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building connection, which you requested, of ne service the affairs of the Jews from the death of Nehemiah, or the settling of the canon of the Old Testament, to the coming of Christ, from whence the New Testament begins; which from the creation, was, according to the exactest computation, the 4000th year of the world.

nine years gh a great id artificers finishing the our Saviour's lorus was ap.

pointed governor of Judea, he dis. charged 18,000 workmen from the temple at one time. And here it should be observed that these, for want of employment, began those tumults and seditions, which after wards drew on the destruciion both Of the temple and Jerusalem.

Thus I have finished that brief

S. What was the general state of the heathen world about this time?

T. It was in profouud peace under Augustus emperor of Rome; to whose jurisdiction, all the known parts of the earth were subjected, when Christ was born.

THE END OF THE

HISTORY OF THE OLD TESTAMENT.

THE

NEW TESTAMENT

EXPLAINED BY

QUESTION AND ANSWER.

CHAP. I

Reasons why the Old Law gave place to the New Covenant. Of the Authors and Books of the New Testamen. Of St. John the Baptist. The Concep tion of the Virgin Mary. The Birth of Jesus Christ. The Murder of the Innocents, and Death of Herod. The Education of Jesus. The Preaching of John the Baptist. Of the Pharisees, Sadducees and Publicans. Jesus baptised of John; fasted forty Days, and is tempted in the Wilderness.

Scholar.

in the gospel of Jesus Christ. But

DID the old law gi
ID the old law give place to the cerimonial law being of posi-

Tutor. Yes.

S. It is written, that the old law should be an everlasting covenant; how then could it give place to the gospel, or to the new covenant ?

T. I will explain this matter brief.

ly. You must remember that the Jewish laws were of several sorts, moral, cerimonial, and judicial. The moral, which contained their duty to God, their neighbour, and to themselves, is that law of the old covenant, which is everlasting, the reason of and relation between these perpetually subsisting; and it is so far from being repealed, that it is much enforced, and highly exalted

tive institution, and a typical nature, relating only to the purifications, sacrifices, and other religious rites, which could never make the comers thereunto perfect, was never therefore prescribed as of perpetual obligation, as containing matters of real and intrinsic goodness; but only were substituted in the room, and appointed to prefigure such good things as God had promised in his due time and manner he would realise, and is now abrogated and supplied by the coming and institutions of Jesus Christ, his person and offices being the things they were set and intended to shew forth and as to the judicial faw,

by which the Jewish commonwealth was governed, this was entirely abolished at the dissolution of their state and government; nor was there ever any promise that it should continue for ever. You may indeed meet with some passages in the scriptures, wherein some of these latter sort of observances are said to be appointed for ever. But a little attention to the meaning of this expression, in other parts of scripture, together with those wherein a new covenant, to which the world should be called, is plainly promised, will prevent your misunderstanding the term of the duration of those ordinances, or tak. ing the expression in its strictest sense. It here denotes no more than

a long time, during which the Jew. isha state and policy should continue; limited according to the nature of the thing, and determinable at the will of the Almighty legislator; who at first created and established them.

S. What do you properly mean by the gospel?

T. It is the history of the conception, birth, life, and doctrines of our Saviour Jesus Christ to which we may add the acts and writings of his holy apostles. In these are contained the glad tidings of the kingdom of God, and the free of fers of his grace and truth to manhind. In these life and immortality are brought to light; and in these is contained a revelation of the pow er and will of God, for the salva. tion of all those, that believe in his Son; and this is properly called the covenant of grace, in opposition to the former, which was the covenant of works.

S. How many parts or books does the New Testament contain:

T Four gospels; the acts of the apostles; fourteen epistles by St. Paul; one by St. James: two by St. Peter; three by St. John, and one by St. Jude; besides the reve 1..tion of John the divine.

S. Who were the gospels written by?

T. By St. Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, who are called Evangelists. S. Do all these evangelists recite the same things?

T. Not always: each of them seems to have had his particular view. St. Matthew has been thought chiefly to describe Christ, as a man; Mark, as a king; Luke, as a priest; and John, as God.

S. Where will you begin this his

tory?

T. With the birth of John the Baptist, the fore runner of Jesus Christ, as had been foretold by the prophets Isaiah and Malachi; appointed to prepare his way before him, or to set all things in readiness for his appearing, and manifesting himself to the world, and putting an end to the old, and opening a beginning for the new dispensation of

God's will to mankind.

S. Who was this John the Eaptist?

T. He was of the sacerdotal rank, son of Zacharias, of the family of Abiah, which was the eighth in the course appointed by David for the service of the temple. Some have thought, that this Zacharias was at last slain by the command of He. rod the Great; being privately mur. dered between the porch and the altar, or in an inclosure that surrounded the altar of burnt offerings : and that he was the very Zacharias, the son of Barachiah, whose blood

ur Saviour mentions to have been shed between the temple and the altar. However this be, it is cer. tain, that while this Zacharias was, in the course of his ministry, offering incense at the altar of the temple, the angel Gabriel was sent to him from God, to inform him, that His wife, who ever had been barren

whose

corceive and bear a son,
name should be called Jesus, or Sa-
viour; that he should be great, and
called the son of the most Highest;
that God should give him the throne
of his father David; that he should
reign over the house of Jacob for
ever; and that of his kingdom there
should be no end.

S. How did Mary receive this surprising message?

and was now well stricken in years, should conceive and bear him a son, whom he should name John; and that he would be a Nazarite from the womb, and an instrument of God to convert many of the Jews from the evil of their ways, and go before the Messiah, in the spirit of the great reformer Elias, to dispose men to receive him. But Zacharias expressing some doubt of the message, and desiring a convincing sign from the angel of the truth of it, was immediately struck dumb, and continued so till after the child was born; which happened according to the time, from his return to Hebron, where he dwelt with his wife Elizabeth. This was in the latter part of the reign of Herod the Great. S. How long was this before the of soul in these words, Behold the Lirth of Christ?

T. About five months: for the same angel Gabriel, six months after, was sent also to Nazareth of Gali lee, to Mary, a virgin indeed of low condition, but of the family of David, and espoused to Joseph of the house and lineage of David also. She was saluted by the angel, with Hail Mary full of Grace; while she mused in herself at what she saw and heard, the angel to dissipate her trouble, desired her not to fear, for that she had found fayour with God; and then declared to her his message, that she should

and

T. With great composure; and only asked the heavenly messenger, how, what he had told her would come to pass, seeing she knew not a man. The angel hereupon assured her, that a man should have no part in the work, but that the Holy Ghost would himself form in her the child of which she was to be the mother: and at the same time shewed her that her cousin Elizabeth, who past for barren in the world, had also conceived a son in her old age; for that nothing was impossible with God. Mary humbly acquiesced with the good pleasure and will of God, thus made known to her; and testified her perfect resignation, and pious disposition

handmaid of the Lord, be it unto me according to thy word, &c.

S. Did Mary acquaint Joseph herewith ?

T. No but without staying to consider the high condition where. unto she was now raised, she undertook a painful journey to visit her cousin Elizabeth who dwelt in the hill country, to rejoice with her on this happy occasion of her being delivered from the reproach of barrenness; and no sooner did she enter into her presence, but the child which Elizabeth carried leaped in her womb; and Elizabeth by divine

inspiration instantly cried out to Mary, Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, &c.

7. So he was: for, do but examine the genealogies of our Saviour's ancestors, and you'll find that be was of the line of David, both by his re

S. How long did Mary stay with puted father Joseph, according to

her cousin?

T. Three months: and soon after her return home to Nazareth, the symptoms of her being with child appeared very visibly.

St. Matthew, and of his mother Mary, according to St. Luke, whose pedigrees they severally give you. Joseph was descended from David by an elder branch, and Mary by a

S How did Joseph behave on this younger. occasion?

T. He was greatly troubled there. at; but being a just man, and unwilling to make public the fault, of which he supposed her guilty, chusing to keep secret the failings of one whom he loved, and to whom he owed respect; resolved only to leave her, to shew his dislike of the evil, which a person so dear to him had committed. He might pursuant to the laws of the Jews, have delivered her over to public punishment; for these made it death for a woman to have carnal knowledge of another man, betwixt the espousals and the consummation of the mariage. But he was Bore tender of her reputation and life; and being minded to put her away privily, an angel from heaven, by night revealed to him the whole council of God, and the secret of this divine child. Joseph comforted by these words of the angel, who had enjoined him also to take Mary to him to wife, and that he should give the name of Jesus to the child, when it should be born, took her immediately home to him, though he had no carnal knowledge of her before she was delivered of her firstborn son Jesus Christ.

S. I have heard that Jesus, or the Saviour of the world, was to be born of the lineage of David?

S. When was Jesus Christ born ? T. In the 36th year of Herod the Great, and in the 44th year of the emperor Caius Julius Cæsar Augustus, who had been called Octavianus, before his defeat of Mark Anthony. Which titles of Cæsar and Augustus were for many ages after assumed by the Roman emperors,

S. Where was he born?

S At Bethlehem, which was the city, or place of David's nativity, and about five miles south from Jerusalem. S. How did this happen, you say that Mary lived at Nazareth, which is sixty miles north from Jerusalem?

when

T. God, whose prophet Mical had long before pointed out this as the place of Christ's birth, put it inte the mind of the emperor Augustus, in the time of profound peace, which the whole Roman state then enjoyed, to enquire into the strength and riches of his dominions; by making an universal register of the people, and levying a poll-tax in proportion to the circumstances of every subject. To this end, an edict was published, requiring all persons within the Roman empire, (to which Judea was then tributary) to assemble in the cities of their respective families, and there register their possessions and conditions, among those

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