A DISCOURSE concerning our Saviour's RESURRECTION.

John XX. 29. Jesus faith unto him, Thomas, because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed: BlefJed are they, who have not feen, and yet have believed.

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HRIST, the great Sun of Righteousness, and Saviour of the World, having by a glorious Rifing, after

a Red, and a Bloody Setting, proclaim'd his Deity to Men, and Angels; and by a complete Triumph over the two grand Enemies of Mankind, Sin and Death, fet up the Everlasting Gospel in the room of all false Religions, has now (as it were) changed the Persian Superstition into the Christian DevoVOL. V. tion;

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tion; and without the least Approach to the Idolatry of the former, made it henceforth the Duty of all Nations, Jews, and Gentiles, to worship the Rising Sun.

But as the Sun does not display his Rising to all Parts of the World together, nor to the same Region shews his whole Light at the same instant; but by weaker Glimmerings at the first, gradually afcends to clearer and clearer Discoveries, and at length beams it forth with a full Diffusion: So Christ here discover'd himself after his Rising, not to all his Apostles at once, nor to any of them with the fame Evidence at first, but by several ascending Instances and Arguments; till in the end he shone out in his full Meridian, and made the Proof of his Refurrection complete in his Afcenfion.

Thomas we have one of the last in this Chorus, refolving to tie his Understanding close to his Senses; to believe no farther than he could fee, nor to venture himself but where he could feel his way: He would not (it feems) take a Miracle upon Hearsay, nor refolve his Creed into Report, nor, in a word, see with any Eyes but his own. No, he must trace the Print of the Nails, follow the Spear into our Saviour's Side, till he even touched the Miracle, and felt the Article of the Refurrection.

But

But as in the too inquifitive Beholder, who is not content to behold the Sun by Reflexion, but by a direct Intuition of his glorious Body, there comes such a Light, as at the fame time both informs, and chastises the over-curious Eye; so Chrift here, in his discovering himself to this doubting Apostle, condescends indeed to convince him in his own way; but so, that while he complies with his Infirmity, he also upbraids his Infidelity; humouring his Patient, but not sparing his Distemper: And yet all this with so gentle an Hand, and such an Allay of Sweetness, that the Reproof is only collateral, or consequential, not directly reproaching him for his Unbelief, but implicitly reflecting upon it, by commending the Belief of others. Nothing in the mean time sharp, or corrofive, dropping from his healing Lips, even in paffing fuch a Reprehenfion upon his Disciple. He only shews him his blind Side in an opposite Instance, and fo leaves him to read his own Cafe in an Antithefis, and to shame himself by a Comparison. Now, inasmuch as the distinguishing Eminency of the Blessing so emphatically here pronounced by our Saviour upon a Faith or Affent springing not from Sight, but a much higher Principle, must needs import a peculiar Excellency of the faid Faith; for it's furmounting all those high Difficulties and Impediments

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pediments attending it, though still with a fufficient Reason to found it upon: (For that Chrift never rewards any thing with a Bleffing, but so far as it is a Duty; nor makes any thing a Duty, but what is highly rational) This, I fay is most certain. But then as for those various and different Objects, which a genuine Faith ought to come up to the Belief of, we must not think that the same strength, as to the Kind, or Degree of it, will be able to match them all; for even the particular Refurrection of our Saviour, and that general one of all Men at the last Day, will be found to stand upon very different Bottoms; the many Difficulties, if not alfo Paradoxes, alledgable against the Refurrection of a Body, after a total Dissolution thereof, being infinitely greater, and harder to be accounted for, than any that can be brought against the Resurrection of a Body never yet diffolved, but only once again united to the Soul, which it had belonged to before.

Besides which, there have, as to this latter fort of Refurrection from the Dead, been feveral Instances of Persons so raised again, both before, and in our Saviour's Time. And in truth, as to the very Notion of the Thing itself, there appears not the least Contradiction in it to any known Principle of Reason: No, nor yet (which is more) does there feem any greater

greater Difficulty to conceive, how God should remand a departed Soul into its former Body, while remaining entire and undissolved; than that after he had formed a Body for Adam, he should presently breathe into it (so formed) a Living Soul, as we read in the second of Genesis.

So that S. Paul's Question, in Acts xxvi. 8. proceeded upon very obvious, as well as great Reason, Why (says he) should it be thought a thing incredible with you, that God should raise the Dead? pointing therein, no doubt, only to the latter fort of Resurrection, specified in the Person of our Saviour, and which alone he was at that time discoursing of.

But on the contrary, if we consider that other fort of Refurrection of a Body raised after an utter Dissolution of it into its first Materials; neither has the World yet, as ) matter of Fact, ever seen any Example thereof; nor, as to the Theory of the fame, does the Reason of Man well comprehend, how it can be done. So that the Belief of this must needs have been exceedingly more difficult, than that of the former.

Which Observations having been thus premised; I shall now proceed to close them all with fomething more direct to the main Subject of the Text, our blessed Saviour's Resurrection. Touching which, though (as it has

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been