this text, in order to accommodate it to their own prejudices, is an inftance of that fort of construction, which the Papifts make use of in the understanding of Tíμios ô váμos Év πάo-Heb. xiii. 4.-Marriage is honourable in all: that is, fay they, in all things, not in all men ; for the Rhemists say, on I Cor. vii. 9. that "the "marriage of priests is the worst fort "of incontinency." Thus we fpeak of polygamy, with just as much ground from GOD's word. Had polygamy been permitted on the fide of the woman, the most material part of the facred history must have loft its evidence: as no genealogy could have been preserved with the leaft certainty, it could not have been proved beyond a doubt that CHRIST is the Meffiah, of the feed of Abraham, and of the house and family of David, to whom the promises were made; confequently, that he is the prophet which was to come; and we are to look for no other. Matt. xxii. 42. and we must have been asking, in another sense than OUR LORD himself did What think ye of CHRIST, whofe Son is be? This fatal ftroke to all our hopes must have been the confequence of a precarious iffue. In a more private Y 2 view view of the matter, all modesty, decency, order, inheritance, relationship, and every bond of fociety, must have been broken afunder; whereas, on the man's fide, polygamy is not attended with any of these things: what the wickednefs and vilenefs of men have introduced, must be looked upon as abuse and perverfion, but are no more * arguments against the thing itself, when used * To argue against any thing from the abuse of it, is the most unfair of all methods of refutation. There are no abfurdities, and indeed no lengths of impiety and blafphemy, into which, by fuch means, we may not be carried. We may even difpute the wifdom and holiness of the CREATOR in making the human fpecies of different fexes-in ordaining the means of increafing and multiplying the human race, by the union of the male and female-in implanting, for this purpofe, a defire towards each other-for if all this had never been, adultery, fornication, and whoredom, could not have exifted :-Nay, we may carry the argument fo far, as to conclude against the divine wifdom and bolinefs in the creation itself-for if this had never been, no evil, either moral or natural, could have ever been known. See vol. i. pref. p. xxiii. Let us go a little farther, and we shall get into fcepticism and from thence into atheism-like those who tread the high priori road, And argue downward 'till they doubt of Gop. РОРЕ. In ufed according to God's regulation and difpofition of the matter, than the murders and maffacres by the Heathens of old Rome, or by the Papifts of modern Rome, are to be reasonably urged (as they have been fally by infidels) against the truth of the gospel. Had not polygamy been allowed to men, the provifion made for the protection and defence of the weaker fex had been deficient; whereas GOD's law hath made it complete, and no man upon earth can, on the footing of that law, plead his fituation, either as a privilege or a difability, against providing for, main taining, In 1536 Archbishop Cranmer, who was projecting the moft effectual means for a reformation of doctrine, moved in convocation, that they should petition the king for leave to make a translation of the Bible. But Gardiner, and all his party, opposed it, both in convocation, and in fecret with the king. It was faid that all the herefies and extravagant opinions, which were then in Germany, and from thence coming over to England, fprang from the free use of the fcripture; and whereas in the May laft year, nineteen Hollanders were accused of some beretical opinions, for which opinions fourteen of them were burnt in pairs in feveral places; it was complained, that all thofe drew their damnable errors from the indiscreet use of the fcripture. And to offer the Bible in the English tongue to the whole nation, would prove the greatest fnare that could be. See Burnet Hift. Ref. vol. i. p. 195, fecond edit. Whoever reads with attention this excellent and entertaining history, will fee what reliance the Popish Y 3 party taining, and protecting as a wife, any or every woman whom he may chufe to feduce. That GOD fhould establish this fecurity, by the pofitive laws which have been fo often mentioned-and that in all cafes where the woman was free-that it fhould be so uniformly and openly maintained, for fo many ages together, in the practice of the best people; and then, all of a fudden, it fhould be found out to be against the primary law of marriage, a fin against the Seventh commandment, and that which was a moral duty by Exod. xxii. 16. and Deut. xxii. 28, 29. fhould be a damnable fin under the gofpel-is either to fuppofe the world fo party had on this mode of argumentation against the Reformers, their writings, and indeed against the Reformation itself. The great Sir Thomas More, in his writings, exercised all his dexterity in expofing the ill confequences that could follow on the doctrine of the Reformers. Ibid. 356. Affuming certain prejudices as true, and thence drawing conclufions, which reft fingly on fuch prejudices, is not only unfair, but is one of the meanest and moft defpicable fophifms that error can have recourfe to. It is that fort of deceit and impofition, which "imports the misrepresentation "of the qualities of things and actions to the common apprehenfions of men, abusing their "minds with falfe notions; and fo, by this artifice, making evil pafs for good, and good for evil in all the great concerns of life." SOUTH's "Sermons. 66 much much better than it was before, and therefore no fuch law any longer needful-or that a law-giver came under the New Teftament to oppose the lawgiver under the Old Teftament, and to fet mankind free from their allegiance and obedience to Him. The former of which fuppofitions is not true in point of fact any more than the latter-our own fenfes may convince us of the first, and CHRIST'S Own declaration, that He came not to deftroy the law (καταλῦσαι, to demolish or loofen its obligation) may asfure us of the fecond. Urging that CHRIST has altered the law of the Old Teftament, by forbidding polygamy— which was, in all cafes where marriage itself was lawful, allowed, and in fome inftances pofitively commanded—is only saying, in other words, that he lef fened that fecurity which the weaker sex have against the stronger, and facilitated the ruin and proftitution of women, by cutting off a confiderable part of that protection which the law of GoD afforded them, and which He fo ftrongly maintained in His whole difpute with the Pharifees on the fubject of divorce, in no one part of it more ftrongly than Matt. xix. 9. the very verfe which fu Y 4 perftition |