SEAM. IV.] CHRIST EXALTED AND THE SPIRIT GIVEN. 65 more astonishing thing, that the souls of persons, who were in a.great measure ignorant of divine truths, should be at once illuminated with a word of wisdom, should be furnished so soon With such an extensive knowledge of the mysteries, doctrines and duties of the gospel; that they were able to preach them to an ignorant world ; and that they should be so fully persuaded of these doc- trines at once, in opposition to many former prejudices which reigned in them, that they could now venture their lives in the defence of these divine truths, which they learned from heaven by such an inspiration; It is grant- ed again, that it is a miracle to make the deaf to hear, the dumb to speak, to put life into a dead body : But is it not a more amazing event, that the Mind of a fisher- man who knew nothing but his mother-tongue, should at once be furnished with a million of words, even the lan- guages ofvarious nations, and that his organs of speech should be enabled to pronounce them right, which would be' the learning and labour of two or three ages ; and that they should speak to every man in their own tongue the wonderful works of God And yet still this wonder is greater, when we consider that the apostles not only spake with strange tongues themselves, but they com- municated this gift of tongues to others also, which was never done by our Saviour himself in his own life time. Such were the attestations to the gospel of our blessed Lord, and so bright was the evidence that was shed over it by these gifts of the Spirit, that this is appointed to be the supreme seal to the truth of it, and he that blas- phemes the Holy Ghost, and renounces this evidence, after it has been convincingly set before him, and obsti- nately attributes these divine wonders to the sleights of men, or to the craft of the devil, is sealed up under con- demnation by the lips of the Saviour of the world; and there is no forgiveness for him; Mat. xii. 31, S2' *. Remark III. " Though Jesus the founder of the chris- tian religion submitted to death, yet the christian church was never designed to die,: because Jesus lives again in an exalted state, and bath all the gifts and graces of the * Of the gifts of the Holy Spirit, and the efficacy and power of them, to prove and confirm the gospel of Christ ; see the best account that ever I read, in " Miscellanea Sacra." Essay I. VOL. III. F
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