and prosecute by God's assistance under these Heads Our Saviour was incarnate or the Son of God was made Flesh That He might destroy the works of the Devil or put an end to his Tyranny over us That The World might be convinc'd that the Law given by Moses to the nation of the Jews was so much God's Law that it could not be disannull'd or antiquated in any particular but by an authority not inferiour to that of God himself who framed it That God's Law as given to the Jews might be exactly and according to the Letter fulfilled in our Nature and so that He who fulfilled it might be an example of Holiness and Obedience to us God was manifest in the flesh or which amounts to the same our Saviour was Incarnate 1 Joh. 3 8. That He might destroy the Works of the Devil and put an end to his Tyranny over us This is the very doctrine of the Apostle For this purpose the Son of God was manifested that He might destroy the works of the Devil that is that He might get the Mastery of Sin and Death so that neither of them might prevail upon us to our eternal Destruction The Devil had got a strange Ascendant over Men since the Fall so that he seemed to preside in every humane action this Prevalency of his almost banished all Natural Religion out of the World or perverted it to so ill Intents and Purposes that it lost it's name in gross Superstition and ridiculous Idolatry The Devil made use of all the various Dispensations of Providence for the promoting of his own wicked Designs so that the bare Permission of him to prevail was thought a sufficient argument by which to assert his own Independent Supremacy over the World and consequently to engross to himself all that Divine Worship which Originally belonged to the Almighty Nor could it be strange that He who seemed to manage all the affairs of the Universe without controul should be generally feared and sacrificed to if it were for no other reasons but that he might do no outward mischief Having thus insinuated himself into the Throne of God tho' he might now and then for his own credit propound some honest Moral Principles to the World yet He took far greater advantages to instil all manner of Impieties into his Adorers it was his malicious and desperate aim to revenge himself on that terrible Justice which had condemned him to eternal burnings and this revenge as he commenc'd with tempting Men to sin at first so he carried it on by moving deluded Wretches to do all such things as seemed the most directly to contradict the Will of Heaven hence arose that horrid complication of sins of which the Pagan world were guilty summ'd up by the Apostle It was Man's unhappiness Rom 1.28 c. that notwithstanding the visible fatal effects of the first sin they would yet believe it possible there might some unknown sweets lye hid in the perpetration of wickedness Sin always made a gaudy shew like a common Whore in gay trappings who carries so much of Witchcraft in her lascivious looks that tho' many rot away piece-meal in her poysonous embraces yet other wicked and adventurous fools are always adding to the tale of her nasty Trophies This gay outside of sin could prevail not only upon the inferior World but upon the Sons of God themselves those separated from the rest of Adam's race by nobler principles and a diviner knowledge tho' the product of that unhappy softness was nothing but Brutes and Monsters the Plagues of Nature and the insolent Enemies of Heaven Sin prevailed afterwards when God had chosen to himself a particular Nation and made them the proper Lot of his inheritance and where God could discover but 7000. of those who had not bowed the knee to Baal who had not defiled themselves by a miserable prostitution of their Souls to Hell the Devil had a spreading and destructive Interest among the thousands of Israel every day added more to his strength and his ready apprehension of his mighty Conquerours approach edged his Industry and raised his Rage to more than a double heat because his time was short It grieved that enemy of Souls to think of the impendent abridgment of his Insolence He had been so us'd to easie Conquests that He knew not how to veil to the blessed Jesus nor could he speak less to him than as if he had still been the Governour of the Universe and could really by virtue of some inherent authority of his own have bestowed all the kingdoms of the world and the glories of them upon whomsoever he pleased If we would make more particular remarks of the Devil's influence on the World about our Saviour's Incarnation we shall find it notorious in the exertion of a double Tyranny He exercised at that time a prodigious and unaccountable Tyranny over the Bodies of Men He could not be content with enslaving Man 's nobler part but as God himself so the great enemy of God would have the whole Man entirely to himself not that it could be any way advantageous to himself and his own destructive purposes for where he had got the Conquest over the Soul before he knew well enough the body must follow but he cared not what impertinent mischiefs he ingaged himself in provided he might but the more directly cross his Maker and his Punisher Hence he came to take Possession of so many bodies and to vent his malice in so many tormenting Distempers and especially he invaded those of the Jewish nation as if knowing by force of antient Prophecies the World's Saviour was to be born among them He 'd take possession entirely of all he could as if it were by violence to keep out the Lawful Heir from that Inheritance which belong'd to him It has seem'd strange to Many that whereas a Corporeal suffering by the ingress of the Devil into a Man is so very rare now a-days and was not so very frequent among the Gentiles even in our Saviour's time yet so many should be possest among the Jews as we find upon record in the Evangelists This has made divers believe that all violent or convulsive distempers were generally taken to be the effects of the influence of some malignant Spirits not as if there had really been any Devil within them but at most as if he had been permitted then as he was in Job's case to inflict bodily diseases upon some by external causes and not otherwise We know well enough that the Devil in some sence may be called the author of all those Distempers Men's Bodies at this time labour under for it was Sin that introduced Death and all the Preliminaries to it and the Devil introduced Sin But to resolve all these Posessions by the Devil recorded by the Evangelists into nothing but some more violent or unusual diseases than ordinary can no way be allowed For we find it not said of those that were Lepers
to have carried Mens sins or to have born them in his own Body at the place of Execution and it would be absurd and ridiculous to apply any such passages to him and yet as they say the Sins of Men were the cause of the death of those Victims offered to Almighty God by the Sinners and in the same manner were the cause of our Saviour's Death so the same Sins may truly be said to have been the cause of the death of St. Stephen and every Martyr yet the former Expressions being inapplicable to them and they contributing nothing to the Remission of Mens sins Christ onely being that Lamb of God who takes away the Sins of the World those Scriptural Expressions concerning the Death of Christ must signifie a great deal more than bare Dying upon Common Reasons can amount to But to answer this they tell us that whereas God proclaims himself Exod. 34.7 a God keeping Mercy for thousands forgiving Iniquities Transgressions and Sins according to the Hebrew Original it ought to be bearing or carrying Iniquities c. which is the same attributed here unto Christ and yet we cannot say that God as there named has satisfied for any sins therefore neither can Christ have satisfied for sins notwithstanding any such passages concerning him but this the Ancients easily answered by asserting our Jesus the Son of God to have been that very Being so often and emphatically called God who all along convers'd with the Israelites during their wandrings in the Wilderness as I formerly shewed and that Testimony given to their Opinion by St. Paul when dehorting the Corinthians from several Sins by the example of those Israelites 1 Cor. 10.9 he inserts Neither let us tempt Christ as some of them also tempted i. e. the same Christ and were destroyed of Serpents where Moses tells us they tempted God when they fell under that Judgment therefore that God was Christ therefore he really did converse with Israel in those days otherwise he could not have been tempted that Testimony for any thing I have yet seen may pass for unanswerable But with all respect to their Critical Skill we must assert they are mistaken the Hebrew word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from whence 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the cited Text not signifying to carry in its primary acceptation but levare to ease or to take away Marin Brinxia in verbo and so Marinus in his Arca Noe translates this very Text by levare or tollere and so God when he pardons or forgives sins is rightly said to ease Men of that burthen they bear or to take them away and consequently our translating the word by forgiving is true and agreeable to the general sense of Interpreters hence the Authors of the Septuagint Translation as good Criticks as our Socinians render it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 taking away not carrying Sins and they could scarce be suspected of being Athanasians no more could the Chaldee Paraphrast who interprets it by those 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 leaving or remitting Iniquity the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 never signifying Carriage or any thing of that Nature but only leaving or remitting with what else may be genuinely deduced from that Interpretation Vid. Castel Lex Hept in verbo so 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Syriack Version signifies leaving remitting pardoning sparing but no where signifies supporting or carrying the Samaritans use 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a word signifying easing and pardoning too the Arabic 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 taking or driving as a flying Enemy is driven away by a pursuing Army So that for them because in a foreign sense the Hebrew word sometimes signifies to carry to interpret it so in this place contrary to the sense of all the World beside themselves is absurd and only shews what mean Shifts they are put to to find some Parallels to their abusive Constructions of Plain Scripture As for the Evangelists application of that Text Isa 53 4. He hath born our griefs and carried our sorrows to our Saviour Matth. 8.17 upon healing all the sick that were brought to him he only applies that to a particular there which really is of a general Import therefore what he applies to the removal of bodily Diseases St. Peter applies to Sins the Diseases of the Soul our Saviour visibly and openly removing the former as a sign of his removing the latter but not doing both in the same manner he cured bodily Distempers by a Word a Touch an Application of outward though seemingly unpromising Means but removing the Distempers of the Soul only by his Death and so by his blood cleansing us from all Sin satisfying his Father for all our Sins by his shedding of it purging our Souls from all the Filthiness and Corruption of Sins by the Application of it and by Faith in it and that Blood-shedding of our Saviour as tending to his Death prov'd it's infinite Price and Value so often taken notice of in Scripture by being equivalent to those Punishments Divine Justice might and must have laid upon Transgressours the Socinians indeed say He takes away our sins i. e. He makes a shew as if he died and bore the Punishment due to our Sins eorum quasi poenam in se recepit so putting a sham upon the World pretending or seeming to do what he never did from which if the World were convinced of the Truth of what they assert it would be very hard to persuade them that he did by such seeming Means eos à vera eorum poena exsolvere discharge Mankind really from those certain Punishments attending upon Sin so for that further put off That our Saviour may justly be said to procure Salvation for us by his Death because by that Obedience show'd to his Father in dying at his Command he had all Power conferred upon him both in heaven and earth and so had power to forgive our Sins and to confer eternal Life upon us It 's against Reason to believe it for all Power in Heaven and in Earth is infinite Power infinite Power must have an infinite Subject to reside in Christ being meer Man can be no such infinite Subject therefore no such Power can be confer'd on him on account of his Obedience for he cannot receive an impossible Reward but that infinite Power being essential to him as an infinite and eternal Spirit his Humane Nature as united to that is made Partaker of that infinite Power and consequently Christ God and Man can indeed bestow on us those mighty Blessings To fix in our Minds the Notion of Christ's Satisfaction for our sins the more we are told by the Apostle as I formerly cited him That we are justified freely by his Grace Rom. 3.24 25 26. through the Redemption that is in Christ Jesus whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood to declare his Righteousness for the Remission of sins to declare at this time his
their eyes What mortal Creature could have seen or discover'd him if he had come down to earth in his own original Nature or such as he is in his Divinity Therefore he took upon him the form of a Man that he might be seen and look'd upon that he might speak and teach and perform all those things for which he was sent into the World And whereas He dyed as a Man p. 37. it 's true his Humane Body was fastned upon the Cross but his Divine Nature was incapable of suffering his Body only suffer'd and that for the Salvation of those very Wretches by whose cruelty he suffer'd The same Author reflecting upon the curiosity of the Heathens because they would not believe what they did not understand asks them a great many questions about the Originals or natural causes of several things in the World which puzled them in those and confound us their posterity in these days He wonders then that they should deride Christians because they cannot explain all the Mysteries of their Religion and own their inabilities in the case when They were so much to seek in those ordinary cases Our concerns are mysteries indeed Et ideo Christus licet nobis invitis Deus Deus inquam Christus hoc enim saepe dicendum est ut infidelium dissiliat dirumpatur auditus c. Therefore Christ who is God in spite of all your opposition that Christ I say who is God for that must be repeated often to scourge the ears of Infidels speaking by God's command in the form of a Man Adv. gent. l. 2. p. 85. knowing the blindness of humane understandings and the weakness of our apprehensions forbad us to be curious or inquisitive into matters so far removed only ordering us to direct our thoughts and souls to him who is the original of all these things What advice Arnobius gives his Pagans in pursuance of this discourse would be very proper for our Socinians among whom a modest opinion of their own Natural strength and an humble supposition of God's superior Wisdom would cure that Incredulity they are at present guilty of Arnobius soon after lays down this Truth That none can save Souls but an Almighty God nor is there any who can give them long life or perpetuity but only He who is himself immortal and perpetual and uncircumscribed by any boundaries of time Yet this work of saving souls he ascribes to the Son of God Adv. Gen. l. 2. p. 87. therefore according to his sentiments the Son of God is that immortal all powerful and unbounded God To all these evidences I shall only add one of Lactantius the Scholar of the forecited Arnobius who endeavouring to reconcile the worship which the Christians paid to the Father and the Son to those adorations which they acknowledg'd only to belong to one God writes thus Instit l. 4. c. 29. p. 445. Ed. Hack. Where we say the Father is God and the Son is God we do not say they are different Gods nor do we separate them one from another for neither can the Father be divided from the Son nor the Son from the Father for the Father in a relative sence cannot be named without the Son nor the Son be begotten without the Father Since then the Father makes the Son relatively and the Son the Father they have both one Mind one Spirit one substance only the Father is as an exuberant Spring the Son as a stream flowing from it the Father is as the Sun in the firmament the Son as the rays beaming from that Sun who because he is dear and faithful to his Father can no more be separated from him than the stream from the Spring or beams from the body of the Sun for the water of the fountain is in the stream and the light of the Sun in those rays which issue from it And this is plain and pertinent enough And thus have I gone thro' the Writings of those first Fathers who are of the greatest Name and Reputation for their learning and piety in the Churches of God I have examin'd on this account only such Men as lived before the Arrian controversie was on foot so that they cannot be suspected of partiality in the case and either we must believe these Men knew very well what was the General Belief of Christians in those earliest ages or they did not if they did not understand what the Catholick Faith really was we are all strangely in the dark and the Socinians are no more capable of giving an account of the Faith of the primo-primitive Church in contradiction to what we now assert than we are in agreeance to it nay there lye all the presumptions in the World against them in the point for all the Writers extant afterwards with an almost Vniversal consent are directly against them So that unless the true Christian Faith were entirely lost about the time of the great Nicene Council the Socinians must of necessity acknowledge that the Christian Church generally believ'd that Christ was true and real God Nor can they secure themselves even among the several Heretical Clans of those ages for though they own Artemon and Paulus Samosatenus and Photinus and Arrius and Aëtius c. for great and very Orthodox Men and the sole Pillars of truth in those times yet neither did Artemon agree with Paulus nor Paulus with Photinus nor Photinus with Arrius or he with Aëtius and the same Writers call our Socinians sometimes by the name of Samosatenians sometimes of Photinians sometimes of Arrians and Semi-Arrians yet really they agree exactly with none of them as might easily be prov'd by comparing their opinions together Now if Artemon and Paulus and Photinus and the rest were such very great Men in all respects and such careful preservers of the true Apostolical Faith in those things wherein they agree with the Socinian sentiments why should not we believe they used as exact a care and were as certainly in the right in those particulars wherein they differ'd from them for doubtless such Good Men would not admit of any Errors in any points of weighty and important concern Those Men certainly must presume very much upon their own infallibility who tho' they are at odds among themselves will admit of none to be in the right but such who and where they agree with them in the most singular and paradoxical opinions But if on the other side we admit that these Fathers I have quoted on this occasion had real opportunities of knowing the General Sentiments of the Christian Church in their days and that they really did know them the result of that acknowledgment will be this either they were honest and faithful deliverers of the same Catholick Faith down to us or they were not if they were not honest and faithful in delivering down the true Faith in their Writings then holy and zealous Martyrs and devout Confessors must have proved themselves a pack of impudent