tween heaven and earth, and celebrate festivals in their honour. If you acknowledge their claims, you must deny his; if you admit his, you must give up theirs *."

The apostle urges several other considerations to dissuade them from eating promiscuously, and without scruple, things offered to false gods; but as they are chiefly drawn from the ill effects that their example might have upon others, who might be tempted to imitate it, though not fully persuaded of the lawfulness of doing it, they need not be explained in this place. It is very observable, that, copiously as the apostle treats this subject, he never once makes any mention of the devil; never intimates that he or any mischievous spirits personated the heathen gods, supported their worship, and were themselves, in reality, the gods of the heathens; though, had he thought this to be the case, it would have been much to his purpose to have clearly and fully stated it, in order to give proper force to his argument against celebrating festivals in their honour. The whole reasoning of St. Paul concerns the idols and demons of the Gentiles, those spirits whom they regarded as gods and lords; and whoever they were, the apostle hath not urged one argument against eating things sacrificed to them, that supposes or implies their having any

* The apostle in like manner taxes the Colossians (chap. ii. 19.) with not holding the head, because they worshipped angels. For though they might allow Christ to be the chief mediator, yet they utterly subverted his proper claim to be the sole mediator between God and

man.

degree

degree of power; but urges quite different considerations, drawn from the circumstances under which some Christians partook of those sacrifices, which might make it an act of religious honour and worship, or might prove a stumbling-block to their weak brethren. He grants that things offered in sacrifice to the heathen demons underwent no change; and that no man was either better or worse for partaking or not partaking of them. He also admits that the demons themselves were mere nothing; and (knowing that some Christians at that time were disposed to ascribe a real power to these demons, and probably foreseeing the same disposition in others, in after ages,) shews that the nullity of demons was a just and necessary inference from that fundamental article of Christianity, there being but one God and one Lord over mankind. The reader cannot fail observing, that St. Paul is here professedly stating the doctrines of the Gospel, and the idea which he himself had of them. Indeed, he elsewhere represents it as the main design of his commission, to destroy the doctrine of demons; or, to use his own words, to turn men from these vanities unto the living God*.

From the whole of what occurs in this section, may we not infer that there is much injustice in reproaching the Scriptures with countenancing the doctrine of demoniacal possessions? Did the sacred writers. first introduce this doctrine? It is not even pretended that they did. Did they ever assert it as a part of that

* Acts xiv. 15. Compare 1 Thess. i. 9.

revelation

revelation which they were divinely commissioned to publish to the world? They could not thus assert it; for it overturns the main doctrine and evidences of the Jewish and Christian revelations. On the contrary, they have done every thing they could fitly do, to banish it out of the world, by carefully instructing Christians in the absolute nullity of demons, by continually inculcating this principle upon them with a zcal equal to its great importance, and by establishing it upon the clearest evidence. If you regulate your judgment concerning demons by that of the writers either of the Old or New Testament, you must allow that there never was, nor can be, a real demoniac.

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CHAPTER II.

PROCEED to solve the several objections which have been urged against the foregoing explication of the gospel demoniacs.

That the persons spoken of in the New Testament as demoniacs were really such, many have attempted to prove, 1st, From what was said and done by the demoniacs themselves. 2dly, From the destruction of the herd of swine, which the demons are said to have entered, and stimulated to an instantaneous madness. And, 3dly, From the expressions used by our Saviour in performing, and his disciples in recording, the cure of demoniacs. Under these three heads. may be comprised all the objections drawn from the New Testament, against the doctrine advanced in the preceding chapter.

SECTION I.

FROM what was said and done by the demoniacs themselves, some have concluded that they were inspired and assisted by superior agents, such as demons are commonly supposed to be.

It must, however, be allowed (what seems to furnish a presumptive argument against this opinion) that the New Testament never represents the language

H

and

and behaviour of the demoniacs as the effect and evidence of a supernatural agency. We are only therefore to examine, whether such agency can be justly and certainly inferred from the facts themselves.

1. It is pleaded, That the demoniacs knew, and proclaimed, Jesus to be Messiah *. The man with an unclean spirit in the synagogue at Capernaum said, What have we to do with thee, thou Jesus of Nazareth? I know thee who thou art, the Holy One of Godt. The demoniac in the country of the Gergesenes called him the Son of God ‡. And we are told that demons§ cried out, and said, Thou art Christ, (the Messiah) the Son of God.

The general expectation of the coming of the Messiah at that time, the testimony borne to Jesus by his illustrious forerunner, and the numerous miracles more especially performed by Jesus himself, at the commencement of his public ministry, rendered him the object of universal attention; propagated his fame throughout all Judea, and the countries bordering upon it**, and created in the Jewish people a

* Some add that the demoniacs ascribed to Christ higher characters than other persons did. But whoever compares their respective declarations will find this to be a mistake. Compare John i. 49. iv. 42. vii. 41. xi. 27. with the titles ascribed to Christ by the demoniacs. Is it not strange, that Christians should refer to devils the first discovery of the divine claims of the Son of God?

+ Luke iv. 34. Mark i. 24.

Matt. viii. 29.

By demons we are here to understand demoniacs. See below, p. 151, &c.

Luke iv. 41.

** Matt. iv. 23, 24.

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