ted with the power of working miracles, which was the moft fhort and the moft convincing argument that could be produced, and the only one that was adapted to the reason of all mankind, to the capacities of the wife and ignorant, and could overcome every cavil and every prejudice. Who would not believe that our Saviour healed the fick, and raised the dead, when it was published by those who themselves often did the fame miracles, in their prefence, and in his name! Could any reafonable person imagine, that God Almighty would arm men with fuch powers to authorize a lye, and establish a religion in the world which was difpleafing to him, or that evil fpirits would lend them fuch an effectual affiftance to beat down vice and idolatry?

V. When the Apoftles had formed many affemblies in feveral parts of the Pagan world, who gave credit to the glad tidings of the Gospel, that, upon their departure, the memory of what they had related might not perifh, they appointed out of these new converts, men of the best fenfe, and of the most unblemifhed lives, to prefide over these feve

ral

ral affemblies, and to inculcate without ceafing what they had heard from the mouths of these eye-witneffes.

VI. Upon the death of any of those fubftitutes to the Apoftles and Difciples of Chrift, his place was filled up with fome other perfon of eminence for his piety and learning, and generally a member of the fame Church, who after his deceafe was followed by another in the fame manner, by which means the fucceffion was continued in an uninterrupted line. Irenæus informs us, that every church preferved a catalogue of its Bifhops in the order that they fucceeded one another, and (for an example) produces the catalogue of those who governed the Church of Rome in that character, which contains eight or nine perfons, though but a very small remove from the

times of the Apostles.

Indeed the lifts of Bifhops, which are come down to us in other churches, are generally filled with greater numbers than one would expect. But the fucceffion was quick in the three first centuries, becaufe the Bishop very often ended in the Martyr for when a profecution arose in any place, the firft fury of it fell upon

this Order of holy men, who abundantly teftified by their Deaths and Sufferings that they did not undertake thefe offices out of any temporal views, that they were fincere and fatisfied in the belief of what they taught, and that they firmly adhered to what they had received from the Apostles, as laying down their lives in the fame hope, and upon the fame principles. None can be fuppofed fo utterly regardless of their own happinefs as to expire in torment, and hazard their Eternity, to fupport any fables and inventions of their own, or any forgeries of their predeceffors who had prefided in the fame church, and which might have been eafily detected by the tradition of that particular church, as well as by the concurring teftimony of others. To this purpose, I think it is very remarkable, that there was not a fingle Martyr among those many Hereticks, who difagreed with the Apoftolical church, and introduced several wild and abfurd notions into the doctrines of Chriftianity. They durft not ftake their prefent and future happiness on their own chimerical operations, and did not only fhun perfecu tion, but affirmed that it was unneceffa

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for their followers to bear their religion through fuch fiery tryals.

VII. We may fairly reckon, that this first age of Apoftles and Disciples, with that fecond generation of many who were their immediate converts, extended it felf to the middle of the fecond Century, and that several of the third generation from these last mentioned, which was but the fifth from Chrift, continued to the end of the third Century. Did we know the ages and numbers of the members in every particular church, which was planted by the Apostles, I doubt not but in moft of them there might be found five perfons who in a continued feries would reach through thefe three centuries of years, that is till the 265th from the death of our Saviour.

VIII. Among the accounts of those very few out of innumerable multitudes, who had embraced Chriftianity, I shall fingle out four perfons eminent for their lives, their writings, and their fufferings, that were fucceffively contemporaries, and bring us down as far as to the year of our Lord 254. St. John, who was the beloved Difciple, and converfed the

moft

moft intimately with our Saviour, lived till Anno Dom. 100. Polycarp, who was the Disciple of St. John, and had converfed with others of the Apostles and Difciples of our Lord, lived till Anno Dom. 167, though his life was fhortened by martyrdom. Irenæus, who was the Difciple of Polycarp, and had converfed with many of the immediate Difciples of the Apostles, lived, at the lowest computation of his age, till the year 202, when he was likewife cut off by martyrdom; in which year the great Origen was appointed Regent of the Catechetick school in Alexandria, and as he was the miracle of that age, for induftry, learning, and philofophy, he was looked upon as the champion of Christianity, till the year 254, when, if he did not fuffer martyrdom, as fome think he did, he was certainly actuated by the fpirit of it, as appears in the whole courfe of his life and writings, nay, he had often been put to the torture, and had undergone tryals worse than death. As he converfed with the most eminent Chriftians of his time in Egypt, and in the Eaft, brought over multitudes both from herefy and heathenifm, and left behind him feveral

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