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on the rebellious Israelites: they were deprived of the extraordinary Providence: and were yet held subject to the Theocracy, as appears from the Sentence pronounced upon them, by the mouth of the Prophet Ezekiel:-"Ye polluted yourselves with your idols " even unto this day and shall I be enquired of by you, house of Israel? As I live, saith the Lord God, I will not be enquired of by you. And that "which cometh into your mind shall not be at all, that ye say, We will be as the Heathen, as the Families of the Countries, to serve food and Stone. As I "live, saith the Lord, with a mighty Hand, and with a stretched-out Arm, and with Fury poured out, "will I rule over you. And I will bring you out from the People, and will gather you out of the Countries wherein ye are scattered, with a mighty "Hand, and with a stretched-out Arm, and with Fury poured out. And I will bring you into the Wilderness of the People, and there will I plead with you Face to Face. Like as I pleaded with your “Fathers in the Wilderness of the Land of Egypt, so "will I plead with you, saith the Lord. And I will

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cause you to pass under the Rod, and I will bring " you into the BOND OF THE COVENANT." Chap. xx. ver. 31-37. It is here we see denounced, that the extraordinary Providence should be withdrawn; or, in Scripture phrase, that God would not be enquired of by them; That they should remain in this condition, which their Fathers had occasionally felt in the wilderness, when the extraordinary Providence, for their signal disobedience, was, from time to time, suspended : And yet, that, though they strove to disperse themselves amongst the People round about, and projected in their minds to be as the heathen, and the families of the Countries, to serve wood and stone, they should still be I 4

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under

under the government of a THEOCRACY; Which, when administered without an extraordinary Providence, the blessing, naturally attendant on it, was, and was justly called, THE ROD AND BOND OF THE COVENANT.

But now if you will believe a Professor of Divinity and a no less eminent dealer in Laws, the case grows worse and worse, and, from a contradiction in my system, it becomes a contradiction in God's. For thus Dr. RUTHERFORTII descants upon the matter: "As the Law was gradually deprived of its

Sanction, the Obligation of it grew continually "weaker, till at last, after the people were returned "from the Captivity, it must have ceased to oblige "them at all. For whatever may be the case of God's "MORAL LAW, yet most certainly, as he withdraws "the Sanctions of his POSITIVE ones, he takes off something from their obligation; and when he has wholly withdrawn the promise of reward and the "threatening of punishment, THOSE LAWS OBLIGE "NO LONGER." p. 329. To this Determination of the learned Professor, concerning OBLIGATION, I have nothing to oppose but the Determination of GOD himself: who, by the mouth one of his Prophets, declares, That the Laws shall still oblige, though the Sanction be withdrawn. "Ye pollute yourselves with your Idols," &c.—as the reader may find it transcribed just above. Here God declares he would withdraw that extraordinary Providence which naturally attended a THEOCRACY I will not be enquired of by you. "Yet do not (says he) deceive yourselves in an expectation that, because for your crimes I withdraw this sanction of my Law, the Law will oblige no longerand that which cometh into your mind shall not be at all, that ye say we will be as the heathen: For, in order to the bringing about my own great purposes, I will

still continue you a select and sequestered people-I will bring you out from the people, and will gather you out from the Countries wherein you are scattered. And will still rule over you by my Law; now, in my wrath, as before in my mercy. With fury poured out I will rule over you, and bring you into the bond of the Covenant."

I suppose the thing that led our Doctor into this rash judgment, That when the sanctions of a positive law are withdrawn, the obligation to the law ceases, was his totally misunderstanding the principles of the best writers on the Law of Nature: Not by their fault, I dare assure the Reader.-The Law of Nature is written in the heart; but by Whom, is the question. And a question of much importance; for if not written by a competent Obliger it is no Law, to bind us. The enquirers therefore into this matter had no other way of coming to the Author of the Law, but by considering the effects which the observance or inobservance of it would have on mankind. And they found that the observance tended to the benefit of all, the inobservance to their destruction. They concluded therefore that it must needs have been given by God, as a Law to mankind; and these effects of its observance or inobservance they called the sanction. Hence it appears that the knowledge of our obligation to the Law of nature arises from the knowledge of the sunction. And, this sanction away, we had not been obliged, bccause we could never have discovered any real ground of obligation.

But the positive Law of the Jews was written in stone by the finger of God, in a visible manner; in which the senses of the People were appealed to, for the truth of the transaction. Here the knowledge of their obligation did not arise from their knowledge of

the

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the sanction, but from quite another thing, namely, the immediate knowledge they had by their senses, thať God, their sovereign Lord and Master, gave them the Law. To inforce which, a sanction indeed was added ; but a sanction that added nothing to the obligation, nor consequently that took from it, when it was withdrawn.

Yet so

This is a plain and clear state of the case. miserably has our Professor mistaken it, that for want of seeing on what principle it was which the writers on the Law of Nature proceeded, when they supposed obligation to depend on the sanction, he hath, of a particular case, made a general maxim: and in applying that maxim, he hath turned every thing topsyturvy, and given us just the reverse of the medal. He supposes the taking the sanction from the moral Law might not destroy the obligation (which it certainly would)-whatsover, says he, might be the cause of God's moral Laws; and that taking away the sanction from his positive Law would destroy the obligation (which it certainly would not).

What might further mislead our Professor (for the more such men read, the less they understand) is the attribute the Roman Lawyers give to such civil Laws ase are made without a penal sanction. These they are wont to call, Leges imperfecte: And our great Civilian might believe that this assigned imperfection, had a reference to the obligation they imposed, whereas it refers to the efficacy they were able to work. He should have known at least this first principle of Law, That it is the AUTHORITY of the Lawgiver, not the SANCTION he annexes to his Law, which makes it, I will not say, OPERATE properly (for this is nothing to the purpose), but makes it OBLIGE really, which is only to the purpose. In-a word, I know of nobody

but

but HOBBES, besides this Doctor, who pretended to teach that the obligation to Laws depended upon their sanction and this he did, because he derived all right. and wrong from the Civil Magistrate: which, for. aught I know, our learned Professor may do likewise, as only mistaking right and wrong (by a blunder like to the foregoing) for good and evil. Yet hath this grave man written most enormously both on Laws and MORALS: And is indeed a great Writer, just as the mighty Giant, Leon Gawer, was a great Builder; of whom the Monk of Chester so sweetly sings: "The Founder of this City, as saith Polychronicon, "Was Leon Gawer, a mighty strong Giant, "Which builded Caves and Dungeons many a one: "No goodly Building, ne proper, ne pleasant."

But our business at present is not with the actual administration of an extraordinary Providence, but with the Scripture representation of such an administration. And this the sacred history of the Jews attests in one uniform unvaried manner; as well by recording many instances of it in particular, as by constantly referring to it in general.

I. The first is in the History of MIRACLES. For.. an equal Providence being, by the nature of man's situation and affairs, necessarily administered partly by ordinary and partly by extraordinary means, these latter produce what we call Miracles, the subject of the sacred Writers their more peculiar regard. But I apprehend it would be thought presuming too much on the reader's patience, to expect his attention, while I set myself formally to prove that many miracles are related in the sacred history of the Israelites.

The simpler sort of Deists fairly confess that the Bible records the working of many Miracles, as ap-. pears even from the free names they give to those

accounts.

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