Part n. ASAint ~r 4 Brute: and not one to be feen, nor mentioned by man in ail the world , (For the fabulous tales of fome in Cht'na, without all proof, are not worth the mentioning.) Certainly fome Book would have been faved or fome Cities, or Jailing piles or fiony monumentS preferved,'or fome fign or tradition kept alive ,. of fome of all cbofe many thoufand years. If you fay , that Writing er Printing were not then' J:...nown ; you come to that which contoupds you more. How is it poffible that in fo many hundred thoufand years, the worldgrew ro no more txperience, and Arts and Sciences were rjpencd no more:, when now they have: ripened in a lhorter time ?· How is it that PrintingandWritingwere not found out?· and that all Sciences and Arts are of folate invention, and as it were , but in their youth ? Certainly Knowledge is the daughter of Experience • . and Experience the daughter of Time ; and therefore if the world had been from .eternity, it mull needs have been many a hundred thoufand years ago at a far higher fiate of Knowledge then is yet attained in the world. For every 21ge receiveth the ex– periences -and writings of the former , and bath opportunity frill to make improvement of them. Ar: leafi the world could not have been ignorant fo long, of Prinring, Writing, and a lmndred things that are certainly of late invention. It is therefore an in– credible thing that an Eternal world iliould lafe all the memorials e~~nd mrmuments of its Antiquity, before the Scripture-time of the Creation. And therefore cloubtlefs it beg~u but then. · ~· :t. And if God- were nor; rhe Author of the Scripture, hrn'1 come fo many_clear and mta6!e Prophefies of it to be fH!filled.? How punctually doth D~tVid, and l~tiah ( 53.) defcribe rbe fufferings of Chriil:, and Daniel foretell the very year ? and fo of . rnnny others? · ~· 3. And how comn it lf!l to cant~tin 'l11tt one entire frame• confpiring to rtVePJI_the[4me doctrine of grace 11nd life , ( at firll more d~rkly, and m types and promifes, and afterwards more · dearly m performance:) when the writers lived at _hundreds and thoufands years difiance from each other? · .fJ2.!!_; 4. An~ if thou hadO: not a blinded prejudiced mind, thou . wou_ldfi percetve tm ·Unimita6le MajefiJ and [firitN~lity in the · Scnptur..e, and wouldit favCPJr the fPirit ofGod it1 it as its author: : and wouldil: know by the image andfaperfcription, that it is the ~W_ord of God. . It beareth unimitably .the Image of his P~wer , , and ..
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