the latter part of the verse for let us with Grotius by the mystery of godliness understand the Gospel as we commonly understand it and which we own does contain the mystery of godliness That the Gospel was preach'd by weak Men we own nay that our Saviour himself in his state of exinanition or in his humane nature appear'd weak and contemptible enough we own too but that the Gospel appear'd in the flesh or cloath'd with flesh which is the proper import of the Apostles phrase we deny as absurd That the Gospel was justified in or by the Spirit the miraculous effusions of that confirming the truth of the Gospel preach'd we may own well enough but that the Gospel was seen of Angels is scarce sence that it was never known before it had been declar'd by Men is false for the Angels could not be unacquainted with the several Prophecies of the old Testament concerning the Messias to come nor could they be so far to seek in the meaning of those Prophecies many of which they had been instrumental in delivering and the Angels themselves were indeed the first preachers of the Gospel So the Angel Gabriel tells Zacharias concerning the Son that should be born to him Many of the children of Israel shall he turn to the Lord their God And he shall go before him in the spirit and power of Elias to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children Luke 1.16 17. and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just to make ready a people prepared for the Lord. The same Gabriel afterwards tells the blessed Virgin Behold thou shalt conceive in thy womb and shalt bring forth a Son and shalt call his name Jesus v. 31 32 33. He shall be great and shall be called the Son of the highest and the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father David And he shall reign over the house of Jacob for ever and of his kingdom there shall be no end It was an Angel that appear'd to Joseph in a dream Matth. 1.20 21. and told him that his espoused wife was with child of the Holy Ghost And she shall bring forth a Son says he and thou shalt call his name Jesus for he shall save his people from their sins Again an Angel of the Lord tells the Shepherds who were watching their flocks by night Luke 2.10 11 13 14. Behold I bring you good tidings of great joy which shall be to all people For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour which is Christ the Lord. To which Gospel a whole Choir of Angels subjoyned their Eucharistical Hymn Glory be to God on high in earth peace good will towards men These instances are enough to prove that Angels knew the Gospel before men preacht it not to mention their administring to our Saviour in the wilderness when entring on his prophetical Office and their publishing his resurrection the great confirmation of the Gospel before his Apostles had any apprehensions of it The Gospel was indeed preach'd unto the Gentiles and believ'd on in the World but it was far from being receiv'd in glory for it was scorn'd and derided and cruelly persecuted both by Jews and Gentiles the Devil raising all the powers in the world as far as possible for the extirpation of what was so great an enemy to his Tyranny the Gospel then will not answer all those particular marks set down in the Text. Neither yet are they applicable to God the Father as several of the Socinians would have them for to say God the Father was manifest in the flesh because his will was preach'd by Men who were but flesh and blood besides that such an assertion quits the Suppositum or Subject which was God the Father unless God and Gods will be one and the same thing which cannot be asserted It 's so uncouth an expression as is no where to be parallel'd either in Scripture or any Ecclesiastical Writer We read not any where that God the Father ever appear'd in the flesh or assum'd Humane nature nor did ever any dream of such a thing unless we recur to the ancient Patropassians so call'd because they believ'd it was really God the Father who being Incarnate suffer'd death on the Cross for the sins of Mankind but of that we have no foot-steps in holy Writ nor was the Deity it self ever made manifest in the flesh but in the flesh of the blessed Jesus Col. 2.9 in whom dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily not in his doctrine as the Socinians would have it but in himself Vid. Schlicktin in loc and according to their own demands on the like occasion we would have them shew us some other clear place of Scripture wherein God the Father is said to be manifest in the flesh or to be manifest in Christ and the Apostles and then we may the better consent to their interpretation Again it 's as odd and unusual to say God the Father was justified in the Spirit for what need was there of any such justification his Eternal Power and Godhead were visible in the Universal fabrick of nature and all the Miracles done by our Saviour which Socinians refer to the influence of the Spirit were done that Men might know he was the promis'd Messias and those done by the Apostles after his ascent into Heaven carry'd along with them the same respect but we never heard of any publick declaration made by the Spirit for a more peculiar conviction of the World that the most High God was God indeed or the true God we may understand things thus as the Socinians say but we may a great deal better let it alone and not run into such interpretations of God's Word as we can neither reconcile to truth nor sense If we go farther the matter is not mended at all when we say God the Father was seen of Angels for what novelty was there in that had not they stood continually before his face from the instant of their first Creation or should we flie to God's will was not that known to his peculiar Ministers till such time as they came to learn it by the preaching of mortal men who can imagine so short a Text of Scripture and design'd to make known the greatest mystery in the world should lash out into such absolute impertinencies but to proceed God the Father was preach'd to the Gentiles but where he 's mention'd often doubtless as the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ in those Epistles written by the Apostles to their Gentile Converts but the Gospel it self is stil'd the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ and the Apostles pretend to preach nay to know nothing among their Converts but Jesus Christ 1 Cor. 2.2 and him crucified as St. Paul expresses himself if we must say God the Father was preach'd he was certainly preach'd most to the Antediluvian World by Noah and the elder Patriarchs or he was preach'd
Father when he has no more and the Union yet between the eternal Father and the eternal Son is of a closer and more levelling kind than any thing inferiour nature can afford Our New Author indeed challenges us Cum Scriptoribus de generatione animaelium haec comparentur Nos Dei virtutem in Virginis uterum aliquam substantiam creatam vel immisisse aut ibi creasse affirmamus ex quā juncto eo quod ex ipsius Virginis substantiâ accessit verus homo generatus fuit Aliàs enim homo ille Dei filius à conceptione nativitate propriè non fuisset Sic Smalcius de vero naturali Dei filio c. 3. Ruarus ab ipso uterque à veritate quantum distat if we believe this eternal Generation to prove it expresly contain'd in Scripture and then to prove this Eternal Generation the true Basis or Foundation of his glorious Title of the Only Begotten Son of God As if clear Consequences from plain Premises were not a demonstrative proof of any thing to Men who pretend to Reason and a capacity of discoursing Rationally which is indeed nothing but drawing Consequences plain or obscure from agreeable Premises Or for an instance as if when I find God call'd a Spirit and I know a Spirit is Invisible I might not conclude God tho' a Spirit to be invisible unless I found Invisibility it self distinctly and separated from the Notion of a Spirit attributed to him somewhere in Scripture Now if all these Proofs I have laid down before have proved that our Saviour had a Being before he was Conceived in the Womb of the Virgin which we think to be proved beyond contradiction and if our Adversaries will but allow that Dictate of Common sence that He who really is my Son is my Son as soon as he has a Being or if He be not my Son then He never can be my Son otherwise than by Adoption and so Christ can never be the only begotten Son of his Father because all those who Believe in and Obey God are his Sons by Adoption too if they 'l but allow this then Christ must have been the Son of his Father before such time as he was Conceived in the Virgins Womb because he had a Being before that Conception If Christ had a Being before his Conception it must have been as a Spirit but Spirits do not generate one another therefore he must have had a Being from the beginning of the World If then we fall in with the Arrians and say God created his Son the Word first out of nothing and then created all other things by Him we contradict Scripture which positively assures us that in six days the Lord made Heaven and Earth and all that in them is and therefore rested the seventh day but God could not rest the Seventh Day nor do all he had to do in Six Days if he wrought more than Six Days but He must have worked before the beginning of the Six Days if he made the Word before he made any thing else and we have the Six Days Work summ'd up authentically by Moses but no account there of the Creation of the Word before the Creation of Matter If he were not Created before Matter then he could not Create all things as the Arrians pretend If therefore He had a Being it must have been from all eternity but he was not Created from eternity for whatsoever is Created must have a Beginning but he was begotten of his Father as the Scriptures assure us if therefore he were Begotten and not Made and Begotten before the beginnings of the World He could be Begotten of nothing but of the Substance of his Father there being no other Substance for him to be originated from and therefore must be eternal because the Substance of his Father is and cannot be otherwise than eternal This being true it would be meer folly not to fix his Sonship more peculiarly in this eternal Generation for He that is Begotten by a Father must be his Son and he that is Begotten from eternity must be a Son from eternity Therefore Christ who was Begotten of his Father from eternity must be the Son of his Father from eternity which was the thing to be demonstrated If yet a Socinian will stumble at the Vnion of the Humane with the Divine Nature as if it were an impossibility or against reason let Him resolve us fairly how the Vnion is made between a rational and immortal Soul of a Spiritual and an heavy and unactive Body of an Earthly Nature We are all convinced they are so joyned together but those subtle Springs whereby an Immaterial Soul actuates a Material Body are hitherto indiscernible by the sharpest Eye of impair'd Reason why then should we conclude it impossible for the Divine and Humane Nature to be united together unless it be united in a way more intelligible than our Souls and Bodies For tho' our Souls are of a Spiritual Nature they are infinitely inferiour to the Nature of Almighty God and being that Constitutive part of Humane Nature by which Man is a Rational Creature it might seem an easie task for us to find out how that Soul we reason by should be united to that Body we reason in But since we are so far to seek in this matter may we not reasonably conclude God has hidden this from our Eyes to moderate and humble our unruly Fancies to keep us from prying into things that are too high for us and to convince us that many things wherein we are more immediately concerned not being a whit the less True tho' we understand them not we ought to believe that some things may be True with respect to God of which yet we are able to give our selves no considerable account And so we may satisfie our selves that our Saviour spoke plain truth when he said I and my Father are One meaning thereby an Essential Vnity between his Father and Him because tho' he were at the time of his speaking so a true Man invested with real flesh and blood yet He was God before he was Man the Word of God before he was made flesh and dwelt among us and was God when He was Man his Divine Nature not being prejudiced by his assuming Flesh and Blood by that Divine Nature he was One essentially with his Father and his Humane assumed Nature being in his Divine Nature as a finite is contained in an infinite there could be but One Person at last 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Christ God-Man our Saviour and Redeemer I take the more notice of this particular which I had insisted on before because our new Assertor of Socinianism would perswade us that if we duely examin'd these Words of our Saviour on this occasion spoken to the Jews when they charged him with Blasphemy because in his former expressions He had made himself God tho' indeed he were but a Man we should quit all arguments drawn from thence the words are these
him for we shall see him as he is And when reason once comes to use sense so far as to see God as he is infinitely happy infinitely good infinitely glorious it has gone far enough And thus far have I given an account of Humane reason or the light of Nature for I think I may well enough use them as Synonymous and how far it may be useful in matters of a Divine nature I shall draw onely a Corollary or two from thence and then proceed We conclude from what has been discours'd concerning Humane reason That our obligation to Almighty God is infinite in that He who might have taken from us wholly that natural light because we had so extremely slighted it was yet pleas'd to continue it so far as that rightly apply'd it might still be useful to us even in matters of salvation It 's true we cannot examine things with that clearness and satisfaction which Adam's first enquiries were accompany'd with our understandings are somewhat parallel to that Earth which fell under a Curse for the sin of Man It was naturally fertile before in good things but then it was to bring forth onely bryars and thorns yet Man might eat bread from it still onely it must be in the sweat of his brows He must take pains for that now which he might have had without any trouble before So our Natural reason was clear and free at first common occurrences needed no deep meditations nor extraordinary passages any tedious study to apprehend them in every circumstance The case is now otherwise our reason busies it self naturally about trifles and onely puzles and perplexes it self in matters of no weight or moment yet still it may move to good purpose but it requires abundance of care and pains to cultivate it so as it may produce any thing that 's good and even with a great deal of pains too sometimes it makes conclusions onely vain troublesome and miserably false this unhappiness is the consequence of our own follies at first and it's God's unmerited goodness that we can yet by making use of due means distinguish in some measure between truth and falshood at least in the more obvious parts of religion and his goodness yet appears farther in that where our decrepit reason fails he 's pleas'd to interpose with the influences of his blessed Spirit and to preserve the Modest and Humble from falling into damnable Error that our Reason may have a subject profitable to employ it self upon God has given us his Word blessed are they who meditate on that word day and night he calls upon us to apply our selves to the Law and to the testimony to search the Scriptures to search them with the same care and diligence as those who work in Mines seek for the golden Ore Whereas he lays in his Word several Commands upon us He would have us examine them so as we may be convinced that they are not grievous but Holy just and good These Commandments therefore must be examin'd by the rule of right Reason which whosoever follows will be infinitely satisfied in them In his dealings with mankind he calls upon them to examine their own ways by the same rule he enters into arguments highly rational with mankind himself he bids them to judge in their own causes between himself and them and see if discussing things rationally they must not necessarily fall upon that confession That God's ways are equal but the ways of men unequal When he recommends his mercies when he would terrifie with his judgments He appeals to Humane Reason still or that share of light which we are now partakers of Now he that will employ that light he has upon such noble subjects if he be not prejudiced with wicked principles before or puff'd up with self-conceit must necessarily be a very religious man for the clearer any mans rational faculty is the more pious he must be only men of very low abilities can be either Atheists or Hereticks It 's confest indeed some Hereticks as the Socinians in particular with whom we are at present concern'd pretend highly to Reason but they only sham us with fond pretences and their reason is all empty and sophistical and Atheists are the Men of sence if we may believe fools and madmen but there is a vast difference between a flashy Wit and a ridiculing Humour and sound judgment and solid and weighty argument But God who knew before what artifices Hell and wicked men would make use of to pervert truth calls upon us to exercise our reason farther in discovering and baffling those cheats the enemies of our Souls would fain put upon us wherein as Hereticks and Schismaticks generally make their appeals to God's Word and we have warning in that very Word That in those doctrines where there 's any shew of difficulty those who are unlearned and unstable wrest the Scriptures to their own destructions We are warn'd to try the Spirits whether they be of God and Scripture being the rule of tryal we are oblig'd to study the true sence and meaning of that To which end our rational faculty carries us along in studying the original Languages in which Scripture was written and finding out the true meaning and import of words and phrases in other authors and the modes and customs of countries to which any Texts refer Reason goes with us in comparing text with text and matters of faith or practice laid down in one place with those laid down in another in observing the force of those arguments drawn from such and such Texts their real dependance upon or direct consequence from the places alledg'd and the general consistency of opinions offer'd with the end and design of those positive truths laid down in Scripture Reason has here a large field to exercise it self in And whereas we are urg'd by some to abjure that utterly with respect to those points of faith or practice that are under debate pretending they 'd insist only on the letter of Scripture Maximus tells us well in the formerly cited discourse of his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they drive you from examining Scripture too strictly insinuating that it 's dangerous to pry too narrowly into secrets 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Maximi disceptatio inter opera Athan. T. 2. p. 296. but disswading it indeed that they might avoid the reproof of their Errors from thence where he takes farther notice how such persons if they meet but with a word that at first hearing sounds favourably to their fancies they run away with it without ever considering the design of the inspired Writer or examining the agreement of their own shallow glosses with the general tenour of Holy Writ an humour that prevails with too many still who prefer the sound of words before the truth and pertinency of texts of Scripture and therefore imagine themselves to argue very piously and agreeably to God's word when all their talk is nothing to the purpose But mysteries the great
God Contra Celsum l. 1. p. 30 so he objects that Christ was educated in the dark was hired a servant in Aegypt that he there tryed their magick powers and returning from thence in confidence of his jugling tricks set up for a God Origen vindicates him from the malicious imputation of being a Magician but never pretends to deny that he was God or that he assumed that title nay he 's so far from that that he takes a great deal of pains to prove that He was God particularly from those passages of the 45 Psalm cited by the Author of the Epistle to the Hebrews in his first chapter which I have clear'd before and he adds that we must here consider the Prophet speaking to that God whose throne is everlasting l. 1. p. 43. and that he asserts that God was anointed by God who was His God with the oyl of gladness above his fellows which is the real sence of the words and which he tells us he had formerly silenc'd an obstinate Jew with In his second book Celsus introduces a Jew speaking against Christ and saying they could not own him for God who did not make good his word who endeavoured poorly to avoid Death and was at last betrayed by one of his own followers c. Origen answers Christians did neither believe the body of Christ nor his soul to be God but the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Word the Son of the God of all things was God that Christians justly condemn the Jews who acknowledge not him to be God whom their own Prophets so often give testimony to as a powerful Being and as God which he is by the witness of the great God and Father of all things himself That when God in the beginning of the world said Let us make Man in our Image the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Word perform'd all that his Father commanded for if according to that of the Psalmist He said and they were made l. 2. p. 6â— he commanded and all things were created if at God's command all the Creatures were framed who according to the meaning of the prophetical Spirit was able to put in execution such his Father's command but He who was the living Word and Truth it self The Word then in the beginning of all things was with God and the Word was God and without him nothing was made that was made It 's the Doctrine of S. John and of Origen too So far then we may know how the beginning of S. John's Gospel was understood in his days and what they thought might conveniently be proved from thence When the Jew afterwards is brought in objecting that Men who are partakers of the same Table would not lye in wait for one another much less would any one have treacherous designs upon God p. 74. Origen might easily have answered that cavil by denying that He was God and then by giving instances of Men false and treacherous to those who have eaten with them at the same Table but He owns his Godhead and only performs the latter Celsus afterwards brings in his Jew objecting against the Divinity of Christ thus Who ever heard of God coming down from heaven to earth on purpose to perswade Men as they say Christ did and failing in his design especially when he was long expected and hoped for a denyal of his Divinity had put a full stop to this objection too but Origen on the contrary retorts upon them That the Jews themselves were instance enough of the possibility of such a thing since God had appear'd so remarkably to them in bringing them up out of the land of Aegypt and in giving them a Law from Sina and yet they nor their Fathers could by that means be perswaded to obedience or prevented from running presently into Idolatry p. 106. After all this Celsus in his own person makes use of this argument to prove that Christ could not be God God says He is good and pure and happy and in himself infinitely excellent and lovely if He should descend to be among Men He must necessarily undergo a change a change from good to bad from pure to impure from happiness to misery and from the most excellent to the most sinful state this God would never undergo To this the Father answers That it 's true God is in himselâ— Immutable nor did he suffer any change oâ— this account But that which descended down to Men was in the form of God but out of his Love to mankind he debased himself so far as that he might be born among them but He suffer'd no change from baâ— to good for that He was without Sin he never committed any He was not chang'd from pure or clean to foul or filthy for Hâ— did not so much as know Sin nor did he fall from happiness to misery He humbled himself indeed but was not a whit the less happy even when he stoop'd the lowest for the good of mankind nor did he fall from the best to the most sinful state because what he did proceeded from Love and Charity to us by being among whom He that was the great Physician of Souls could be no more altered for the worse than a Physician for the body is by conversing with those that are sick and full of diseases But says he if Celsus think that because the immortal God the Word assumed a mortal body and an humane Soul that therefore He suffered an alteration or a change Let him know that the Word essentially continuing the Word still suffers by none of those things which happen either to the body or the Soul but that He condescends to become flesh and to speak in a Body l. 4. p. 169 170. for the sake of those who are not able to behold the eradiations and brightness of his Divinity so long till He who receives him being in a short time rais'd to a greater understanding by the Word may be able to contemplate his original nature And finally in his sixth book against the same Celsus he speaks â—hus excellently If then Celsus enquire how we think to know God and to be saved with him We will answer him That He who is the word of God being in them who seek him or who wait for his appearance is sufficient to make known and to reveal the Father who was not to be seen before His appearance for who else can save the Soul of Man and guide us in every thing to God but only God the Word who being in the beginning with God for the sake of those who are confin'd to flesh became flesh that he might be comprehended by those who were not able to see him as He was the Word and as He was with God and as He was God l. 6. p. 322. and appearing in flesh and speaking in the body He calls those who are in the flesh to himself that first he might make them like to the Word which was made flesh and
to the Jews of whom we acknowledge that they had no such distinct notions of the Trinity as we by the Gospels assistance have at present but yet both among Jews and Gentiles he was declar'd by other names than that of God the Father and if according to our common Logical notions Relatives do mutually suppose or remove one another if Jesus Christ was not really and actually the Son of God pre-existent to his incarnation the name of Father could not properly have been apply'd to the supreme God nor he be preach'd to the World under that character so that in fine we conclude that the preaching of God the Father to the World was no part of the Mystery of Godliness Nor is it properly so to say that God the Father was believ'd on in the World for that too was nothing newly effected by the appearance of our Saviour the World in general from its first original believ'd there was a God if there were any who from those apprehensions they had of the existence of a God set themselves to live virtuously as considering that God under the notion of a knowing and severe Judge and one capable of rewarding men according to their works such Persons believ'd in God according to our own sense when we repeat the Creed Now that some did thus believe before our Saviour's appearance in the flesh is unquestionable all those who liv'd religiously before the promulgation of the Mosaic Law did thus believe in God and are some of them remembred as the great Heroes of Faith in the beginning of the Eleventh Chapter to the Hebrews If then this were a Mystery it was of a very ancient standing and discovered long before the coming of Christ The application of the particulars thus far failing we have some reason to believe that neither will the last agree any better to that imposed sense He was received up in glory or into glory Here our adversaries flie to God's will again so confounding God and God's will as if they were not to be considered as distinct but this we have consider'd before where we observed that contradiction the Gospel met with in the World As to God the Father where or when or how or by whom was he receiv'd up in glory the holy Scriptures give us no intimation of his having descended at any time from Heaven to Earth and He that 's receiv'd up into glory ought to be so receiv'd by some Being superior to himself which a Socinian knows God the Father cannot have now as the Apostle teaches us He that descended Eph. 4.10 is the same also that ascended up far above all heavens that he might fill all things but God the Father never that we hear of in Scripture descended therefore God the Father who ever of himself was surrounded with infinite glory never was by any receiv'd up into glory And thus have we shown the vanity of those glosses which the Socinians and others have fixt upon this Text we shall now show to whom the particulars in the Text do properly and unquestionably belong And here since Scripture makes it very plain that the whole method of serving God in an acceptable manner is laid down by our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ That as himself tells us He is the Way the Truth John 14.6 and the Life and no man comes to the Father but by him The whole mystery of Godliness or of true Christian Religion can consist in nothing but what refers to him who is the author of it that is the blessed Jesus concerning whom and whose doings and sufferings for us there is nothing reveal'd in the Gospel or in the foregoing prophecies but what 's mysterious He was indeed God manifest in the flesh God blessed for ever yet for the sake of wretched Sinners descending to Earth and taking our Nature upon him being cloth'd with flesh and all those incumbrances and infirmities attending upon a mortal state sin onely excepted He is that eternal Word which was in the begining with God nay that Word that was God John 1.1.14 and that Word was made flesh and dwelt among us as we learn from St. John Now if Christ really was God the most opinionative of the Socinians would conclude the Text plain enough for that Christ was certainly and literally made flesh but if we cannot read this Text of the Apostle truly without inserting the word God And Smalcius one of the great promoters of the Socinian heresie declares Smalc de verbo incarnato c. 18. Nos Graecum textum Vulgatae longe esse anteponendum censemus is vero habet Deum in carne esse manifestatum We look upon the Greek Text as far to be preferr'd before the Vulgar Latine and the Greek reads it God was manifest in the flesh and if neither the Gospel nor the will of God nor God the Father can properly or truly be said to be made flesh and yet God was manifest in the flesh then that Jesus who was truly and literally cloth'd with our flesh must be that God the farther proof of Christ's real and eternal Divinity belongs to another place but his true and indisputable humanity is the first plain and most obvious assertion of the Apostle here This same blessed Jesus was as plainly justified in the Spirit since not onely the miracles he did justified him in the sight of all Mankind and prov'd that he could be no cheat or Impostor as the Jews were willing to have him thought but at the time of his Baptism by John in Jordan while he was praying the Heaven was open'd and the Holy Ghost descended in a bodily shape like a Dove upon him and a voice came from Heaven which said Thou art my beloved Son Luke 3.21 22. in thee I am well pleas'd Now the Holy Spirit would not in so open a manner have descended on him who had pretended to that relation to Allmighty God which really never belong'd to him Therefore John the Baptist makes a right inference from that descent I saw says he Joh. 1.32 the Spirit descending from Heaven like a Dove and it abode upon him And I knew him not v. 33 34. but he that sent me to baptize with water the same said unto me Vpon whom thou shalt see the Spirit descending and remaining on him the same is he which baptizeth with the Holy Ghost And I saw and bare record that this is the Son of God Our Lord himself makes it one of his last instructions to his Disciples that when the Comforter that Holy Spirit whom he would send should come he should amongst other things convince the world of righteousness because He the blessed Jesus went to his Father and the world should see him no more c. 16. v. 8. 10 14. and that that Holy Spirit should glorifie him for he should receive of his and shew it to men And thus effectually that Sacred Spirit when he was so plentifully according to promise pour'd out
deep ever to be made up It 's true when God himself was mention'd as the undertaker of so great a work even despairing man might entertain some dawning hopes but when they saw a poor Carpenter's Son one who had not so much as where to lay his head assume yet the glorious title of the world's Redeemer and Saviour their hopes slagg'd their almost grasped joys seem'd just vanishing into empty air When the Holy Ghost God too infinitely good and powerful and wise interpos'd and attended that humble Man with so much vigour and constancy that He by a thousand glorious actions and by a close and perpetual correspondence with Heaven visible even to vulgar eyes prov'd the entire Union that was between himself and his Father and that Sacred Spirit and justified himself in the thoughts of very aliens themselves who could not but acknowledge of a truth that for all his mean appearance and his scandalous Passion on the Cross He was the Son of God But could men have doubted still the happy Angels those purer and more discerning Spirits saw him too they saw him and knew him and ador'd him they saw their mighty Lord tho' veil'd in all the rags of poor mortality And tho' sin might have made a former breach between those blessed Spirits and polluted man yet now where their Lord loved they lov'd too and always look'd and always waited on him while he wrought the worlds redemption while he was so justified and so attended on divers gave up themselves absolutely to his service whom he lov'd and taught and protected and endued with miraculous knowledge eloquence and courage and sent them on that blessed errand to preach to the Gentiles the glad tydings of Salvation in his name They boldly undertook the work and tho' they had ignorance and prejudice and malice and cunning to contend with meer men contemn'd before but then inspired broke through all opposition and the forsaken Gentiles heard the gladsome sounds of peace and tho' there were too many enemies to their own good yet those laborious messengers of Heaven preached with that power and efficacy that men began every where to call on the name of the Lord Jesus Christ Nay the more men of perverse minds cross'd the designs of that Gospel preach'd in the name of the Son of God the more those who believed in him were multiplied As for himself when he had finished that stupendous work and by his own Death had conquered Hell and Death He broke those fatal chains and rose again no more lyable to humane rage His Almighty Father who had viewed all the prodigious efforts of his Love to mankind with an ineffable complacency reach'd out his holy arm to receive that very humane Nature in which his beloved Son had done and suffered so much from him the chearful clouds were sent for a Chariot and he went upwards flying upon the wings of the wind while jâ—cund Angels those ministerial flames waited on his triumphs and taught his wondring followers what they were afterwards to expect from their Redeemer These are those mighty mysteries on which our most holy faith is built their truth however unintelligible to us is our security and the sincerity of our faith will necessarily show it self in an holy conversation and godliness The Verse I have explain'd then imports That without Controversie the Mystery of Godliness is great or in more words That the Basis or foundation of that Religion introduced into the World by the Doctrine of Christ's Gospel is indisputably and agreeably to the nature of Religion to Humane reason extremely profound and unintelligible To prove this we shall enquire Into the Vniversal agreement of all persons of what Religion soever That Mysteries are essential to Religion Whether our Saviour intended the entire abolition of all other Religions for the settlement of his own or rather to unite what was good in every distinct Religion into one and to sublime or perfect that so as it might tend most to God's glory and Man's happiness and whether that could be effected Men standing in their present corrupt state without the retaining of old or instituting of new Mysteries in his Religion What considerable advantages can accrue to Religion from those Mysteries it 's founded upon Then we must enquire into that Vniversal agreement of all persons whatsoever that Mysteries or some principles or circumstances of a more secret and abstruse nature are essential to all Religion But here to prevent all mistakes it must be remember'd That so much as concerns the practical part of Religion as contain'd in the Word of God is so clear and evident that the words of St. Paul are justly apply'd to them If they be hid they are hid to those that are lost whose eyes the God of this World hath blinded that the light of the glorious Gospel of Jesus Christ should not shine upon them 2 Cor. 4.3 4. The words whereby all things necessary to be done toward the attainment of eternal life are exprest are such and so plain that the simplest Christian may understand them And that person who goes about to involve the practical duty of a Christian whether in respect of his communication with God or man in obscure and mysterious terms crosses the end of the Gospel which is to instruct the weakest understanding in an easie and intelligible way how to live godly righteously and soberly in this present evil world yet it must be acknowledged that even in relation to practice there are some apparent difficulties and notwithstanding all that plainness apparent in God's word a Man has a very hard task sometimes to distinguish between what 's lawful and what 's unlawful such cases are commonly known by the name of Cases of Conscience or such matters wherein so many arguments seemingly strong and plausible appear on both sides to the understanding that it knows not which way to act and all that hesitancy or doubtfulness arises onely from a fear of offending God These generally respecting Christian practice create a great deal of trouble frequently to very good Men for others are seldom troubled with such religious fears and these are sometimes by various and unusual circumstances rendred so very intricate that the wisest and most discerning Men are often at a loss to clear and resolve them to the Querent's satisfaction Here the Jews were order'd to have recourse to their Priests whose lips were suppos'd to preserve knowledge and the Priests when there was any thing of a more inextricable nature had the Vrim and Thummim to appeal to The Heathens had some emergent doubts as to matter of publick management of themselves which sometimes perplex'd them too and they had their imaginary wise Men the Priests attending their desecrated altars who would assume as if they had the art of resolving doubts those who profess Christianity have still a severer task in these matters as having no Oracle immediately to consult and having doubts more numerous and
nick-names given 'em by the Talmudical writers as cited out of the book Sotah by Buxtorf Buxtorf in voce 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Lex Talmud Where first they are called Sichemites because as Hamor and Sichem consented to be circumcised so these not out of any respect to God's honour but to advance interest and serve their own carnal ends this was their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the second sort of them was the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I might call them Creepers from their pretended humility whereby they seemed afraid to raise their feet from the ground as being far from any thing of a lofty humour by which means they stumbled often and fell down the inconvenience of which they bore with a great deal of apparent patience the next was the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Blinking Pharisee or one that breaks his face against the walls a name given them on occasion of their imaginary purity and spirituality which was so great that for fear a maid or a woman or any other unclean thing should fall into their sight they walkt with their eyes so far shut that they could not chuse their own way and so often ran their heads against walls and posts The fourth sort was the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 these may be call'd Crook-backs from an humour some of them had taken up of stooping so much out of humility too as they call'd it that they seemed almost to walk double or to be very crooked and this was lest by walking upright they should disturb the Almighty or hit his feet which they concluded to be very near the earth that being his footstool and he filling all things with his presence The fifth is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This Pharisee I would call a Supererogatorian or one who superciliously asks what you can shew him more that he has to do and hee 'l do it intimating thereby that he has already done every thing God has commanded and has now time and ability to perform a new task The sixth kind is the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This tho' it sounds favourably and signifies the Pharisee of Love yet the Talmudists tell us plainly it signifies no more than a meer Mercenary or one that endeavours to observe the Law not out of any principle of fear or love of God but of a fondness of that reward that 's promised to those who do so which reward tho' we may have a due respect to as the Apostle assures us yet the love of God must principally constrain to that filial obedience which God requires at our hands the last nick-name the Pharisee carries is that he is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Pharisee of fear or he that keeps the Law or pretends to do it meerly out of a wretched slavish fear of punishment These several names were justly bestowed upon them as so many characters of infamy from those several observations the world made of them Their long clothing carried somewhat venerable in it but Rabbi David upon that of Zephaniah where the Prophet in God's name threatens to cut off all that wear strange apparel tells us Zeph. 1.8 Vid. Drusium de 3. Sect. l. 2. c. 1. That by that expression some understand those men who to make a shew of piety and holiness to the world put on garments that are not like the garments of other men that by those garments they may be taken notice of for very pious and holy men but in the mean time their ways are wicked such were the Pharisees who in a word at our Saviours appearance had perverted the Law of God so as to be a meer stale of their ambition and false interest they were religious in shew but the greatest enemies of Religion in reality If after the Jews we come to take notice of the Gentiles we shall find they were fallen into the same or greater corruptions The precise Stoicks so famous for their Morals were both themselves and their followers as infamous for their effeminacy and luxury those great enquirers into the wisdom of God discover'd in the works of Nature lost themselves and their admirers in a thousand follies they recommended continence and sobriety themselves in the mean time being bauds and panders to their own unnatural Lusts they declaim'd against pride yet thought themselves too good to converse with earth their chief Philosophers ptetended to unite a rational Soul to the Divine Nature and at the same instant made ignoble Magick and Diabolical contracts the very crown of all their endeavours the generality of the Pagan world tho' they multiplied their Deities so fast scorn'd the slavery of a devout fear and dar'd and hector'd the greatest of their Gods with their extravagancies they fell into the foolery of deifying one another and by such a superfetation of Divinities came to have no fear at all of God before their eyes what enormous crimes they fell into S. Paul gives us a just account of where for their senceless Idolatries he assures us God gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts to dishonour their own bodies between themselves and as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge so God gave them over to a reprobate mind to do those things which are not convenient hence they were filled with all unrighteousness fornication Rom. 1.24.28 32. wickedness covetousness maliciousness they were full of envy murder debate deceit malignity they were whisperers back-biters haters of God despiteful proud boasters inventers of evil things disobedient to parents without understanding covenant-breakers without natural affection implacable unmerciful and these knowing the judgment of God that they which commit such things are worthy of death not only did the same themselves but took pleasure in those that did them Sin was grown among them then as at present it is with us one of the most fashionable things in the world so that even their own companions the Parasites and Sycophants of those irreligious ages could not but now and then Satyrize upon their vices it was indeed no wonder that in our Saviour's time and the immediately precedent and subsequent Ages they should be so miserably corrupted the degeneracy began betimes for Maximus Tyrius tells us a story of Anacharsis the Scythian a man of a truly philosophical spirit and of ancient simplicity and living about the time of the great Cyrus who restor'd Israel to their countrey after the Captivity of Babylon Maximi Tyrii Dissertat 15. that he came into Greece in quest of a wise man or one whose words and actions were of a piece Athens that eye of Greece and where all the various Sects of Philosophers were in their splendor could shew him no such man nor could the rest of Greece satisfie his inquiry till at last in an obscure corner of the Countrey he found one Myson a man of no name nor reputation in the world but one that really spoke and acted too as became a
vogue of the World and their Dictates have been valued by learned Men as the great standards of Philosophic reason Nay the acquists of some in these matters have puft them up with that ridiculous vanity and pride that they have dared to trample upon all Religion nay upon the Deity it self imagining themselves able to demonstrate how the World and all the parts of it might be constituted regulated and continued without any concurrence of a Divine and unbounded Providence but when these same mighty pretenders to wit and sense have come to look into the shallow Mystick rites of ancient Heathens they have but fool'd and disgraced themselves but when such fall upon the foundations of Christianity they prove like that Stone our Saviour speaks of which whosoever shall fall on shall be broken Matth. 21.44 but on whomsoever it shall fall it will grind him to powder they onely show themselves egregious fools and endeavour to ridicule every thing which they find themselves unable to understand Thus Lucian or some of his Contemporaries in his Philopatris a Dialogue of that name makes it his business to scoff at several things reveal'd in Scripture and at several of the Mysteries of Christianity though neither he nor his followers not Celsus nor Porphyry nor Libanius nor Julian himself nor any other of that witty scoffing tribe were ever able to confute the Writings of the Prophets or the Apostles or to baffle their Christian Antagonists by any serious argument In the forenam'd Dialogue Critias offering to swear to Triepho or to give him an oath for his security from any danger having named several of their Heathen Gods Triepho derides them all with reason enough Critias at last breaks out thus By whom then shall I swear that I may be believ'd The other answers Thou shalt swear by that God who rules above Philopatris Oper. Luciani T. 2. p. 770. the great the immortal the Heavenly God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Son of the Father the Spirit proceeding from the Father one of three and three of one 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Reckon of these as of Jupiter esteem these God after this the same Buffoon proceeds to scoff at that great Apostle of the Gentiles St. Paul calling him that bald high-nos'd Galilaean who mounted upon the air into the third Heaven and there learnt wonderful matters 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He regenerated or renewed us by water and gently guided us into the foot-steps of the blessed and redeem'd us out of the regions of the wicked and again he burlesques the original of all things where he tells his Companion that there was light incorruptible invisible incomprehensible which put an end to darkness and disorder 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 onely with speaking one word as that slow-tongu'd Man meaning Moses has written and more to the same purpose and of the same scurrilous stamp and this is the wit of Atheistical heads who think it 's enough to expose a Doctrine they understand not or cannot edifie by as some would express it meerly to name it and no more where as the true Sons of Religion though they are far enough from pretending to fathom the great objects of faith cannot yet but derive ineffable consolations from the positive truth of those Mysteries contain'd in Holy Writ but this overweening of their own extraordinary wit made many persons of excellent natural abilities of well exercised reason and inimitable diligence in the first ages of the Gospel stumble so foully at the Doctrine of a crucified Saviour for as a just punishment for that foolish pride and self conceit God destroy'd the wisdom of the wise 1 Cor. 1.19 and brought to nothing the understanding of the prudent so the Stoic and Epicuraean Philosophers were mightily puzled with those new Gods as they were pleas'd to call them Acts 17.18 viz. Jesus and the resurrection as if because they could not understand what the meaning of a resurrection was therefore the Apostles who preach'd it up must needs either make a God or a Goddess of it Thus the same doctrine of the resurrection and that of Christ's being the Son of God and several other mystick truths were cast in the teeth of suffering Christians as if they could be no better than mad men who would undergo so many hardships for assertions so very unintelligible as that they could deserve nothing less than derision and it was often urged as an evidence of a bad cause that it had so many strange and incomprehensible postulates attending on it The same is the plea of the Atheistical what if I should add of the Heretical wits of our age who labour hard to expose whatsoever they meet with beyond the reach of their debauch'd understandings and would therefore have all sound Religion banish'd out of the Commonwealth because forsooth they cannot comprehend How God should become Man should be born of a pure Virgin should converse with men should dye for their sins rise again for their justification and ascend up into glory with that humane body he had assumed unto himself from whence before the Worlds dissolution he should certainly come to be the Supreme determining Judge of all both Men and actions upon which Faith the whole Christian Oeconomy is built and without the certain truth of all which Christianity would be the most absurd and unreasonable religion in the World Thus Hereticks thus Atheists discourse as if it were indeed impossible there should exist a God of greater wisdom and power than themselves or however that he must dispose of all things just agreeably to their Capacities on pain of being dethroned for a default when yet every day they see men like themselves born into the World but can give no possible account of the reason of their acquiring such and such particular shapes or features in the World they see a man born naked into the World but cannot tell us why they are not all cover'd with hair or scaly armour like Beasts or with scales and fins as Fishes or with feathers as Birds they see and know they have naturally but two feet but cannot tell why they should not be born without any as Worms or Fishes or why they should not have four as the greater number of Beasts or why not greater numbers as most insects they see Man a Creature of a noble and Majestick frame endued with a discursive faculty ready to descant upon every visible object yet cannot tell why nature should have given man but two eyes wherewith to survey so vast and unaccountable a variety when at the same time she has studded the head of a contemptible Fly with several thousands they find themselves able to call to mind a mighty number of particulars seen heard read talkt of but cannot inform themselves certainly where the numerous Idaeas of sensible things past should be lodged when at the same time the mind is crouded with a World of present objects and roving too after the
the chief family of which the Priesthood belong'd came to be in some measure incorporated into the greater tribe of Judah if withal he take notice that tho' the regal power in the tribe of Judah ended with the Captivity of Babylon yet the Priesthood continued in the family of Aaron he may easily see the fulfilling of Jacob's words for we may see Aaron the first Patriarch of the Priestly family breaking out of his own into the tribe of Judah and marrying Elisheba the daughter of Aminadab and sister of Naashon of the tribe of Judah Exod. 6.23 which Aminadab and Naashon are particularly reckoned among David's predecessors by S. Matthew Matth. 1.4 by which means the Regal and Sacerdotal line were intermingled as well as the tribes were afterwards nor were such alliances altogether extraordinary for we find afterwards Jehoiada the high-priest marrying Jehoshabeath the sister of Ahaziah King of Judah 2 Chron. 22.11 of the house and lineage of David Now the Scepter is assign'd immediately to the hands of Judah the royalty being fully and entirely in the hand of that tribe without any competition either with the Benjamites or Simeonites part of which tribes stuck fast to Judah's interests after the revolt of the ten tribes but the Lawgiver is placed between his feet not according to the sence some affix to that phrase as if Jacob spoke modestly of the original birth of such Law-givers as if being between the knees were an equivalent to being born from the womb of such a one as it 's true it sometimes means but it signifies the Lawgiver shall be in his protection or within his jurisdiction and limits as a great Officer between the feet of the Sovereign on some solemn occasions or as the Bishop of Rome is said to have set the Archbishop of Canterbury between his feet at the Council of Lyons with that expression Includimus hunc in orbe nostro tanquam alterius orbis Papam and so the Law-giver was continually within the proper bounds and limits of the tribe of Judah both before and after the Captivity of Babylon But as the Scepter departed from Judah at that Captivity so the legal expounder of sacred writings to the Jewish nation was taken away about the time of our Saviour's Incarnation the family of Aaron being then lighted and every one admitted to the high-priesthood who could give most money for that office and the Civil Government tho' under the title of Herod being a meer vassal to the Roman Empire When these things were both come to pass then Shilo the promis'd Messias came in whom those particular assurances to David were made good That out of his loyns the Messias should come In him the Royal and Priestly line were united he was legal Heir to both Houses he was a King and Priest for ever to whom the gathering of all Nations is and ought to be Luke 1.27 32.35 Now that the blessed Virgin was of the House and Lineage of David as well as Joseph we learn from Scripture and if the Tribe of Judah was exalted by the advancement of David to the Imperial Throne it was much more exalted and more adorable to the rest of the Tribes by the birth of Jesus the Saviour of the World and the King of all things both in Heaven and in Earth How Moses his word was made good of the Prophet to be rais'd up like to himself I show'd before that being made truth in the birth of Christ but it 's more compleat application belonging to our Saviour's manly age when he made himself publick and undertook to preach repentance to his obstinate Country-men But that of a Body hast thou prepar'd for me came to pass when the Angel's word was effected The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee and the power of the highest shall overshadow thee therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God Luke 1.25 It was an immediate Divine power that gave a beginning and increase to that Sacred Body in the Virgin 's Womb nothing could be produced between Man and Woman as under the ancient curse and miserably corrupted and polluted in their natures that was fit for those great things at that time design'd for us for who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean therefore a Virgin untouch'd by man was chosen for his habitation who was to redeem lost mankind and was overshadowed by the power of the Almighty Gen. 1.2 which did incubare in Virginem as the same Spirit is said to move upon the face of the Waters to cover it as the Bird covers her Eggs to make them prolifick as the word imports now a body so prepar'd and so inhabited as our Saviour's humanity was could not be but pure and undefiled since if a corrupt Tree cannot bring forth good fruit neither can a good Tree bring forth evil fruit the reasons of both their productions being the same Nor was it unreasonable he should be David's Lord though his Son according to the flesh whose birth was intimated by holy Angels whose Father was Almighty God himself and whose Kingdom was to endure from everlasting to everlasting all which circumstances rendred him infinitely more considerable to pure reason than ever David was nor could the humble manner of his entrance into the World be any just prejudice to his mighty title David was mean and inconsiderable too when God took him from attending on the Sheep-fold to feed his People Israel and the Prophet Zachary gives him notwithstanding his apparent meanness his due Honour Rejoyce greatly O Daughter of Zion shout O Daughter of Jerusalem Zach. 9.9 behold thy King cometh unto thee he is just and having salvation lowly and riding upon an Ass and upon a Colt the foal of an Ass He might then be a King still how despicable soever he appear'd to humane eyes and as a King according to the extent and proportion of his Empire might be Lord of David and of all the Kings upon Earth Isaiah had long since foretold he should be born of a Virgin and so in the event he was Mary his Mother was a Virgin even beyond the confutation of the malicious Jews it was to such a one the Angel was sent it was such a one who was according to his assurance to be overshadow'd by the Holy Ghost it was such a one who was to conceive and bring forth And the Evangelist openly declares of Jesus That when as his Mother Mary was espous'd to Joseph Matt. 1.18 before they came together she was found with Child of the Holy Ghost and of Joseph he asserts That he knew her not until she had brought forth her first born Son v. 25. and he call'd his name Jesus And whereas the Prophet had been ecstasi'd with joy at the knowledge of a Child a Son of so Divine a nature being given to his People when that Child was born indeed the Sacred
of his Unction to their government and David was God because he held the place of God and in his room and by his appointment managed that people You see the reason of beginning so would be the same which these Men assign to our Evangelist but would you not look on such an Historian as an impious blasphemer or could ever any without the spirit of Prophecy imagine that by such expressions any thing of this nature could be meant It 's true again that God promis'd Moses Exod. 4.16 c. 7.1 he should be instead of God to his brother Aaron that he should be a God to Pharaoh King of Egypt and what looks yet greater that Aaron should be his Prophet We would conclude that by these expressions God meant no more than that Moses should interpret the Will of God or make it known to Aaron dictating always to him what He should say and do in the name of God and that Pharaoh should shew a respect to him as to a Divine Person and should be no more able to offer him violence or to do any injury to him how angry so ever he might be than if he had really been a God and that because of his slow speech Aaron should deliver his mind and errand to Pharaoh for him this Interpretation is natural and the sequel of the story confirms it but would ever any Man that desired to be soberly understood have said of Moses even when he was upon the Mount that Moses was with God and that Moses was God No Author sacred or prophane can afford us any parallel to this bold and impious assertion that the Word was God or that any Person was God and yet no more than a meer Man Socinus tells us that certainly if God had designed that we should believe Jesus Christ was the most high God he would have told us so in plain terms Now had not Socinus himself and his Partners endeavour'd to have perswaded the world otherwise all mankind would have concluded this expression of the Evangelist such a plain passage as he required and was the want of a single particle enough so to obscure the whole discourse of the Evangelist that without a 1000. fictitious stories added to him he must become absolutely unintelligible God in that expression the Word was with God and in that again the same was in the beginning with God is by themselves understood to signifie the most high God and why should it be otherwise interpreted in the middle sentence But Schlicktingius here sets upon us with an absurd paraphrase of his own contrivance the necessary consequence of the current interpretation of the Evangelist For says he it will amount to this as if the Evangelist had said Schlicktin in locum In the beginning was that one God and that one God was with that one God and that one God was that one God and that same one God was in the beginning with that one God and that one God made all things by that one God Absurd and ridiculous enough but our own learned Dr. Hammond has furnished us with one of a more genuine and sensible complexion thus In the beginning of the World before all time before any thing was created the Son of God had a real being and that Being with his Father of whom he was begotten from all eternity and was himself eternal God and being by his Father in his eternal purpose designed to be the Messias who was among the Jews known by the title of the Word of God and is here fitly express'd by that name The Word This eternal Word of God I mean by whom all things were at first created He brought with him the Doctrine of life c. Here we have the meaning of the Catholick Church set down and a full explication of the Evangelist without any such nonsence or Tautology as Schlicktingius would amuse us with But as if the Spirit of God had resolved to prevent the Socinian Cavils the Evangelist to make us more certain who this Word was adds this to his Character ver 3. All things were made by him and without him was not made any thing that was made but to evade this they give us a new cast of their subtilty and boldness For here the word All things must lose its sence and be understood only of some particulars for they recur to their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 their original false principle which is that in the beginning is only in the beginning of the Gospel and so by all things here are meant only such things as have a particular respect to the promulgation of the Gospel of all which things he was the Author but their first principle is yet very far from being made good nay had our Evangelist expresly said In the beginning of the Gospel was the Word which yet neither was nor could be his meaning All things were made by him could not admit of their restrained sence the following words forbid it without him was nothing made that was made and for fear these words should be liable to any exception the Apostle interprets their meaning by that He was in the World and the World was made by him v. 10. and the World knew him not But here rather than not elude the force of the words they will in one verse make the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the World to carry no fewer than three several sences as it 's three times repeated for first by his being in the world is meant his Conversing with all men in general for there by the World is meant All men by the World which was made by him is meant all those who were created a-new in Christ to good works they are those upon whom his Doctrine had its due effect Schlicktin in locum Renovantur autem restaurantur homines per sermonem cum ad fidem in ipsum adducuntur c. Men are renewed and restored by the word when they are brought to Faith in him and draw a new Spirit even the Spirit of Adoption thro' him whereby they mortifie the Flesh and the Works of the Flesh from sinners and slaves to vice they are made Saints and from persons condemn'd and lost they are made certain of eternal life Such persons then as these constitute the second World that World which was made by him but because it would sound very odly that these new Creatures Men thus renewed in the Spirit of their minds should not know Him who had renewed or created them again therefore they have thought of a third World that World which did not know him and that is the World of obstinate and contumacious Men who would not listen to the Word tho' speaking never so powerfully nor could the Word work at all on them tho' in it self of so efficacious a nature those indeed are sometimes called the World because they are men of earthly and degenerate minds Men who give themselves wholly to mind earthly things
be the power of God a virtue flowing out of or from the Supreme Deity under this Notion we may rationally assert that this Holy Spirit can be commanded no way but by the Supreme God himself none else can promise it none can give it for if the Spirits of the Prophets are subject to the Prophets much more certainly must the Spirit of God be subject to him it subsisting wholly in him and being according to our Adversaries one of those qualifications necessarily in the Supreme God Granting all this if our Saviour was a meer man as they say he could not possibly command this Sacred Spirit this Spirit so much superiour to mankind tho' considered as no more than a meer Appendage to the Almighty Yet our Saviour seems to employ this Spirit as he will that 's no wonder if the Father the Son and the Holy Ghost tho' three persons be all one God That exact concurrence in their eternal wills taking away all difficulties Thus when the Lord met with his Disciples and shew'd them the necessity of things happening with relation to himself as they did then He opened their understandings that they might understand the Scriptures Luk. 24.45 this opening their understandings did not consist barely in explaining some particular Texts to them they were yet but very dull and slow of understanding in themselves and tho' they had heard a thousand Texts authentically explain'd they might have continued very inapprehensive still Nor is it an usual manner of speech to say when a man explains any Author to others that he opens their understandings he may open the meaning of such or such Books or Passages very well yet those who hear him may not improve in their intellectuals this opening their understandings therefore argued some force upon their minds some extraordinary Energy of the Spirit within them whereby their natural and inveterate Dulness went off and they had more of spriteliness and vigour in their Souls than formerly they seem'd as Slaves with their fetters knockt off nimble and active and therefore more capable of apprehending any thing offered to them than formerly This was the first beginning to fit them for that great work they were in a few days to engage in it was to make them capable of satisfying themselves gradually in the Truth and Reason of those things which they were afterwards to preach to the world abroad and which they were compleatly fitted for by the following extraordinary effusions of that Holy Spirit upon them The first operations of it upon them then were gentle and easie but it was the operation of that Sacred Spirit only and of that Spirit as ordered by the blessed Jesus by which their understandings were thus opened We may agree to this the more easily if we consider that Promise Christ makes to his Disciples after this Behold I send the promise of my father upon you Luk 24.49 but tarry ye in the City of Jerusalem untill you be endued with power from on high The Father promises it but I send it Now this uses not to be a task for a man to make good the Promises of God it 's out of his power especially if the Promise be to be made good in some particular wherein God has a more peculiar interest Is my Spirit my breath none then can give it to another tho' my Spirit be not originally my own but breathed into me by an Almighty Creator Is the Holy Ghost the Breath the Spirit the Influence of God none then can dispose of it from him and the rather because it is originated in him and must be one with him it was then a strange presumption in our Lord to take upon him the making good Gods Promises to others since if he were no more than a Man He promised what was not in his power and pretended to make up some defects in his veracity who was the God of Truth and Truth it self But our Saviour went farther yet for making a visit once to his Disciples after his Resurrection His Blessing being bestowed he gives them a Commission of an extraordinary nature As my Father hath sent me even so send I you i. e. Job 20.21 As my Father sent me to reform the World so I send you to caâ—ry on that same work and as my Father's mission of me gave me a sufficient authority to do those things necessary to so great an end so my sending you gives you as great and unquestionable authority in proportion to those things which are laid on you this intimates that Christ had power to send men to govern and manage his Church as his Father had and in the same degree for if our Saviour was only his Father's Ambassador to them and so inferiour to him that sent him this had been an extravagant vanity it was never heard that an Ambassador from a King or Emperor pretended to send another Envoy from himself with such kind of expressions as these As my master the King has sent me so send I you nor are Princes wont to entrust their Agents with any such Power and the Credentials of such sub-ambassadors would appear very ridiculous to all those to whom they should be sent But from this Commission our Lord proceeds And when he had said this He breathed on them and said unto them ver 22. Receive ye the Holy Ghost Spiritus Sanctus est virtus seu efficacia à Deo in homines manans iisque communicata quâ eos ab aliis segregat suis usibus consecrat say the Socinians in the Racovian Catechism The Holy Spirit is a virtue or efficacy flowing from God upon men from the True the Supreme God they mean and communicated to them by which he separates such men from others and consecratâ— them to his own use If it be the efficacy or Power of the Supreme God how comes one whom they suppose to be a meer Man to confer it with his breath It was given afterwards by the laying on of the Apostles hands they gave it not by any virtue inherent in them but where they laid on their hands God sent it and that in different manners and proportions as he judged fit for the Receivers whose fitness the Apostles knew nothing of Our Saviour bestows it with his breath It must therefore be his own therefore he must be the Supreme God for in this action our Saviour did not mock his Disciples as Schlicktingius confesses CaetechismeÌ„ Rac. sect 6. c. 6. but he did certainly separate them by this action from the rest of the world and consecrated them peculiarly to his own service and this at the appointed time they engaged in according to his orders In the forementioned Catechism when they ask what the gift of the Holy Spirit is the answer is Est ejusmodi Dei afflatus quo animi nostri vel uberiore rerum divinarum notitiâ vel spe vitae eternae certiore atque adeo gaudio ac gustu quodam
〈◊〉 c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 144. A. of him was Jesus Christ so far as concerned his flesh of him were the Kings Princes and Leaders of Judah where it 's observable that nameing our Saviour He says of him that He was of Jacob according to the flesh by a particular phrase 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 according to or so for as concerned in the flesh but of the Princes and Levites deduction from that Patriarch he speaks only in the common way now this particular way of expressing himself in relation to Christ must have been very impertinent had it not been designed to shew the difference there was between the manner of Christ's Descent and Theirs for never was such a thing said of any meer Man by any Writer in the world that He was born of such and such Parents according to the flesh as it would look ridiculously to say David was the Son of Jesse according to the flesh the very phrase intimates some different origination according to some other nature Rom. 1.3 4 whatever it be and the Apostle uses the same expression in the same distinguishing sence So elsewhere S. Clement calls our Lord 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the same word used by the Author of the Epistle to the Hebrews and by us translated Heb. 1.3 the brightness of God's glory properly enough or it might be render'd a beam from the body of his glory from which expressions the Antients generally collected that Christ must be co-eternal with his Father so S. Chrysostome tells us the Son is call'd the brightness of the glory of his Father as always existing in the Father as brightness always is in Light for the light cannot be without brightness nor brightness without light so the Son cannot be without the Father nor the Father without the Son for he is begotten of his Essence before all time and is always with him to the same purpose but more largely speak Theodoret Gregory Nyssen Theophylact c. and S. Clement to shew his meaning to be the same with that of the Author to the Hebrews proceeds in a large citation out of that Chapter from whence we have before evidently prov'd the eternal Divinity of the Son of God Besides this unquestionable Epistle of Clement which we have almost entire there 's a Fragment of another written by the same excellent person to the same Corinthians not so generally own'd indeed but of very great antiquity being taken notice of by S. Hierome and before him by Eusebius Conc. T. 1. p. 181. the very first words of which give us a full proof of the doctrine we now assert Brethren says the Writer We ought to think concerning Jesus Christ as concerning God as concerning the Judge both of the quick and the dead If we must think of Christ as of God we must think and believe that he is God for so we think always of the Supreme Being But these passages are sufficient from an Author of so great antiquity From him we shall proceed to the next Greek Father Blessed Ignatius Bishop of Antioch One who had seen Christ himself in the flesh who is reported by some to have been that Child whom our Saviour took in his arms Mark 9.36 who conversed frequently with the Apostles He left several Epistles behind him to several Churches full of excellent advices and truly savouring of an Apostolical Spirit and temper In Him we meet with many evidences of his belief that Jesus Christ the Son of God was the real the True God So in the very first words of his first Epistle to the Church of Smyrna He begins Epist ad Smyrn Edit Voss 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I glorifie Jesus Christ who is God he is with him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the God with an article the want of which the Socinians so frequently cavil at in Scripture that Article is certainly exclusive of all other Gods The Son he is the only True God the Father is the same True God not two Gods but two persons and one God or one Deity this is a plain passage and needs no descant upon it In the conclusion of his Letter to Polycarp then Bishop of the Church of Smyrna the same who is called the Angel of the Church of Smyrna by S. John in the Revelations who dyed afterwards a Martyr for the truth he gives Polycarp this salutation I pray that Grace may be always with thee in Jesus Christ our God Ad Polyc. he neither prefixes nor subjoyns any thing to the words that might allay the sence or make it ambiguous it is an entire sentence and as clearly owns that He thought Jesus Christ was God and that he wrote to another who had the same Faith in that respect with himself So that the real Deity of the Son of God was no strange Doctrine in those days In the Inscription of his next Epistle to the Ephesians He stiles that Church predestinated from the beginning Ad Ephes or before all worlds to everlasting glory according to the will of the Father and Jesus Christ our God where he plainly makes the Father and Jesus Christ one God to which blessed Jesus he ascribes the same character of an absolute Deity with his Father So again in the beginning of the Epistle it self he tells the Ephesians they bore an honourable reputation and justly gained by their Faith and Love in Jesus Christ our Saviour being imitators of God and re-enflamed or revived by the blood of God An expression like that of S. Paul to the Elders of the same Church when he tells them God had made them overseers of that Church Act. 20.28 which he had purchased with his own blood Now we cannot with any propriety of speech call any blood the blood of God unless it be really his and it cannot be his as he is God therefore he must have assumed some such nature as wherein his blood might be shed which might and did come to pass by his taking our nature but our Nature being substantially united to that which was before eternal and Divine and so God and Man being but one Christ when Christ as Man shed his most precious blood for our sakes that blood was properly and truely called the blood of God or God's own blood But we meet with yet plainer evidence in the same Epistle so I take those words of his to belong to Christ Nothing lies hid from the Lord that is the common title of our Saviour in all Apostolical writings but even our most secret things are near to him Let us then do all things as if He lived in us that we may be his Temples and He may be God in us which also he is and will appear before our faces for which reasons we justly love him I the more readily apply this which argues Omniscience to Christ and is no more than what Scripture openly ascribes to him as I have formerly shew'd because soon
Doctrine S. Cyprian himself is mighty frequent in such passages so in his Epistle to Rogatianus he calls out Lord Jesus Christ our King and Judge and our God Ep. 3. p. 6. Ep. 11. p. 23. and what higher characters could be given him In his Epistle to his Presbyters and Deacons he encourages them to assiduity in Prayer by the consideration of having Jesus Christ our Lord and God our Advocate and Mediator Plebi Thibaeri p 123 125. p. 146 148. so again in his fifty first Epistle to Cornelius Bishop of Rome in his fifty eighth Epistle twice in h s sixty second to Januarius and others Christ is our Judge our Lord and our God so in his sixty third in his Epistle to Jubaianus concerning the invalidity of the Baptism of Hereticks He argues against that Baptism thus If any one says he can be truly baptis'd by Hereticks he may then by that Baptism obtain remission of sins if He obtain remission of his sins he is sanctified and is made the temple of God I ask then of what God if of the Creator he cannot be his temple because he believed not in him if you say of Christ neither can he be his temple Epist 73. p. 203. who denyes Christ to be God if you say he 's the temple of the Holy Ghost seeing the Father the Son and the Holy Ghost are all One how can the Holy Spirit be pleas'd with him who is an enemy to both the Father and the Son Here the force of the Martyrs argument lyes only in the Identity of nature in â—he Father the Son and the Holy Ghost and the poyson of Heresie consists effectually in denying the Lord Jesus Christ to be God but he would not have argued thus had not the Divinity of Christ been the general and well known Doctrine of the Church p. 212. He uses the same argument again in his 74. Epistle to Pompey to name no more Now â—n conclusion who can imagine that a holy Martyr so great an enemy to Idolatry so careful to refute the vulgar Error of a â—lurality of Gods should yet so very frequently use such suspicious expressions as must needs make the World believe he â—wned Christ for God and consequently multiplied those Gods himself which he expos'd others so much for if the whole objection were not to be removed by that assertion that the Father was God and the Son God yet they were not two but one God an Identity of their nature necessarily inferring the Vnity of the God-head The same Africa affords us yet another Writer of great antiquity and learning Arnobius in his several books against the Pagan Religion in his first book reflecting upon several of their Gods he takes notice how much they were grieved that Christ should be worshipped by Christians and received for and esteemed as a God And whereas Pagans derided Christians Arnobius adver gentes l. 1. p. 21. Edit Leidensis for accounting him a God whom they owned to have been born a Man he retorts upon them that They were guilty of that crime but says He supposing all you object in that respect were true would not Christ on account meerly of those benefits he confers upon us deserve to be call'd and to be thought a God He argues from their own principles who thought every considerable Invention of any Man was enough to procure his being Deified as Bacchus for finding out the use of Wine Ceres for Bread Minerva for Oyl c. But in the mean time Arnobius openly enough acknowledges that Christians did receive Christ as God He speaks yet more plainly soon after Christ for his benefits ought to be called God Nay He really is God without any scruple or ambiguity and would you have us deny him Worship or disown his Government But will some angry Pagan cry out is Christ a God We answer he is God and a God of infinite Power too and which will more exasperate an infidel he was sent from the supreme King to us upon the greatest errand in the World Perhaps the Pagan being more enraged at this will demand a Proof of what we say there needs certainly no greater proof of Christ's Divinity than an exact examination of his actions If it be objected that He was a Magician and performed his mighty works only by unlawful arts Let them who object this shew us any of their Magicians who ever did any thing like what was done by Christ or if they have done any thing of a prodigious nature it has still been by invoking some other Being but Christ without any Helps without any Magick Rites or Observations did all he did by the power of his own Name and what was proper and agreeable to and worthy of a True God nothing he did was hurtful or mischievous but helpful saving and the kind effects of divine Bounty And was he Mortal was he only one of us at whose ordinary commands Weaknesses Sicknesses Fevers and all bodily Pains were gone at once Was he one of us l. 1. p. 27. c. whose very Look the Devils could not endure Was he a meer Man whose slightest touch could cure the bloody Issue whose hand could make Hydropick humours vanish who could make the Lame run the Wither'd Hand recover its motion the Blind to see nay those who were born without eyes to see the light Was He a meer Man at whose word the angry Seas laid down their rage the rugged Storms and Tempests sunk while He with a dry foot walkt upon the swelling billows and trod upon the Oceans back the waves themselves standing amazed at the prodigious action and humble nature submitting to her Founder And so he proceeds in a florid and pathetick stile by an induction of particulars and a relating of circumstances to prove that Christ must be True God and that all the Idols of the Heathen were none Again a little after he tells the Pagans Christ was the high God the God from the beginning a God sent from unknown kingdoms God sent by the Prince of all things to be the universal Saviour whom neither the Sun nor Stars if they have any sence nor the Governours nor Princes of this World nor those mighty Gods who assuming that terrible name affright poor mortal creatures were able to find out or so much as to guess what He was or whence He came at whose very look then when he was clothed with flesh p. 32. the universal fabrick trembled and fell into a sudden disorder Again Arnobius brings in the Pagans objecting If Christ was God why was He seen in the form of a Man Why was He put to Death as Men are to this he answers Was there any other way whereby that invisible power which had no Corporeal Substance could suit it self to the World or be visibly present in the assemblies of mortal Men than by assuming a covering of solid matter which might be a proper object whereon Men might fix
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
When the Arrian Controversie was on foot Alexander Bishop of Alexandria condemned it in a Synod of almost an hundred Bishops who all concluded the Doctrine of Arius a perfect Innovation not at all consistent with the Faith of the Universal Church what Arius asserted we have in Alexander's circular Epistle viz. That God was not always a Father but that there was a time wherein he was not the Father that the Word of God was not always but had its original as other Creatures out of nothing for He that is God framed or made him who had no Being out of what had no Being Therefore there was a time when he was not c. Of these Heterodox assertions of Arius Alexander in that Epistle gives us a confutation and that strong and pithy and such as being drawn from plain texts of Scripture could never have been oppos'd had not there lived in elder ages some who were able to study out as perverse glosses for positive texts as the Socinians do now a-days But that 's not all what Alexander insists upon is the disagreement of these positions with the Churches antient Faith so he first stiles the Arian Heresie a fore-runner of Anti-Christ and properly enough After this He says they were Apostates such as had fallen off from the Faith of the Church and delivered such Doctrines as were no way consonant to Scriptures Whoever heard such things before says He or who is there who hearing them now Socratis Hist Eccl. l. 1. c. 6. Edit Val. would not be amazed and stop his ears that they might not be defiled with hearing such abominable stuff That there had been many Heresies before but this the worst of all the rest and making the nearest approaches to Anti-Christianism Thus Alexander in his circular Epistle But Alexander must have been equally silly and impudent to have written in this manner to all the Bishops of the Church when his business was to satisfie them of the reasons of his proceedings against Arius and his Accomplices and when he was to countermine the stratagems and interests of Eusebius of Nicomedia a subtle and powerful adversary If the Doctrine of the Son's co-eternity and co-essentiality with his Father had not been the receiv'd and well known Doctrine of the Church for the whole design of his elaborate Epistle had been blasted had but his Brethren the Bishops or any part of them retorted upon him that Arius taught no new Doctrine but what had been held even from our Saviour's time and generally taught in all Christian Congregations but we find nothing of this kind offer'd at and Alexander himself going off the stage of the world at last with the reputation of a very wise and a very good Man Eusebius of Nicomedia then makes a considerable party for his Client Arius and supports and encourages him to resolution in his Opinions this made the Controversie grow hot and obliged Constantine the Great who desired by all means to preserve the Peace of the Church to call that famous General Council at the City of Nice in Bithynia to determine at once the Arian and the Paschal Controversie the Emperor himself in his Letter to Alexander and Arius by Hosius of Corduba seems to be very indifferent in the Controversie his indifference was enough to give life and vigour to the Eusebian or Arian party yet all would not do for notwithstanding the Emperors indifferency and Eusebius his industry and activity upon fairly debating the matter of 318. Fathers which made up that Assembly there were only Five who refused to subcribe the condemnation of Arius Eusebius of Caesarea the Church Historian seem'd to hesitate a little at first but after mature deliberation subscribed and gave an account of his Subscription and the reasons of it to his own Diocese of Caesarea wherein he gives them a Copy of that Creed himself had drawn up wherein he declared He believed in God the Father Almighty Creator of all things visible and invisible and in one Lord Jesus Christ the Word of God God of God light of light life of life the only begotten Son the first-born of every Creature begotten of God the Father before all ages by whom all things were made who for our Salvation was made flesh and convers'd among Men Thus Eusebius Socratis l. 1. c. 8. this he declares to have been always his Faith and therefore he could safely subscribe to that Form propos'd in the Council it self and so he did and he declares that He willingly subscribed those Anathema's propounded against Arius because they particularly forbad the use of such words with which Scripture was unacquainted of which several which he there instances in were in the Arian Formulary or Confession The Nicene Council it self in their Synodical Epistle declares the opinions and expressions of Arius so uncouth and blasphemous c. 9. that the Council could scarce have patience to hear them that He had yet unhappily seduced two Bishops with his impious Heresie whom they therefore had excommunicated with Arius himself The Emperor Constantine in his Epistle to the Church of Alexandria on the conclusion of the Council tells them Ibidem that Arius and his Companions had blasphemously contradicted Scriptures and our Holy Faith that when three hundred and eighteen Bishops had setled the Faith according to God's Word only Arius seduced by the Devil refused to submit to it he advises them to embrace that Faith which God himself had delivered that all should return to their dear Brethren from whom that instrument of the Devil had separated them And thus the whole Controversie came at last to rest in the determinations of entire Councils These particular persons Alexander Eusebius and Constantine had called the Arrian opinion Apostasy a seduction from the true Faith a subserviency to the Devil disagreeable to God's Word c. the Councils gave their positive Determinations and Confessions of Faith suitably oppos'd to those encroachments men in those days made upon the true Catholick Faith Thus the second Council at Antioch before mentioned gives us this Confession of Faith with respect to our Saviour We confess our Lord Jesus Christ begotten of his Father according to the Spirit before the Worlds born in the last days of the Virgin according to the flesh one Person of the Heavenly Divinity and of humane flesh united whole God even with his body but not God according to his body whole Man even with his Divinity but not according to his Divinity wholly adorable even with his body but not adorable according to his body entirely adoring God himself even with his Divinity but not adoring him according to his Divinity wholly uncreated even with his body but not uncreated according to the body wholly created even with his Divinity but not created according to his Divinity wholly consubstantial with God even with his body but not consubstantial with God in his body and wholly consubstantial with Man even with his Divinity but
tho' it were an inward grace a strengthning of the Soul which they requir'd of him Again when the Disciples were with him on ship-board and during his quiet sleep just sinking by the violence of an angry tempest they in a fright wake their Master and cry out to him Lord save us we perish Mat. 8.25 If our Saviour was a meer Man the Disciples acted with much less sence than Jonah's Mariners who every one in the storm called upon their Gods for help and summoned sleeping Jonas not to save them by His Power but to joyn with them in calling upon his God For was it ever heard before that when a Ship was just sinking or running upon a rock the ship's Crew ran to some poor ignorant Passenger to beg their security from him The Mariners tho' convinced that he was an extraordinary Person made no such application to Saint Paul in a parallel danger it 's God alone who can command the Seas and Winds his permissive Word makes them ruffle the Universe and put Nature into a Consternation the same Word lays them still as in their first Originals ere uncorrupted Nature knew any thing terrible or dangerous In the case before us our Saviour answered them not as that King of Israel did the Woman If the Lord help thee not what can I do But He arose and rebuked the Winds and the Sea and there was a great calm Nature in its greatest hurry own'd his Divine Authority only his Disciples stumbled upon the Question ver 27. What manner of Man is this that even the Winds and the Sea obey him They talked like Men beside themselves with Fear they called upon him for Help as if they had believed him to be God they reflected upon that Deliverance he had given them as if he had been no more than Man but he takes no notice of any error they were in in their first Devotions but by his Mercy encouraged them to do the same again upon a like occasion What the Disciples did here in a storm at Sea that Saint Stephen the first Martyr for Christianity did in a more violent storm of Persecution on Land for when he came to his last Agonies when it was the proper season for a good Man to exert the utmost vigor of his Faith and Charity then for himself and with respect to his own Soul he prays Acts 7.59 Lord Jesus receive my Spirit The frequent expiring Ejaculation of Holy Saints and Martyrs after him Compare now this with that assertion of the wise Man concerning Death Eccles. 12 7. Then shall the Dust return to Earth as it was and the Spirit shall return to God who gave it and the consequence will be either that our Lord Jesus Christ was the great Author or Creator and Giver of the Rational Soul or else that this Holy Martyr then when filled in an extraordinary manner with the Holy Ghost in his extreme hours when commonly Mens apprehensions of futurity are most Clear and Rational talk'd in a very Impertinent and sinful manner to devote his Soul to him who could have no right to it if he were a meer Creature and to forget his God Franciscus Davidis would have us believe here that Stephen did not call upon Jesus Christ but upon God the Father and that we should translate the expression O thou Lord of Jesus receive my Spirit but this Socinus has strongly confuted tho' upon their common Principle of our Saviour's being a meer Creature Franciscus undertakes the much more rational part However here his subterfuge is nothing worth It was Jesus the Son of God He who bore that proper name of Jesus from his Circumcision for whose sake Stephen was now persecuted to Death by the malicious Jews it was the same Jesus whom he saw at the right hand of God when the Heavens opened to give him such a view of future Glory prepared for Martyrs as might support and encourage him under his sufferings it was to him therefore that Stephen applyed himself and sitted himself for a glorious and happy Exit by that admirable Resignation But neither did Saint Stephen stop there but as the utmost effort of a dying Martyr's Charity He adds this to his former ejaculation ver 60. Lord lay not this sin to their charge He certainly designed exemplary Charity in this and to imitate his dying Saviour who prayed his Father to forgive his Murderers for they knew not what they did But the Martyr's enemies would have had little reason to have admir'd his Charity had he presented his Prayers for them to one who had no power to forgive them and the Jews would be as ready now to make the Objection as heretofore Who can forgive sins but God only And if God to whom vengeance belongeth in whose sight the Death of his Saints is precious would certainly avenge the blood of his Saints and Martyrs upon their Persecutors to what purpose was it to pray to him to forgive them who not being the most high God himself could have no Power to forgive those who had sin'd against the most high God so as to give them any security but above all He could never have hoped for any acceptance at the hand of God in any Petition whatsoever had he now in his last extremity been guilty of Idolatry Saint Paul had been made partaker of extraordinary Revelations had been snatch'd up into the third heavens where he had seen and heard things not lawful for a Man to utter 2 Cor. 1â— 7 8 9. indeed things unspeakable lest He should have been exalted above measure thro' the abundance of those Revelations there was given to him a thorn in the flesh the messenger of Satan to buffet him This was a very severe humiliation and Saint Paul was sensible of it and at first as appears by the Text very uneasie under it Saint Paul knew well enough that the best remedy for all calamities was Prayer that Prayers presented to the true God with a sincere heart could not return unfruitful but Saint Paul presently applyes himself to Christ For this cause I besought the Lord thrice that it might depart from me says he and He said unto me my Grace is sufficient for thee for my strength is made perfect in weakness By the Lord here the Socinians themselves understand our Lord Jesus and therefore alledge this Text as a proof of Pious Mens praying to Christ Now had Saint Paul prayed to Christ for Assistance and Relief in such a case where only the Supreme God could really help him if that Christ were a meer Creature then such a Prayer must be Idolatrous and such Service be called Idolatry wherein the Creature was rather worshipped than the Creator and Christ a Creature must as Lucifer of old have endeavoured to set himself up for a rival God and prosecute a separate Interest of his own and manage and assist his servants in a way of opposition to the most high God and
concluded that such Persons lie under some very unaccountable Prejudice against the Person of the Offerer or that Authority invested in him Such was the condition of the world in general at our Lord's appearance in our Nature they were all Prisoners to their greatest enemy to him who desired to be the eternal tormenter both of their Bodies and their Souls that Liberty he pretended to indulge them with was nothing but extreme Slavery the most base and unworthy of a rational Creature that possibly could be contrived like that wherein the Poet tells us Circe kept the Companions of Vlysses where they were turned to Wolves and Dogs and Swine the very tortures of which beastly state made some more fiery Souls conclude it was better by their own hands to disengage themselves from those weighty fetters they mourn'd in than endure so base a confinement To these our Saviour appeared that Sun of Righteousness came to them with healing in his wings Compassion to their wretched condition drew him from the bosome of his Father and made him manifest himself in the flesh The end of his descent was That whosoever believed in him should not perish but have everlasting life That all might believe in him He fully and clearly stated their own miserable condition before their eyes he shewed them the Strength and Malice of their Tyrant their own inability to get free from those Chains he had laid upon them his own readyness to be their Deliverer if they 'd but depend upon him for it and he gave all Men every day new Proofs that he was able to make good what he offer'd the Devil who was their Persecutor flying before him as a Wolf would before a generous Lyon or a Child before a Gyant Yet after all this our Saviour came even to his own as the Evangelist assures us and his own received him not Joh. 1.11 He came among them at that precise time which their Prophets had assigned to his advent He came when their Religion was almost vanished into Air and the Law of Moses of no more Authority among a company of nice Scribes and Pharisees than the whole Book of God was afterwards among the Schoolmen They look'd every day for his coming and could not avoid being sensible of their present wants But for all this the Devil had fill'd them with such ridiculous Jealousies of their Law and with such Prodigious Prejudices against the Person of Him they so long waited for that necessity it self could make but very few of them own or believe in him It 's true he appeared but in the form of a servant in a very mean and despicable state and the Jews being enslaved to a Foreign Power expected some mighty Monarch who should have broke the Roman fetters and have made Jerusalem sensibly superiour to all the Cities upon Earth Prejudice in the mean time shut their eyes so strongly that they could not see that He who was able to heal all manner of Distempers to quell the Ragings of a stormy Sea to drive whole Legions of Infernal Spirits before him with a Word notwithstanding the meanness of his outward garb might be able if he saw it good to effect all these mighty conquests they expected at his appearance as if his saving Power had depended only on the Greatness of his Retinue the Gayety of his Habit or the Grandeur of his Court The Gentiles had their Prejudices too they thought a Contemptible Man far too weak td baffle all those numerous Deities whose directions they had so long managed themselves by they concluded that one Crucified by the prosecution of his own Country Men one whose Disciples freely own'd his ignominious Death and seem'd proud of their Master's Cross whose Apostles pretended to no elaborate Eloquence to no niceties of Argument to no depth of Learning and yet would always be Preaching in their Master's name they concluded it impossible that such a One should be the World's Saviour that such Messengers should really be the authentick Ambassadors of Heaven tho' they too did numerous miracles in the name of Him they preach'd and without Learning baffled all the wit and arguments of their nimble Sophisters As if it were the outward appearance and not the inherent power and authority of a person that must effect the mighty work or as if compleat Liberty could not be worth a Man's acceptance unless it were given by a royal hand It must certainly be a strange ascendant which Hell had over mankind which could infatuate them so far and perswade such vast numbers to build their own eternal ruine upon such pitiful Objections The Devil infected Mens Souls about the time of our Lord's Incarnation with a Prodigious and unaccountable Laziness such as made them absolutely unready to contribute to their own happiness They saw themselves abus'd by those Gods they worshipp'd their Credulity impos'd on and their good Intentions perverted this they publickly declared They found themselves cheated with an empty shew of knowledge and caress'd by others like themselves for their Philosophick atchievements when indeed they were not able so much as to agree about the Supreme Good but fell into more than 300. different opinions about it tho' they accounted the atchievement of that good the great end of all Humane Actions This they could not but laugh at themselves They saw that notwithstanding their continual Declamations against unsociable Vices or notorious Immoralities their very Instructors themselves scarce deserved the names of Men by reason of their dissolute and irregular lives They found themselves irrecoverably addicted to all those very things which themselves branded as irrational and odious This they lamented and they seemed earnestly to wish for a remedy of all these evils but they were like the Clown in the ditch they 'd cry to Heaven for help but never went about to rescue themselves by Care and Industry from those Calamities they were involved in The Devil could well enough bear with all the Remonstrances of those who were sensible of the World 's deplorable state so long as Sloth had seized their Vitals and would permit them to go no further than empty Lamentations Nothing can render Men more ridiculous or contemptible than this Temper to their cruel Adversary the very Heathens could represent their ancient Hero's as Men of daring Spirits never giving themselves to ignoble Ease but travelling continually through the World to seek Adventures worthy of their Strength and Courage yet they could easily forget their own Examples and languish in a miserable slavery to Sin neither combate with their own Vices nor with the Temptations of the Devil they could not so much as find the way to Him who was able to assist them who could renew their languid Souls with a sprightly Vigour and make them by the influences of his sacred Spirit triumphant over all their in-born Corruptions the Blind were desirous to be led to him the Lame to be carried to him only those who were
thine Altar Psal 26.6 therefore we find that during the whole force of the Ceremonial Law the outward Purifications might on an extraordinary Occasion as that of Hezekiah's Passover be dispensed with but the inward Purification of the Heart was a duty absolutely indispensible whence it was that when several of Ephraim and Manasseh and Issachar and Zabulun had not cleansed themselves Hezekiah put up that petition for them to God 2 Chron. 30.18 19 20. The good Lord pardon every one that prepareth his heart to seek God the Lord God of his fathers though he be not cleansed according to the purification of the Sanctuary and the Lord hearkened to Hezekiah and healed the people which additional Passage intimates that God inflicted some punishment on the People for participating of the Passover when legally unprepared so to teach them a Lesson of punctual Obedience but he healed them upon account of their inward and spiritual Preparation to satisfie them that he esteemed inward Holiness beyond all the ceremonial Purifications of the Sanctuary In the Law there were a great many Washings appointed and upon several occasions the Scribes and Pharisees by virtue of some Traditions of their own added more Mark 7.3 4. they would not eat except they washed their hands and when they came from their markets they wash'd and there were many other things which they had received to hold as the washing of Cups and Pots and of brazen Vessels and of Tables Now all these things might contribute to outward Purity and argued a great care of Cleanliness nor were the Jews to have been condemned for these practices if they had not laid too great a weight upon them and for the sake of such Purifications banish'd all thoughts of true inward Purity out of their minds and this our Saviour reproves them for not condemning their outward Neatness but their making void the Law of God by their Traditions and he carries the reproof yet further Matth. 23.25 Wo unto you Scribes Pharisees Hypocrites for you make clean the outside of the cup and of the platter but within they are full of extortion and excess c. But the Purity of the Soul was what God principally regarded and those outward Washings originally ordain'd in the Law were so many Types design'd to put Men in mind of that clean Hand and that pure Heart which every one was to endeavour after If we look into Circumcision it self that great initiating Ceremony in the Jewish Church it was really a preventive of natural Vncleanness yet though it were made by God the Seal of that Covenant between himself and the Seed of Abraham the Jews had a right notion of what that Ceremony was to put them in mind of given them by Moses himself Deut. 10.16 so he bids them to circumcise the fore-skin of their hearts and to be no more stiff-necked Stubbornness and Disobedience were the Vncleanness of the Heart therefore what care the Jews took to prevent that of Nature it was reasonable they should take to remove that accruing from Sin Moses therefore promises it as a great Blessing from Heaven on them in case of their sincere Repentance when under God's afflicting hand Deut. 30.6 the Lord thy God will circumcise thy heart and the heart of thy seed to love the Lord thy God with all thine heart and with all thy soul that thou mayst live where the stubborn Heart is once mollified the Love of God is easily settled in it Now that this Circumcision could effect nothing ex opere operato or that it could contribute nothing to the Obedience of the Soul we see demonstrated by the case of the Jews at present who are careful enough in performing the outward Rite of Circumcision and yet obdurate and unmalleable by all the Tendries of the Gospel therefore the Apostle has furnisht us with an easie Distinction between a Jew by Nature or one descended lineally from Abraham and a Jew by Grace or one ally'd to Abraham spiritually as he was the Father of the Faithful for says He He is not a Jew that is one outwardly Rom. 2.28 29. neither is that Circumcision which is outward in the flesh but he is a Jew which is one inwardly and Circumcision is that of the Heart in the spirit whose praise is not of men but of God We see then that these Ceremonies to instance in no more have only a Typical Nature and can have no more because though they may serve to represent to our Memories the solid Duties of sincere Religion yet it 's impossible they should operate on the inward Man or in themselves make any one that is punctual in them acceptable in the sight of God Nor was there any need they should be more than Memorials or Representations of more important Good for those Ceremonial Vsages were from their first beginning whether among Adam's universal Race or the People of Israel intended only as comfortable supports to mens Spirits otherwise ready to droop under the various pressing calamities of a mortal Life God had given Adam the promise of the blessed Seed whose heel was to be bruised by the Serpent which bruise signified Death unless we can imagine Adam so weak as to draw any comfort from a literal Interpretation of the words but that sense could really afford none more than a promise that I should break the Head of some Snake and that should bite or wound my Heel could be a matter of consolation to all Mankind but Adam's case was this He saw how his Folly and Disobedience had made way to Sin and Death to tyrannize over all his own Posterity that the Sin committed was irrevocable the wages of Sin consequently inevitable these thoughts were enough to deject the most daring Spirits and Adam without the interposition of immense Goodness must have sunk irrecoverably beneath the dreadful weight of his own Misery What could prevent his despair could only be this an Assurance that the Powers of Sin and Death should not totally prevail but there should by some sufficient means be a stop effectually put to their Tyranny This Assurance God design'd to give him in that memorable Promise which though spoken to the Serpent was only a terrible Threatning to him but a precious Promise to Adam I will put enmity between thee and the Woman Gen. 3.15 and between thy seed and her seed it shall bruise thy head and thou shalt bruise his heel The bare settling an Enmity between Him who had tempted Adam by the Serpent and the Seed of the Woman could have signified little to Adam's satisfaction he had suffered too deeply in the first engagement with Him and therefore could not wish his Posterity engaged in a perpetual Warfare with so subtle an Adversary therefore the following words the seed of the Woman shall bruise the Serpent's head contain'd the Comfort long'd for To bruise the Head is to wound a vital part to crush it is to put an
Obedience uninterrupted and universal at least it must be said He 's very unkind for He who can forgive and as Socinus asserts does forgive all our Sins without any Satisfaction tender'd to his Justice might as well forgive us without putting us to the trouble of informing our Minds or regulating and restraining our Actions for we cannot easily give any reason why he should exact such Duties of us as Conditions of our Salvation when if it pleas'd him he could give us Salvation without any Conditions at all If it be objected that He has declared otherwise in his reveal'd Will and it's Justice in him to be true to his own Declarations that Plea again reduces all to perfect Arbitrariness and he will be irrespectively Merciful merely because he will be Merciful and he will be irrespectively Vindictive merely because he will be so which things seem somewhat to contradict our common notion of Justice That it does suum cuique tribuere give to every one what 's due and proper to him We believe more safely that God lays those Duties which yet we are unable to perform in that perfect manner we ought upon us that they might be as continual Remembrancers to us of that Satisfaction which he really requires at our hands for could we perform all God's revealed Will without any failure either in Time or Circumstance God's Justice would be otherwise satisfied and employ'd wholly in distributing Rewards among us but since when we take the utmost pains our Duties are either at one time or other essentially or circumstantially sinful therefore we our selves ought to conclude some such Satisfaction necessary as may make up for our unavoidable defects and since we are assured by God's Word that One has undertaken that Work who was every way capable of performing it we are obliged in gratitude to so great a Benefactor to endeavour after all that Holiness and Perfection how little soever it is that we are capable of and we are oblig'd to do it for our own sakes because it 's no way reasonable those should be Partakers of any benefit from Christ's Satisfaction who do not perform those Conditions upon which only that Satisfaction can be any ways beneficial to us To this we may add yet further That if God can forgive Sinners without Satisfaction made for their Sins without any derogation from his Justice how merciful soever God may seem to Mankind yet he seems wholly to have forgotten all that Mercy with respect to the fallen Angels for if no Satisfaction was needful for Sin why could not their Maker forgive their Transgressions too without it as well as Men's there might have been a thousand Means doubtless found out to confirm a Covenant of Grace with them as well as that of the Death of Christ to confirm the same Covenant with Men but it seems God would not so forgive them though he could they could offer no Satisfaction for themselves therefore they are eternally and immediately damn'd these Conclusions are necessary and inevitable from Socinian Principles but in themselves are detestable and damnable But what the Socinians fail to effect by God's Word they make no doubt of making good by dint of Reason in which they look upon themselves as wholly invincible Here then they assert That if Christ have made Satisfaction for us and that suitable to our Necessities then Christ must have suffer'd the pains of Eternal Death because Mankind by Sins were liable to such Eternal Death but here we may observe that they fasten upon that single Instance of Christ's Sufferings viz. his Death in the matter of Satisfaction for Sinners onely whereas our Lord was a continual Sufferer on that account from his first Condescension to take our Nature upon him to his Crucifixion and I make no question but what he underwent when he bore humane Infirmities when he was in that bitter Agony in the Garden when he cry'd out upon the Cross My God My God why hast thou forsaken me I make no question but his Sufferings in those Instances were much greater than what he underwent in Death it self and so the very Story of his Passion represents things in relation to those latter Scenes of his Life on Earth for what prodigious Cause must we imagine there was that he declar'd to Peter and the Sons of Zebedee Matth. 26.38 My Soul is exceeding sorrowful even unto Death 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 my Soul is compass'd round about or even overwhelmed with Sorrow for so the Original imports In his Agony in the Garden what through a clear Apprehension of that dreadful Task he was then to set about more immediately what with the Fervour and Earnestness of his Prayers to his Father either that if it were possible that Cup that bitter Cup he was then to drink might pass from him or that what he was then suffering might be truly effectual to that great End for which he suffer'd Luke 22.44 his Sweat was as if it had been great drops of blood falling down to the ground the Terror of his instant Sufferings to that Flesh and Blood he had assumed as well as the Strength of his Enemies and the greatness of the Conflict he was then engaged in might be the occasion of that stupendous Sweat for experience tells us that Fear opens the Pores of the Body and emits as grumous Sweats as the most earnest Intention whatsoever of the Body or the Mind and the Angel appearing to Christ in the Garden and strengthening him seems more necessary with respect to those Terrors ready to seize on Flesh and Blood engaged in mighty Sorrows and oppressing Woes than meerly to re-inforce that Earnestness in Prayer which the greater the Danger is so long as the Soul is consistent with it self will naturally be the more earnest and importunate for Assistance or Deliverance His Sufferings yet seem to work more violently upon him when he comes to that bitter Cry My God My God why hast thou forsaken me why dost thou seem to hide thy Face from me and to leave me wholly to the barbarous Cruelties of wicked and malicious Men the Complaint was more natural and carried with it a greater Emphasis when proceeding from that Son of God that onely that beloved Son in whom he was well pleased so far his holy Soul seems to be upon the rack but when he receives his last bitter Draught and owns the mighty work as well as the Types and Predictions relating to him were finished the Storms that ruffled him before seem to sink into a Calm and he breath'd out his Sacred Life with those charming eruptions of unbounded Love Father forgive them Luke 23.34 for they know not what they do and those full expressions of absolute Satisfaction in what he had undergone Father into thy hands I commend my Spirit v. 46. Our Lord's Sufferings ended there and there with his dying Breath he rais'd to himself the first Trophies of his glorious Victories for though
shall not depart from Judah Page 241 Exod. 4.16 Moses a God to Pharaoh and Aaron his Prophet Page 343 7.1 Moses a God to Pharaoh and Aaron his Prophet Page 343 14.21 They believed in the Lord and in his Servant Moses Page 329 25.22 The Propitiatory or Mercy-seat Page 721 34.7 Forgiving Iniquity Transgression and Sin Page 699 Levit. 16.12 13. Censer of Burning Coals in the Holiest Place Page 726 v. 16. To make an Atonement for the most Holy Place Page 725 2 Kings 3.26 27. King of Moab offering his Son Page 105 2 Chron. 30.18 19 20. Hezekiah's Prayer for the Vnprepared Page 603 Psalm 40.6 7 8. Sacrifice and Burnt-Offerings not desired Page 225 45.2 Thy Throne O God is for ever and ever Page 314 82.6 7. I have said Ye are Gods Page 342 Isaiah 9.6 Vnto us a Child is born a Son is given Page 320 Jeremiah 23.5 6. I will raise unto David a Righteous Branch Page 321 Micah 5.2 Thou Bethlehem Ephrata c. Page 323 Haggai 2.8 The Glory of the Second House greater c. Page 753 Matth. 1.23 Thou shalt call his Name Emanuel Page 325 18.23 The Parable of the Debtors to their Lord. Page 651 28.18 All Power is given to me in Heaven and Earth Page 407 v. 19. In the Name of the Father Son and Holy Ghost Page 328 Luke 4.29 30. They led him to the Brow of the Hill Page 382 24.45 He open'd their Vnderstandings Page 395 John 1.1 In the beginning was the Word Page 332 3.13 No man hath ascended up into Heaven c. Page 337 5.23 The Father hath committed all Judgment c. Page 202 10.30 I and my Father are One. Page 354 10.34 35 36. Is it not written in your Law Page 558 17 21. That they all may be One as Thou c. Page 358 20.28 My Lord and my God Page 360 Acts 7.59 Lord Jesus receive my Spirit Page 524 Rom. 2.6 God will render to every Man c. Page 124 3.24 25 26. Justified freely by his Grace c. Page 649 703 8.19 20 21 22. The earnest Expectation of the Creature Page 490 9.5 Of whom as concerning the Flesh Christ came Page 370 10.13 Whosoever shall call upon the Name of the Lord c. Page 203 1 Cor. 1.14 15. Lest any should say I had baptized in my own c. Page 402 10.2 All were baptized into Moses c. Page 329 15.3 Christ died for our Sins Page 693 2 Cor. 5.19 20. Reconciling the World c. Page 648 719 12.7 8 9. For this cause I besought the Lord thrice Page 527 Gal. 3.19 In the hand of a Mediator Page 711 Philip. 2.5 11. Being in the Form of God c. Page 374 Col. 1.24 What was behind of the Afflictions of Christ Page 694 1 Thess 5.17 Pray without ceasing Page 505 Heb. 1.8 9 10. c. When he bringeth his First-Begotten c. Page 314 5.5 Thou art my Son this day have I begotten thee Page 549 6.1 2. Leaving the Principles c. Page 184 8.4 If on Earth he should not be a Priest c. Page 733 c. 9. c. 10. Page 689 727 728. 11.1 Faith is the substance of things hoped for c. Page 87 1 Pet. 2.24 Bore our Sins in his own Body on the Cross Page 698. 3.18 He suffered for our Sins the just for the unjust Page 697 1 John 2.1 2. He is the Propitiation for our Sins Page 719 5.7 There are Three that bear Record in Heaven Page 458 v. 20. This is the True God and Eternal Life Page 205 ERRATA PAge 3. l. 5. after Salvation dele p. 5. l. 20. put a Period after Text. l. 30. after Attentatam d. ◠p. 6. l. 3. r. Wissowatius p. 130. in the Margent r. Serrarii p. 142. l. 19. r. seem'd p. 148. l. 31. r. Posterity p. 200. l. 14 r. One p. 209. l. 26. r. really and indeed p. 221. l. 7. r. Paradisiacum p. 239. r. this p. 139. l. 21. r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 149. l. 21. d. And. p. 289. l. 29. r. those p. 312. l. 3. r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In the Margent r. Sandii Hist Eccles Enucl p. 318. l. 6. r. for p. 332. l. 16. r. those p. 336. l. 25. r. Stranger p. 364. l. 29. r. at p. 413. l. 21. r. far p. 448. l. 20. r. Libraries p. 467. l. 22. r. Separation p. 492. l. 26. d. One p. 511. l. 10. r. deliver p. 539. l. 3. r. Lazarus p. 552. l. 31. in Marg. r. Epistolarum p. 602. l. 12. r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 609. l. 13. r. Sacrifices p. 666. l. 1. he be p. 690. l. 29. r. Levitical p. 700. in Marg. r. Brixian l. 3. r. curing p. 704. l. 31. r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 720. l. 11. r. Catiline p. 752. l. 10. r. Administrator Several smaller Mistakes especially in the Pointing the Reader will easily observe and pass by or correct as fitting Books Printed for Walter Kettilby at the Bishop's-Head in St. Paul's Church-Yard TEN Sermons with Two Discourses of Conscience By the Lord Archbishop of York 4 to 's Sermon before the House of Lords Nov. 5. 1691. 's Sermon before the King and Queen on Christmass-Day 1691. 's Sermon before the Queen on Easter-Day 1692. Henrici Mori D. D. Opera omnia Bishop Overal's Convocation-Book 1606. concerning the Government of God's Catholick Church and the Kingdoms of the whole World 4 to Dr Falkner's Libertas Ecclesiastica 8 vo 's Vindication of Liturgies Ibid. 's Christian Loyalty Ibid. Mr. Lamb's Fresh Suit against Independency Ibid. Mr. W. Allen's Tracts Ibid. Bishop Fowler 's Libertas Evangelica Ib. Jovian or an Answer to Julian the Apostate Ibid. Animadversions on Mr. Johnson's Answer to Jovian In Three Letters to a Country Friend Ibid. Turner de Angelorum Hominum Lapsu 4 to Mr. Raymond's Pattern of Pure and Undefiled Religion 8 vo 's Exposition on the Church-Catechism Ibid. Mr. Lamb's Dialogues between a Minister and his Parishioner about the Lord's Supper Ibid. 's Sermon before the King at Windsor 's Sermon before the Lord Mayor 's Liberty of Humane Nature stated discussed and limited 's Sermon before the King and Queen Jan. 19. 1689. 's Sermon before the Queen Jan. 24. 1690. Dr Hickman's Thanksgiving-Sermon before the Honourable House of Commons Oct. 19. 1690. 's Sermon before the Queen at Whitehall Oct. 26. 1690. Dr Burnet's Theory of the Earth 2 Vol. Folio 's Answer to Mr. Warren's Exceptions against the Theory of the Earth 's Consideration of Mr. Warren's Defence 's Telluris Theoria Sacra 2 Vol. 4 to Bishop of Bath and Wells Reflections on a French Testament Printed at Bourdeaux 's Christian Sufferer supported 8 vo Dr Grove now Lord Bishop of Chichester his Sermon before the King and Queen June 1. 1690. Dr Hooper's Sermon before the Queen Jan. 24. 1690 1. Dr Pelling's Sermon before the King and Queen Dec. 8. 1689. 's Vindication of those that have taken the Oaths 4 to Dr Worthington of Resignation 8 vo 's Christian Love Ibid. Religion the Perfection of Man By Mr. Jeffery Ibid. Faith and Practice of a Church of England Man 12º The Fourth Edition Kelsey Concio de Aeterno Christi Sacerdot 's Sermon of Christ Crucified Aug. 23. 1691. Mr. Milbourn's Sermon Jan. 30. 1682. 's Sermon Sept. 9. 1683. An Answer to an Heretical Book called the Naked Gospel which was condemned and order'd to be publickly Burnt by the Convocation of the University of Oxford Aug. 19. 1690. With some Reflections on Dr Bury's new Edition of that Book to which is added a Short History of Socinianism by W. Nichols M. A. c. Two Letters of Advice I. For the Susception of Holy Orders II. For Studies Theological especially such as are Rational At the end of the former is inserted a Catalogue of the Christian Writers and Genuine Works that are Extant of the First Three Centuries By Henry Dodwell M. A. c.