A Treatise of the Laws of Nature. Richard Cumberland

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СКАЧАТЬ Satan,” Tim. 5. 15. He ruleth them in making them Atheous and Wicked; and, when they become such, their Life is an obeying, pleasing him, doing him Service, and “his Servants they are, to whom they obey.” His Rule and Empire, therefore, is commensurate to the Reign of Sin. They walk “according to the Prince of the Power of the Air,” which Prince and Power taken collectively are “a Spirit mightily operative in the Sons of Disobedience,” by way of Inspiration, Afflatus, internal Motion, Persuasion and Suggestion, Eph. 2. 2, 3. They are animated by the Agency of that great one that is in the World, 1 John 4. 4. who influences them, not only by tempting Objects, and external Means, but by internal Operation, “blinding the Mind, putting into the Heart, filling the Heart” (2 Cor. 4. 4. John 13. 2. Act. 5. 3.) Like a mighty Pharaoh he commandeth them, and putteth upon them the vilest Practices, the basest and most painful Drudgeries, and they serve and obey, not considering what a Master they serve, usually designing only to serve their own Lusts, in the Fury whereof he hurrieth them like the Swine to Perdition. He is the Father of their Family, they are a Serpentine Brood and Race,³⁰⁹ and Devils incarnate; agreeably to which our Saviour saith of a Miscreant among his Disciples, “Have not I chosen you twelve, and one of you is a Devil?” Joh. 6. 70. such is a Son of Belial (for Belial is one of Satan’s Names, 2 Cor. 6. 15.) and such are the Children of the Wicked One in various degrees, and all that belong to the Synagogue of Satan, who are necessarily under his Domination, by way of criminal Subjection.

      3. Almost the whole World of Mankind were some time under Satan’s Domination and Power by way of criminal-religious Subjection, as being the Religionists of his Institution, and his religious Worshippers. One sort of these Diabolical Religionists are Witches and Magicians, whose Existence has been so well attested by Experience and by Persons of unquestionable Learning and Veracity, so acknowledg’d by Heathens, by all wise Laws and Governments, and by the Holy Scriptures, is of Theory so unexceptionably Rational, and the Objections against it so inconsiderable, that, notwithstanding the many Impostures and false Stories of this kind, he that would reject them all, must be a superlative Believer. Another Instance of Diabolical Religionists are the Heretical-Pagan-Gnosticks, that infested the Primitive Church, who invented a Theology and Religion, which was a mixture of Magick and Demonolatry; upon which account, some part of them were called Ophitae, Serpent-Worshippers, others Sataniani, Satan’s Religionists; which is the heavy Character of the whole World of Heathen Religionists, as appeareth from the Historical Accounts of Heathen Countries, from their Theology and Religion, from the Nature of Christianity, and the Sense of all Christians, and from this Testimony of the Holy Scripture, which is also the Acknowledgment of several learn’d Pagans, That what the Gentiles and Gentilizing Israelites sacrific’d, they sacrific’d to Devils, not to God.³¹⁰ The Christians usually call’d their Doctrines, Doctrines of Devils; their Altars, the Devil’s Altars; their Priests, the Devil’s Priests; their Religion, the Devil’s Institution; their Inspirations, Afflatus’s, and Methods of Divination, Diabolical; their Sacrifices, the Delight of Devils; their Gods, unclean Demons. Agreeably whereto, the Renunciation of Heathenism at Christian Baptism was compos’d. The Apostle opposeth “the Cup and Table of the Lord to the Cup and Table of Devils,” in the Heathen Idol-Feasts, 1 Cor. 10. 21. So the Heathen-Roman Empire is said to be “subjected to Satan the Chieftain, and to his Angels the Demons, by way of Religious Subjection”;³¹¹ by the Holy Ghost it is represented as a Demonarchy, (Satan and his Angels were in reigning Condition, whilst Paganism flourish’d, but Christianity threw them down, Revel. 12. 8.) And all that Empire’s Idol-worship is styled the Worship of Devils, Revel. 9. 20. Christianity therefore supposeth, that the World of Heathens, thro’ their own Weakness and Wickedness, and the Artifices of Satan (Visions, Prodigies, Oracles, Vaticinations, Healings, and moving the Images) were seduc’d into an Opinion, that the Evil Demons were Gods, that they prostituted their Souls to be corrupted by them, were enslav’d by them, and subjected to their Domination and Power, as the Religionists of Satan, who had at Rome, and in other Places, as it were, his Imperial Seat and Throne, Rev. 2. 13 and 13. 2. They invited these Evil Demons to be the Inmates and Inhabitants of their Souls; these they deputed to be the Guardians of their Life; to these they attributed a mundane Presidency, pay’d divine Honours and a Religious Subjection, managing both their Civil and Religious Affairs by their Conduct. The learn’d Writers of the Gentiles do not only inform us, That they worshipp’d Arimanius, Cacodaemones, Vejoves, whom they knew to be evil Spirits; but some of their learn’d Theologers were of Opinion, that a considerable part of their Religion was the Religion of Evil Demons, whom the generality of Pagans ignorantly worshipp’d.³¹² Porphyry discourseth at large of Evil Demons, of their Religious Worship amongst the Pagans, and of their Delight in bloody Sacrifices.³¹³ Plutarch discourseth, that the Order of Demons is obnoxious to Passions and brutal Affections, which are Properties, “of which there are Footsteps and Marks in their Sacrifices and Mysteries.”³¹⁴ And, having enumerated several Rites of their Religion, “the tearing and devouring raw Flesh, and other Discerptions, Howlings, obscene Speeches in their Sacra, Madnesses excited with noise and tossing of the Neck,” he saith of them, “They are not the Worship of any of the Gods, but are instituted to sweeten and appease Evil Demons.”³¹⁵ These Acknowledgments of learned Heathens are great approaches to the Christian Hypothesis, that the Heathen World were Satan’s Religionists, of the Truth whereof we have so many authentick Proofs.

      The great usefulness of Revelation is evident from the foregoing Consideration of the State of the Heathen World.

      This, therefore, seems to have been the State of the Heathen World. Abraham was educated in Idolatry, as appears from Jos. 24. 2. When Abraham was call’d out of Ur of the Chaldeas, the only Country, in which we have any account that the true Religion was profess’d, was Salem, afterwards call’d Jerusalem, of which Melchizedek was King and also Priest of the most high God.³¹⁶ Job also and his Friends worshipp’d the one true God; which appears likewise to have been the legal Establishment in the Country where he liv’d; for, speaking of worshipping the Sun and Moon, which he disclaims the ever having been guilty of, he says, “That were an Iniquity to be punish’d by the Judges,” Job 31. 28. It seems also pretty plain, from another Passage (Job 23. 11, 12.) that Job had something more than the mere Light of Nature to walk by, and that he was no Stranger to supernatural Revelation; for he saith there of himself, “My Foot hath held his Steps, his Way have I kept, and not declin’d, neither have I gone back from the Commandments of his Lips; I have esteem’d the Words of his Mouth more than my necessary Food.” Which Words some will have to be meant of the Light and Law of Nature, merely as such, which seems an extremely absurd Construction of the Place, which is plainly meant of some Law or Doctrine, that was God’s Word by his Prophets, of which Number Job himself seems to have been One. He must also have been no Stranger to the 7 Precepts of the Sons of Noah, as they are called, and to the Revelations made by God to Abraham, if that Opinion be true, which is generally embrac’d by the most learn’d and judicious Commentators, that Job was a descendent of Abraham, probably an Edomite, the Land of Uz being part of Idumea; and that he liv’d before the giving of the Law to Moses. But the first Mention we find made of the Religion of the Inhabitants of Jerusalem, after the Children of Israel’s coming into the Land of Canaan, is that they were Idolaters; as were also the Children of Edom, where we first find their Religion mention’d, after the Israelites began to have any Intercourse with them; which was also the Case of all the other Nations descended of Abraham, and of the several People inhabiting Arabia and Canaan. So that, when God gave his Laws to the Israelites, we know not of any one Nation in the World, where the Worship of the one true God was profess’d, the Israelites excepted. As for Zoroastres, who set up the Worship СКАЧАТЬ