of the argument on either side of
the question, it would be arrogance in me to deliver any judgment. And
it is unnecessary. For what I am concerned to observe is, that even they
who think it was a general, but erroneous opinion of those times; and
that the writers of the New Testament, in common with other Jewish
writers of that age, fell into the manner of speaking and of thinking
upon the subject which then universally prevailed, need not be alarmed
by the concession, as though they had anything to fear from it for the
truth of Christianity. The doctrine was not what Christ brought into the
world. It appears in the Christian records, incidentally and
accidentally, as being the subsisting opinion of the age and country in
which his ministry was exercised. It was no part of the object of his
revelation, to regulate men's opinions concerning the action of
spiritual substances upon animal bodies. At any rate it is unconnected
with testimony. If a dumb person was by a word restored to the use of
his speech, it signifies little to what cause the dumbness was ascribed;
and the like of every other cure wrought upon these who are said to have
been possessed. The malady was real, the cure was real, whether the
popular explication of the cause was well founded or not. The matter of
fact, the change, so far as it was an object of sense, or of testimony,
was in either case the same.

Secondly, that, in reading the apostolic writings, we distinguish
between their doctrines and their arguments. Their doctrines came to
them by revelation properly so called; yet in propounding these
doctrines in their writings or discourses they were wont to illustrate,
support, and enforce them by such analogies, arguments, and
considerations as their own thoughts suggested. Thus the call of the
gentiles, that is, the admission of the Gentiles to the Christian
profession without a previous subjection to the law of Moses, was
imported to the apostles by revelation, and was attested by the miracles
which attended the Christian ministry among them. The apostles' own
assurance of the matter rested upon this foundation. Nevertheless, Saint
Paul, when treating of the subject, often a great variety of topics in
its proof and vindication. The doctrine itself must be received: but it
is not necessary, in order to defend Christianity, to defend the
propriety of every comparison, or the validity of every argument, which
the apostle has brought into the discuss