Scriptures. But it might as well be argued, that because fome particular Men have had the Misfortune to be robb'd upon the publick Road, therefore none ought to travel the Road any more; or because one Pilot has run his Ship upon a Rock, therefore no Ship fhould ever make Ufe of a Pilot any more. The more myfterious Parts of Scripture are not the proper Subjects of every ordinary Perfon's Meditation: There are enough Places plain and intelligible to the meaneft Capacities, where they may more profitably employ themselves. The Jews tell us, that it was accounted a very prudential Method among them,to forbid their young Men reading the Books of Ecclefiaftes, the Song of Solomon, the Prophecies of Ezekiel and Daniel, till they were come to a greater Maturity of Age and Underftanding; and then they might take thofe darker and more myfterious Books into their Hands. It would be very well if Perfons of inferiour Parts would but follow the fame Method; and firft ftudy plain and obvious Truths, and by Degrees, afcend to greater Things; fo their frequent Errors and Mistakes might be happily prevented, But for a poor ignorant Creature to ftep into a Mystery at once, is only to bewilder and confound himself. Prudence and a good Method make the moft difficult Things eafy; but to begin at the wrong End is the Way never to do any Good.

It is indifpenfably neceffary to Salvation to obferve and obey the Precepts of the Gofpel; but no Precepts are myfterious. To dive into Myfteries may be delightful to Men of great Abilities; but they may be fav'd without understanding

derftanding them. Yet if Men will be curious in fearching into the more obfcure Paffages of holy Writ, the Affiftance of their lawful Paftors, or of other learned and pious Men may be of excellent Ufe, and their Explications of fuch dark Places may be very inftru&tive: And if the weaker and more fimple Part of Mankind would but apply fuch Explications to the known and common Rules of God's Word, and receive them only as they find them agreeing with what they can underftand; If by these Means fuch weak Perfons fhould be mifinform'd at laft, they are yet fecure from Danger, and tho' it may be, they don't hit upon the real Meaning of the Place inquir'd into, they may learn a great deal of good and useful Truth from it: Since a Man of found Piety and Learning, tho' he may be to feek in the Meaning of a dark Expreffion, yet to be fure, he'll teach nothing but what's agreeable to the Analogy of Faith. The Apoftle tells us, that the Miftery of Godlinefs is great. Myfteries are neceffary in the OEconomy of the pureft Religion in the World, that it may be received with the greater Veneration. But while God has taken Care by myfterious Rites and Ordinances to fecure Religion from Contempt; he has taken Care too that we should have no Reafon to complain for Want of a fufficient Information of our Duties. For there is nothing of abfolute Neceflity for the Salvation of Mankind which is not fo plain and clear in his written Word, that even be who runs may read it. As then, we are under the ftricteft Obligations to examine the Word of God affiduously and through

ly,

1

ly, fo we fhould be very careful not to have it wrefted out of our Hands, by a Pretence to unwritten Traditions, as if they would be more certain and infallible Inftructors than any written Laws can be. It has been look'd upon as one of the Felicities attending Learn ing, that it makes Men able to confult with the Dead, as well as with the Living, or to read the Compofitions of our Predeceffors; who being by Death difengaged from all inferiour Interefts, muft of Neceflity be the more im partial and ufeful Counfellors.

Traditions pretend, indeed, to be deriv'd from immemorable Time; but it is certain we can receive them only from thofe, who, (tho they may be our Seniors,) muft yet have been our Contemporaries for a good while. Now living Men are liable to a Thoufand Temp tations to mifreport, to palliate, to aggravate or to extenuate Matters, which when they have fund Reason to do, that Tradition which was pure in its original Fountain grows by Degrees foul and corrupted in its Streams. And it has been to prevent this Inconvenience, that all thofe Perfons who have been the first Inventors of excellent and ufeful Arts, where they have had a due Regard to the Benefit of a Pofterity, have always deliver'd their Sentiments and Discoveries in Writing, by which Mean we find out their Meanings as well as if they were still living, and we held Converfation ordinarily with them. And if the Tranfcribers of their Works take but any tolerable Care in the Matter, we can't be very frequently mistaken as to their Notions or Opi nions. God himself took particular Care that

the

the Ifraelites fhould inform their Children of what great Things God had done for them in delivering them from Egyptian Slavery, and in fettling them in the Land of Promise. But the Behaviour of the fucceeding Generations evidences that thofe Traditional Inftructions would foon have dwindled into nothing, had it not pleas'd God both to fet down that Charge it felf, and the Subject of that Charge, in the Books of the Old Teftament. And it would be very hard to affign a tolerable Reason why God fhould have written fo very short a Syftem of Precepts as that contain'd in the Ten Commandments, and all with his own Hands; if he had thought Tradition the most infalli ble Method of delivering his Will down to Pofterity. Were Tradition fo very excellent, we fhould fcarce ever meet with fuch a thing as a Sinner in the whole Chriftian World: For he who would be fo mindful of his Duty to God and his Family as to inftruct them diligently in the Laws of God, would be as ready to obey God in other Matters: And those very Inftructions which he would give his Children, would be as fo many conftant Checks upon his own Extravagancies; and he could never give Correction to his Child for his Negligence in adverting to fuch Inftructions, but he muft at the fame Time, pafs the Sentence of Condemnation upon himself. And therefore, fince we cannot but with Grief of Heart obferve the prodigious Progrefs of Wickedness even among the Profeffors of Chriftianity; with the fame Obfervation we find, that wicked Parents never trouble themselves about infufing religious Principles into their Chil

dren,

dren, by which Means Piety and Truth is almost infenfibly loft: For it is hardly to be expected that thofe who have neither good Rules, nor good Examples, fhould ever attain to any great Perfection in Piety.

Had Tradition been enough to have fix'd Religion in its due State after the Return of the Jews from their Captivity about Babylon, there would have been no Need that Ezra fhould have taken fuch Care to retrieve the Reading and the Meaning of the Law or of the Prophets. Ezra, who was a Perfon throughly vers'd in them, might have deliver'd them orally to his Companions, and fo it might have been seen handed down from one to a-. nother. But he chofe a very different Method: And therefore, fince the Jews had very much corrupted their Mother-Tongue, fo that they did not ordinarily underftand that in which their holy Books had been firft written, Ezra read it indeed to them in the Original Language; but he had thofe ftanding by him, who explain'd or read it down to them in that Dialect which they then us'd, that fo, they might have no Plea for Ignorance of thofe facred Laws. And they had their new Copies penn'd in the fame Dialect, and as is generally fuppos'd, in the fame Character which they had learnt in Babylon. From whence it is not unreasonably concluded among learned Men, that the Mofaic Hebrew Character is now entirely loft; unless it furvive in that which is call'd the Samaritan which yet they are not very certain of; and that which the Original Text is now written in is the old Chaldaan Character; but the Text not a whit the

lefs.