We are, thirdly, invited to recollect the success of the apostles and of
their companions, at the several places to which they came, both within
and without Judea; because it was the credit given to original
witnesses, appealing for the truth of their accounts to what themselves
had seen and heard. The effect also of their preaching strongly confirms
the truth of what our history positively and circumstantially relates,
that they were able to exhibit to their hearers supernatural
attestations of their mission.
We are, lastly, to consider the subsequent growth and spread of the
religion, of which we receive successive intimations, and satisfactory,
though general and occasional, accounts, until its full and final
establishment.
In all these several stages, the history is without a parallel for it
must be observed, that we have not now been tracing the progress, and
describing the prevalency, of an opinion founded upon philosophical or
critical arguments, upon mere of reason, or the construction of ancient
writing; (of which are the several theories which have, at different
times, possession of the public mind in various departments of science and
literature; and of one or other of which kind are the tenets also which
divide the various sects of Christianity;) but that we speak of a
system, the very basis and postulatum of which was a supernatural
character ascribed to a particular person; of a doctrine, the truth
whereof depends entirely upon the truth of a matter of fact then recent.
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