds of thefe eminent Pagan converts, for ftrengthening their faith in the hiftory of our Sa viour, than the predictions relating to him in those old prophetic writings, which were depofited among the hands of the greatest enemies to Christianity, and owned by them to have been extant many ages before his appearance. The learned heathen converts were astonished to see the whole history of their Saviour's. life published hefore he was born, and to find that the Evangelifts and Prophets,

in their accounts of the Meffiah, differed only in point of time, the one foretelling what fhould happen to him, and the other defcribing thofe very particulars as what had actually happened. This our Saviour himself was pleased to make use of as the strongest argument of his being the promised Meffiab, and without it would hardly have reconciled his Difciples to the ignominy of his death, as in that remarkable paffage which mentions his conversation with the two Difciples, on the day of his refurrection: St. Luke xxiv. 13. to the end.

VI. The heathen converts after having travelled through all human learning, and fortified their minds with the knowledge of arts and fciences, were particularly qualified to examine these prophecies with great care and impartiality, and without prejudice or prepoffeffion. If the Jews on the one fide put an unnatural interpretation on thefe prophecies, to evade the force of them in their controverfies with the Chriftians; or if the Chriftians on the other fide over-ftrained feveral paffages in their applications of them, as it often happens among men of the best understanding, when their minds

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are heated with any confideration that bears a more than ordinary weight with it: The learned heathens may be looked upon as neuters in the matter, when all these prophecies were new to them, and their education had left the interpretation of them free and indifferent. Befides these learned men among the primitive Chriftians, knew how the Jews, who had preceded our Saviour, interpreted thefe predictions, and the feveral marks by which they acknowledged the Meffiah would be difcovered, and how those of the Jewish Doctors who fucceeded him, had deviated from the interpretations and doctrines of their forefathers, on purpose to ftifle their own conviction.

VII. This fet of arguments had therefore an invincible force with thofe Pagan Philofophers who became Chriftians, as we find in moft of their writings. They could not disbelieve our Saviour's hiftory, which fo exactly agreed with every thing that had been written of him many ages before his birth, nor doubt of thofe circumstances be.ng fulfilled in him, which could not be true of any perfon that lived in the world befides

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