their avowed enemy, as one who came to pollute their altars, to deprive them of their rights and privileges, and which, to pride like theirs, was a mortifying circumftance, and an injury they could not forgive, to fet them upon a level with their fellow-creatures.

A third reason why the difciples of John the Baptift, in particular, were not fatisfied with our Saviour, but looked for another Mef. fiah, was probably, Becaufe Jefus Chrift was both in his public and private character extremely different from their own master, whom they greatly honoured and revered.

John the Baptift came, as our Saviour obferved, neither eating bread nor drinking wine; he is defcribed as reclufe, folitary, and abftemious; practifing great aufterities, and diftinguifhing himself by peculiarities with regard to his diet, converfe, and behaviour: he had his raiment of camel's hair, and a leathern girdle about his loins; and his meat was locufts and wild honey. The dignity and folemnity of his appearance induced many of the Jews to refort to him: they crowded to him from Jerufalem and Judea, and all the region round about Jordan, and many were baptized of him; and when John talked to them of Jefus as the promifed Meffiah, they had always before them the idea of a powerful earthly monarch; they imagined, when they came to Jefus, to have found him alfo affuming the like, or rather a fuperior dignity, practising the same aufterities, and behaving with the fame refervedness as their favourite prophet: they were furprised

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and aftonifhed, therefore, when, inftead of the formal pietift, or the rigid philofoper, they met with the humble, the condescending, the familiar friend, when they found him eating and drinking, affociating and converfing even with publicans and finners. This fhocked their pride, and wounded their felf-love: all their pleafing profpects of freedom from the Roman yoke were obfcured, and all their delufive hopes of univerfal empire deftroyed and obliterated. They were disappointed and diffatiffied at our Saviour's appearance; they could not bring themselves to imagine, that one who was fo inferior to their mafter, in every external perfection, could, in reality, be fo far his fuperior as to answer the idea they had conceived of a Meffiah.

Thefe, amongst many others, (equally fuperficial and inconclufive) were most probably the ftrongeft reasons that induced the Jews to reject the true Meffiah, and to look for another: very poor and unfatisfactory they doubtless are, as will more evidently appear, when we come, as I propofed in the second place, to lay before you thofe far more cogent and powerful arguments, which ought fully to have convinced them that Jefus was in truth the Redeemer whom they expected, and that they need not have looked for another.

They should not therefore, in the first place, have looked for another, because all the remarkable prophecies of a Meffiah in the Old Teftament, were exactly and literally fulfilled in him it is there predicted, that he was to

fpring from the Jews, to be a prophet and a law-giver, as Mofes had been before him; to be born of a virgin; the fceptre was not to depart from Judah, nor a law-giver from between his feet till Shilo came: he was to be a light to lighten the Gentiles, as well as the glory of his people Ifrael; he was to be a fpiritual (and not a temporal) king, and the prince of peace; to be a man of forrows, and acquainted with grief; to put an end to fin, and make reconciliation for iniquity; to be cut off, but not for himself; to feal up prophecy, and establish everlasting righte oufness.

Such is the conftant language of holy writ concerning him. With all these indifputable marks and ftamps of the divinity fo ftrongly and visibly impreffed upon him, nothing but that more than Egyptian darkness which clouded their understanding, and debauched their fenfes, could have prevented this infatuated pleople from feeing and acknowledging their gracious Redeemer.

If our bleffed Saviour had not been the true Meffiah, but what the Jews accounted him, an hypocrite and an impoftor, he would then have acted just as they wifhed, and expected him to act: he would have fallen in with their prejudices and pre-poffeffions, would have affumed the charac ter of a temporal deliverer. The whole Jewish nation at this time was, we very well know, ripe for rebellion; they burned with uncommon ardor for revenge on their conquerors, and wanted only a bold and enterprising leader to affist them in fhaking off the Roman yoke.

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He might have taken advantage of the popular opinions in his favour, have feized the golden opportunity, and, as the arch-impofter Mahomet did in after-times, might have raised himfelf to the feat of empire: if his kingdom had been of this world, he might, at that fortunate period, very eafily and firmly have established it.

But that the Jews might have no excufe left for their unpardonable infidelity, our Saviour, who was well acquainted with their temper and difpofition, he who fo well knew the pride and haughtiness of their hearts, made it the business of his life to undeceive them in their mistaken ideas of his character, and to fet them right in a point fo important: he conftantly disclaimed all title to royalty, all rank, power and precedency; he encouraged no feditious or rebellious principles, but preached and practifed humility, taught fubmiffion to kings and rulers, and inftead of oppofing the Roman power, as they had fondly expected, strengthened and fupported it; commanding them to give unto Cæfar the things that were Cæfar's, and to God the things which were God's. In vain, however, did he endeavour to convince those who were not to be convinced. In anfwer therefore to John's difciples, in the words of my text, he has recourse, we may obferve, to the strongest and most unanfwerable argument which he could poffibly have made ufe of: Go, fays he, and hew John thofe things which do hear and fee: the blind receive their fight, the lame walk, the leapers are cleanfed,

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the deaf hear, the dead are raifed up, and the poor have the Gospel preached unto them. He refers them, we fee, to that part of the ancient prophecies, which could not be mistaken; which could not be applied to any but to him. felf: he appeals indeed not to their memory, or their understanding, but to their fenfes, and to their hearts: he would have them rely not on their faith, but on their fight: Tell John what do hear and fee: as if he had faid," If 66 you will not believe those scriptures which you pretend to have fo great a reverence for, "and which teftify of me; if ye believe not "your own mafter, whom ye acknowledge to "be a prophet; if ye believe not me, nor him "who fent me; at least will believe your own eyes, and your own ears, which cannot "deceive you. If the miracles which I per"form are beyond the reach of human power, "they muft flow from the divine; none can "do the works of God but the Son of God."

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An argument fo powerful and irrefiftable; an argument adapted, as this was, to univerfal capacity, muft have commanded, one fhould imagine, univerfal conviction: this must have put to filence the ignorance of foolish, the perverfenefs of obftinate men, and turned at once the hearts of the difobedient to the wisdom of the just. The miracles of our bleffed Saviour were indeed received by many with that degree of reverence, and efteem of their divine Author, which they fo highly deserved: the impartial and unprejudiced could no longer with-hold their affent to facts fo indisputable;

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