THIS ARGUMENT RESTATED.

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XII.

THE RESURRECTION HISTORICALLY DEMONSTRATED.

"For I delivered unto you first of all- * * And that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures."-1 Cor. xv. 3, 4.

IN the Discourse last Sabbath evening, I offered you, First, some brief remarks on the importance of this Article of our Creed-showing that it was the key-stone, without which the whole arch must fall to the ground. Secondly. I explained the history of the Article and the reasons for adopting its phraseology. Thirdly. The main particulars of the Article-namely, He rose, He rose again, and He rose again the third day, were explained. It was found: First. That the Jewish Church believed in a Messiah who was to suffer and die, and to rise from the dead. Secondly. It was also found that Jesus of Nazareth suffered and died, was buried and rose from the dead, precisely as the promised Messiah of the Jewish Church was to do; and our conclusion—and certainly it seems to us a fair and an inevitable conclusion-is, that Jesus is the true and only Messiah. It is my purpose now, with God's blessing, to offer you—

I. A summary of the evidence on which we believe this Article—that Christ rose from the dead the third day according to the Scriptures.

II. The Effects or Benefits resulting from His resurrection.

I. A summary of the evidence in behalf of the truth of our Lord's resurrection. And on this head we may remark, that our Lord's resurrection from the dead is not absurd or incredible in itself. In the history of his life and death, as well as in the whole history of the Jewish Church before his mysterious Incarnation, and in the history and existence of the Christian Church at this very hour, we have very strong presumptive proof of the truth of his resurrection from the dead, just as it lies before us in the Evangelical Memoirs, and in the Discourses and Epistles of his Apostles. All cavils about the resurrec tion of Christ, as to its impossibility, are silenced at once by resolving it into the power of Divinity. St. Paul boldly meets this objection in regard to the resurrection of believers by his argument from the growth of plants from seed. He declares, you remember, that "that which thou sowest is not quickened, except it die. And that which thou sowest, thou sowest not that body that shall be, but bare grain, it may chance of wheat, or of some other grain: But God giveth it a body as it hath pleased him, and to every seed his own body. So also is the resurrection of the dead." God giveth to every one his own body. Nor is there any antecedent presumption why the raising of the body is more incredible than its original creation. The same Almighty power that created man at first out of the dust of the ground, can raise his body in the resurrection. And besides, it is certainly a presumptive argument of no small force to look at the consequences. For such is the relation of the fact of Christ's resurrection to Christian doctrines, that it is their only support, and the foundation of Christian faith. It is the key-stone of the arch. If Christ is not risen from

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the dead, "Christianity is the most consummate imposture " that the world has ever seen. But if Christianity is the result of a base conspiracy, how can we account for its fruits in the world? What consistent, intelligible account does any one give of the ordinances, institutions, and effects of Christianity, who denies the resurrection of Jesus? The Lord's Day, the existence of the Church itself, proves the truth of our Lord's resurrection. This doctrine must be true, or we must abandon every thing that belongs to the Gospel. All our hope of salvation depends on the truth of what the Apostles preached, and the Creed of the Church has always declared, that Jesus Christ rose from the dead the third day. If Christ be not risen, our preaching is indeed foolishness, and your faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins, and we are all false witnesses. And they also which are fallen asleep in Christ are all perished. But now is Christ risen from the dead, and ever lives and reigns as an Almighty Saviour. And "if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved."

II. In the second place, we do not rest our belief on presumptive proof alone. We have abounding positive evidence of the truth of this great fact, which is as strong as the nature of the case admits. And as a specimen of this kind of evidence, may I ask you to read, first, an account of our Lord's death and burial, as in John xx. 38-42, compared with what the other Evangelists say on the same points-as in Matthew xxvii. 57-66; Mark xvi. 1–7. And, secondly, the narrative of our sacred writers concerning his resurrection, especially in Matthew xxviii. 1-15. Also Luke xxiii. 55, 56; xxiv. 1-9. John xxi. 1-10.

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First, then, may I not ask any one who reads this account of our Lord's death and burial and resurrection : Is there not in it internal evidence that it is a simple, staightforward, natural account of just what eye-witnesses saw, heard, and believed? Is there in any part of these records any particle of evidence against the honesty of the writers? Is there, in regard to any particular, the slightest or smallest sign of a made-up story? Do not "Fictions usually go naked of circumstances?" The events described in them are said to have happened 'once upon a time;" but the narrators do not tell us when, nor where, nor how; or, if they do profess to give us such details, it is done in such a way that we can never find the place nor identify the parties, nor get a solid foundation for the things stated as facts. Whereas our sacred writers have, each in his own way, given a simple and direct and independent narrative of the resurrection of Jesus from the dead. No one of them ever seems to think that any account of it was to be written, or had been written, different from his own, or that any other view could be taken of it than the one he presents. And hence, although at first there may seem to be such omissions or additions as to amount to discrepancies in their accounts, yet when the Evangelists are fairly examined, there is no contradiction between them, and that which at first seemed to be against them, turns out, in fact, in favor of their intelligence and honesty as witnesses. Each one is an original, independent picture from his own point of view. And both the fact itself of our Lord's resurrection, and of the preaching and recording it as a fact, were so arranged as to make the time suitable, and in every way best calculated to give strength to the truth of the facts stated. Our Lord was long enough in the tomb to prove that there was no delusion as to the fact of his being really dead. He was so long in the tomb that no

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ordinary or natural cause could by any possibility bring him forth alive. And yet his resurrection was not delayed until he was forgotten. He rose from the dead while yet his features were fresh, vivid in the memories of friends and foes-even his wounds fresh-and while the feelings of both friends and enemies were greatly excited, and while the whole conversation in many a circle and through many warm discussions must have still occupied the time and thoughts of the Jewish rulers as well as of Jesus' late followers-He rose while both friends and foes were keenly alive to the scenes of his death. And yet, strange as it may seem, his enemies were more observant of what He had said about his rising from the dead than his friends were. It is strange that his disciples were so stupid or forgetful as not to keep in mind his promise that He would rise the third day from the dead. Still, it was so ordered as to fulfil the Scriptures, and make the proofs of the fact of his resurrection as strong as they could be.

In the early part of his public ministry, our Lord had said, speaking of his body: "Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up again." You remember the Jews perverted his meaning, and made these words the ground of a charge against him before Caiaphas that he was the enemy of the Jews, and desired to destroy their beautiful temple, and overthrow their worship and polity; and yet, after his crucifixion, they understand the words literally, and do every thing they could to prevent their coming to pass. And again, our Lord declared no sign from heaven should be given to that generation, in regard to his Messiahship, except that of Jonah the Prophet, for "as Jonas was three days and nights in the whale's belly, so must the Son of Man be three days and nights in the heart of the earth." And still again, immediately after our Lord had instituted the