Page images
PDF
EPUB

where we fhould end the old race. When we find our church, in our latter days, pestered, feftered, inthralled, befet, furrounded and hemmed in, not only by the old lice, but their young nits; fuch as Whitfieldlights. Weftleyfhites, Madenites, New-lights, Perfectionists, and without number. But my confeffion is, the Prefbyterians and Papifts always have and ever will be my averfion; my reasons are permanent. The Calvinist robs me of fpirituals; the Papifts (if they should be restored to their birthright) of all my temporal immunities; fo that betwixt the two ftools, as you feem now placed, poor bumfiddle must kiss the ground. You obferve how I totter, though in my bifhop's chair, robed and crown'd in my mitred Cap. (Luther feated in a chair of eafe, mounted on two ftools, robed in a loose fcarlet rochet and crowned with a bishop's cap). Hey day, Tan-ta-ta-ra-ra, mask all, mafk all, fing tanta-ta-ra-ra rogues all, or the like of that.

Boy. What are the points you would wish to difcufs in this day's debate?

Mofes. The feventh was a day of reft. May the Almighty be merciful and grant my long wifh for reft, which I have been in fearch of from my youth, the cause which has intailed the unfathomable miferies on my nation.

Luther. 'Come under my wing as a chick under its dam and I will nourish you. The christian covenant is the reft into which the Jewish or old covenant muft, according to divine appointment, be translated.

H 2

Boy.

Boy. And the christian into blifs eternal. Moses. Prove Jefus the Meffiah, and I am a christian.

Luther. This will add redundancy to my happiness, and add force, strength and vigour for purging our fcriptures and common-prayer book from Prefbyterian or Calvinistical errors and contradictions; fo that a child may convert an old man, with what cannot be gainfaid, and I lead you triumphant metamorphofed to my metropolitan chair of Canterbury. Amen. Turn again, Whittington, thrice Lord-Mayor of London. These will be happy tidings for Old England, and difpel the meafly tribe of fycophants who have intruded, as Judas, for miserly views, into the priesthood, to betray the innocent. O Stillinfleet, Tillotfon, Burnet, Covil, Marshall, Mead, Hammond, Newton, and many more of this tribe, whose writings, ftuffed as a hagges with blafphemous contractions as troubled waters, put to fhame our new Sion. Boy. You grant a new covenant.

Mofes. Granted according to the fcriptures. Luther. By all means.

Boy: A legiflator.

Mofes. The Meffiah.

Luther. It would be pish to deny.

Boy. The time marked out.

Mofes. At the time of Jefus, whom you call Chrift.

Luther. The matter bears a pleasant face.
Boy. This Meffiah to be from David.

Mofes. And to be feated on his throne, and

bring all nations under fubjection,

Luther.

Luther. It must be a pretty thing, and I hold myfelf highly exalted, and most eminent.

Boy. You grant truth, force, efficacy, and completion to the prophecies.

Mofes. Our fcriptures are unalterable, being immediately from the High and eternal God. Luther. Of whom we receive all our good things.

Boy. To grant the prophecies their due completion, you must allow two periods, or stated times for the Meffiah's appearing in the world; the first, as a fervant, or man of forrow and fufferings, which must be sealed by his death, for the redemption and falvation of man. The fecond, in his glory, to put an end to our mortality, and render to each of us our due reward.

Mofes. If you can make this clear, you will remove the partition-wall that divides us, and take away many dark paffages and feeming contradictions in our prophecies.

Luther. The priest's lips diftil wisdom. Boy. The kings of the earth ftood up, and the princes affembled together against the Lord and against this Chrift.

Mofes, We acknowledge Herod, Pontius Pilate, Annas, Caiphas, and rulers of the people fat in judgment, condemned and put to death Jefus for calling himself the Christ'; but this does not prove him the Meffiah.

Luther. It was an error in judgment.

Boy. Saith the angel Gabriel to Daniel, feventy weeks are determined upon thy people, and upon thy holy city, to punifh the tranfgreffion, and to make an end of fins, and to

H 3

make

make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteoufnefs, and to feal up the vifion and prophecy, and to anoint the moft holy. Know, therefore, and understand, that from the going forth of the commandment, to restore and to build Jerufalem unto the Meffiah, the prince fhall be feven weeks; and three fcore and two weeks the street shall be built again, and the wall even in troublesome times; and after three fcore and two weeks fhall the Meffiah be cut off, but not for himself, and the people of the prince that fhall come shall destroy the city and the fanctuary, and the end thereof shall be with a flood; and unto the end of the war defolations are determined, and he fhall confirm the covenant with many for one week; and in the midst of the week he fhall cause the facrifice and the oblation to ceafe, and for the overfpreading of abominations he shall make it defolate, even until the confummation, and that determined, fhall be poured upon the defolate.

Mofes. This prophecy is clear, taken each day for a year, from the going forth of the commandment, or decree, from the king of Perfia to rebuild Jerufalem. To the date of your Meffiah, this both the Jews and chriftians concur, and are agreed; but that Jefus, who was executed as a common malefactor, can be our Meffiah, this is impoffible, therefore, cannot be granted.

Luther. If Jefus is not the Chrift, unless you can produce fome one intitled to that dignity, both law and prophets fall and become abortive,

and

and you abandoned, and as you well obferved, a bye-word and proverb throughout the earth, and this melancholy and deplorable state of Ifrael dates its mifery from the rejection of Jefus Chrift. In my forrow I exult, as Sampfon over the Philistines, and I now have you hip and thigh. What a far-fetched shift of one of your great men to fcreen, cover, conceal, hide, and amufe his poor deluded nation, in the dark veil of their obduracy and feduction, given out that their Meffiah, according to promife, came into the world, but could not manifeft himself, fin being prevalent; but at a proper period he will appear a great and magnificent prince, and bring back the twelve tribes of Ifrael from all parts of the earth to Paleftine, rebuild Jerufalem and temple, and renew the facrifices and other parts of the Jewish worship and reign in glory, bringing all the earth under His fubjection, themselves to be in full peace, fitting under their fig-trees, and feafting in every pleafure and voluptuoufnefs: in the mean time he is refting in the fea.

Boy. This extravagance is fimilar and equal proteftancy, both denying the accomplishment of the prophecies, the Jews denying their putting to death their Meffiah and being rejected, until the times or converfion of the Gentiles, when themselves will also be converted; and the proteftant, for denying that Jefus Chrift reigns and governs his holy church until the end of the world.

Mofes. You err in putting Ifrael on a level with herefy; we are poffeffed of a contract, or

H 4

covenant,

« PreviousContinue »