Footnotes

FOOTNOTES ft1 “Few, if any, of the ancient pagan philosophers acknowledged God to be, in the most proper sense, the Creator of the world. By calling him Dhmiourgov, ‘the Maker of the world,’ they did not mean, that he brought it out of nonexistence into being; but only that he built it out of pre-existent materials, and disposed it into a regular form and order.” See ample proofs and illustrations in c. 13, part i, of LELAND’S Necessity of Revelation.

ft2 “Tell men there is a God, and their mind embraces it as a necessary truth; unfold his attributes, and they will see the explanation of them in his works. When the foundation is laid sure and firm that there is a God, and his will the cause of all things, and nothing made but by his special appointment and command, then the order of beings will fill their minds with a due sense of the Divine Majesty, and they may be made a scale to raise juster conceptions of what is immortal and invisible” (ELLIS’S Knowledge of Divine Things.)

ft3 The language of every nation is formed on the connection between cause and effect. For in every language there are not only many words directly expressing ideas of this subject, such as cause, efficiency, effect, production, produce, effectuate, create, generate, &c, or words equivalent to these; but every verb in every language, except the intransitive impersonal verbs, and the verb substantive, involves, of course, causation or efficiency, and refers always to an agent, or cause, in such a manner, that without the operation of this cause or agent, the verb would have no meaning.—All mankind, except a few Atheistical and skeptical philosophers, have thus agreed in acknowledging this connection, and they have acknowledged it as fully as others in their customary language. They have spoken exactly as other men speak, and the connection between cause and effect is as often declared in their conversation and writings, and as much relied on, as in those of other men. (DWIGHT’S THEOLOGY, vol. 1. p. 5.)

ft4 The notion of an infinite series of caused and successive beings is absurd; for of this infinite series, either some one part has not been successive to any other, or else all the several parts of it have been successive. If some one part of it was not successive, then it had a first part, which destroys the supposition of its infinity. If all the several parts of it have been successive, then have they all once been future: but if they have all been future, a time may be conceived when none of them had existence: and if so, then it follows, either that all the parts and consequently the whole of this infinite series must have arisen from nothing, which is absurd; or else, that there must be something in the whole, beside what is contained in all the parts, which is also absurd. See Clarke’s Demonstration, and Woolaston’s Religion of Nature. “A chain,” says Dr. Paley, “composed of an infinite number of links can no more support itself, than a chain composed of a finite number of links. If we increase the number of links from ten to a hundred, and from a hundred to a thousand, &c, we make not the smallest approach, we observe not the smallest tendency toward self-support.” ft5 “We will acknowledge an impropriety in this word, and its conjugate, self-originate, sometimes hereafter used: which yet is recompensed by their conveniency; as they may perhaps find who shall make trial how to express the sense intended by them in other words. And they are used without suspicion, that it can be thought they are meant to signify as if God ever gave original to himself; but in the negative sense, that he never received it from any other; yea, and that he is, what is more than equivalent to his being self-caused; namely, a Being of himself so excellent as not to need or be capable to admit any cause.” ft6 See Boyle on Final Causes, Ray’s Wisdom of God in the Creation, Der-ham’s Astro and Physico Theology, Sturm’s Reflections, Paley’s Natural Theology, &c.

ft7 “They are called attributes, because God attributes them to and affirms them of himself. Properties, because we conceive them proper to God, and such as can be predicated only of him, so that by them we distinguish him from all other beings. Perfections, because they are the several representations of that one perfection which is himself. Names and Terms, because they express and signify something of his essence. Notions, because they are so many apprehensions of his being as we conceive of him in our minds.” (LAWSON’S Theo-Politica.) ft8 The celebrated Hunter, “in searching for the principle of life, on the supposition that it was something visible, fruitlessly enough looked for it in the blood, the chyle, the brain, the lungs, and other parts of the body; but not finding it in any of them exclusively, concluded that it must be a consequence of the union of the whole, and depend upon organism. But to this conclusion he could not long adhere, after observing that the composition of matter does not give life; and that a dead body may have all the composition it ever had. Last of all, he drew the true, or at least the candid conclusion, that he knew nothing about the matter.” (Medico. Chirurgical Review, Sept. 1822.) This is the conclusion to which mere philosophy comes, and the only one at which it can arrive, till it stoops to believe that there is true philosophy in the Scriptures.

ft9 A curious instance of the transmission of this name, and one of the peculiarities of the Hebrew faith, even into China, is mentioned in the following extract of “A Memoir of Lao-tseu, a Chinese philosopher, who flourished in the sixth century before our era, and who professed the opinions ascribed to Plato and to Pythagoras.” (By M. Abel Remusat.)—”The metaphysics of Lao-tseu have many other remarkable features, which I have endeavoured to develope in my memoir, and which, for various reasons, I am obliged to pass over in silence. How, in fact, should I give an idea of those lofty abstractions, of those inextricable subtleties, in which the oriental imagination disports and goes astray? It will suffice to say here, that the opinions of the Chinese philosopher on the origin and constitution of the universe, have neither ridiculous fables nor offensive absurdities; that they bear the stamp of a noble and elevated mind; and that, in the sublime reveries which distinguish them, they exhibit a striking and incontestable conformity with the doctrine which was professed a little later by the schools of Pythagoras and Plato. Like the Pythagoreans and the Stoics, our author admits, as the First Cause, Reason, an ineffable, uncreated Being, that is the type of the universe, and has no type but itself. Like Pythagoras, he takes human souls to be emanations of the ethereal substance, which are re-united with it after death; and, like Plato, he refuses to the wicked the faculty of returning into the bosom of the Universal Soul. Like Pythagoras, he gives to the first principles of things the names of numbers, and his cosmogony is, in some degree, algebraical. He attaches the chain of beings to that which he calls One, then to Two, then to Three, which have made all things. The divine Plato, who had adopted this mysterious dogma, seems to be afraid of revealing it to the profane. He envelopes it in clouds in his famous letter to the three friends; he teaches it to Dionysius of Syracuse; but by enigmas, as he says himself, lest his tablets falling into the hands of some stranger they should be read and understood. Perhaps the recollection of the recent death of Socrates imposed this reserve upon him. Lao-tseu does not make use of these indirect ways; and what is most clear in his book is, that a Triune Being formed the universe. To complete the singularity, he gives to his being a Hebrew name hardly changed, the very name which in our book designates him, WHO WAS, AND IS, AND SHALL BE. This last circumstance confirms all that the tradition indicated of a journey to the west, and leaves no doubt of the origin of his doctrine. Probably he received it either from the Jews of the ten tribes, whom the conquest of Sulmanazan had just dispersed throughout Asia, or from the apostles of some Phenician sect, to which those philosophers also belonged, who were the masters and precursors of Pythagoras and Plato.”

ft10 Jackson’s Existence and Unity, &c.—Vide also Watts’s Philosophical Essays, and Law’s Inquiry into the Ideas of Space, &c. ft11 Nihil Deo clausum, interest animia nostris, et mediia cogitationibus interenit. Sen. Epist, ft12 Quis enim non timeat Deum, omnia pervidentem, et cogitantem, &c. Cic. De Nat. Deor.

ft13 Several parallels have been at different times drawn, even by Christian divines, between the character of Socrates and Christ, doubtless with the intention of exalting the latter, but yet so as to veil the true character of the former. How great is the disgust one feels at that want of all moral delicacy from which only such comparisons could emanate, when the true character of Socrates comes to be unveiled! On a sermon preached at Cambridge by Dr. Butler, which contains one of these parallels, “the Christian Observer” has the following just remarks:— “We earnestly request that such of our readers as are sufficiently acquainted with classical literature to institute the examination, would turn to the eleventh chapter of the third book of the Memorabilia of Xenophon, and we are persuaded that they will not think our reprehension of Dr. Butler misplaced. The very title of the chapter, we should have thought, would have precluded any Christian scholar, much more any Christian divine, from the possibility of being guilty of a profanation so gross and revolting. The title of it is Cum Meretrice Theodata de arte hominum alliciendorum disserit, (Socrates, viz.) Doubtless many who heard Dr. Butler preach, and many more who have since read his sermon, have taken it for granted, that when he ventured to recommend the conduct of Socrates, in associating with courtezans, as being an adumbration with that of our Saviour, he must have alluded to instances in the life of that philosopher of his having laboured to reclaim the vicious, or to console the penitent with the hope of pardon. For ourselves, we know of no such instances. But what will be his surprise to find that the intercourse of Socrates with courtezans, as it is here recorded by Xenophon, was of the most licentious and profligate description?”

ft14 There is another theory which was formerly much debated, under the name of Scientia Media; but to which, in the present day, reference is seldom made. The knowledge of God was distributed into Necessary, which goes before every act of the will in the order of nature, and by which he knows himself, and all possible things:—Free, which follows the act of the will, and by which God knows all things which he has decreed to do and to permit, as things which he wills to be done or permitted:—Middle, so called because partaking of the two former kinds, by which he knows, sub conditione, what men and angels would voluntarily do under any given circumstances. “Terriam Mediam, qua sub conditione novit quid homines aut augeli facturi essent pro sua libertate, si cum his aut illis circumstantiis, in hoc vel in illo rerum ordine constituerentur.”—EPISCOPIUS De Scientia Dei. They illustrate this kind of knowledge by such passages as, “Wo unto thee, Chorazin! wo unto thee, Bethsaida! for if the mighty works which were done in you, had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes.” This distinction, which was taken from the Jesuits, who drew it from the schoolmen, was at least favoured by some of the remonstrant divines, as the extract from Episcopius shows; and they seem to have been led to it by the circumstance that almost all the high Calvinist theologians of that day entirely denied the possibility of contingent future actions being foreknown, in order to support on this ground their doctrine of absolute predestination. In this, however, those remonstrants, who adopted that notion, did not follow their great leader Arminius, who felt no need of this subterfuge, but stood on the plain declarations of Scripture, unembarrassed with metaphysical distinctions. Gomarus, on the other side, adopted this opinion, which was confined, among the Calvinists of that day, to himself and another. Gomarus betook himself to this notion of conditional prescience, in order to avoid being charged with making God the author of the sin of Adam, and found it a convenient mode of eluding so formidable an objection, as Curcellæus remarks: “Sapienter ergo, meo judicio, Gomarus, cum suam de reprobationis objecto sententiam hoc absurdo videret urgeri, quod Deum peccati Adami auctorem constituerit, ad præscientiam conditionatam confugit, qua Deus ex infinito scientiæ suæ lumine, quædam futura non absolute, sed certa conditione posita prænovit. Hac enim ratione commodissime ictum istum declinavit.— Eumque postea secutus est Wallæus in Locis suis Communibus; qui etiam feliciter scopulum illum prætervehitur.—Nullurn præterea ex Calvini discipulis novi, qui hanc in Deo scientiam agnoscat.—De Jure Dei.

To what practical end this opinion went, it is not easy to see either as to such of the Calvinists or of the Arminians as adopted it. The point of the question, after all, was, whether the actual circumstances in which a free agent would be placed, and his conduct accordingly, could both be foreknown. Gomarus, who adopted the view of conditional foreknowledge, as to Adam at least, conceded the liberty of the will, so far as the first man was concerned, to his opponents, but Episcopius and others conceded by this notion something of more importance to the supralapsarians, who denied that the prescience of future contingencies was at all possible. However both agreed to destroy the prescience of God as to actual contingencies, though the advocates of the Media Scientia reserved the point as to possible, or rather hypothetic ones, and thus the whole was, after all resolved into the wider question, Is the knowledge of future contingencies possible? This point will be presently considered.

ft15 So little effect has this theory in removing any difficulty, that persons of the most opposite theological sentiments have claimed it in their favour.—Socinus and his followers,—all the supralapsarian Calvinists,—and a few Arminians.

ft16 Certainty is, properly speaking, no quality of an action at all, unless it be taken in the sense of a fixed and necessitated action; in this controversy it means the certainty which the mind that foresees has, that an action will be done, and the certainty is therefore in the mind, and not in the action.

ft17 “Though his grace rightly lays down analogy for the foundation of his discourse, yet, for want of having thoroughly weighed and digested it, and by wording himself incautiously, he seems entirely to destroy the nature of it; insomuch that while he rejects the strict propriety of our conceptions and words, on the one hand, he appears to. his antagonists to run into an extreme even below metaphor, on the other. “His greatest mistake is, that through his discourse he supposes the members and actions of a human body, which we attribute to God in a pure metaphor, to be equally upon the same foot of analogy with the passions of a human soul, which are attributed to him in a lower and more imperfect degree of analogy; and even with the operations and perfections of the pure mind or intellect which are attributed to him in a yet higher and more complete degree. In pursuance of this oversight, he expressly asserts love and anger, wisdom and goodness, knowledge and foreknowledge, and all the other Divine attributes to be spoken of God, as improperly as eyes or ears; that there is no more likeness between these things in the Divine nature and in ours, than there is between our hand and God’s power, and that they are not to be taken in the same sense.

“Agreeably to this incautious and indistinct manner of treating a subject curious and difficult, he hath unwarily dropped some such shocking expressions as these, the best representations we can make of God are infinitely short of truth. Which God forbid, in the sense his adversaries take it; for then all our reasonings concerning him would be groundless and false. But the saying is evidently true in a favourable and qualified sense and meaning; namely, that they are infinitely short of the real, true, internal nature of God as he is in himself.—Again, that they are emblems indeed and parabolical figures of the Divine attributes, which they are designed to signify; as if they were signs or figures of our own, altogether precarious and arbitrary, and without any real and true foundation of analogy between them in the nature of either God or man: and accordingly he unhappily describes the knowledge we have of God and his attributes, by the notion we form of a strange country by a map, which is only paper and ink, strokes and lines.” (Bishop BROWN’S Procedure of Human Understanding.)

ft18 Melancthon says: ‘The Lord was very angry with Aaron to have destroyed him; and I [Moses] prayed for Aaron also at the same time, Deuteronomy 9:20. Let us not elude the exceedingly lamentable expressions which the Holy Ghost employs when he says, God was very angry; and let us not feign to ourselves a God of stone, or a Stoical Deity. For though God is angry in a different manner from men, yet let us conclude that God was really angry with Aaron, and that Aaron was not then in [a state of] grace, but obnoxious to everlasting punishment. Dreadful was the fall of Aaron, who has through fear yielded to the madness of the people when they instituted the Egyptian worship. Being warned by this example, let us not confirm ourselves in security, but acknowledge that it is possible for elect and renewed persons horribly to fall,” &c. (Loci Præcipui Theologi, 1543.) ft19 “It would destroy the confidence of prayer, and the ardour of devotion, if we could regard the Deity as subsisting by himself, and as having no sympathies, but mere abstract relations to the whole family in heaven and earth; and I look upon it as one of the most rational and philosophical confutations of your system, that it is fitted neither for the theory nor the practice of our religion; and that, if we could adopt it, we must henceforth exchange the language of Scripture for the anthems of Epicurus:—

“Omnis enim per se Divum natura necesse est,

Immortali ævo summâ cum pace fruatur,

Semota ab hostris rebus, sejunctaque longe;

Nam privata dolore omni, privata periculis,

Ipsa suis pollens opibus, nihil indiga nostri,

Nec bene promeritis capitur, nec tangitur irâ.

“It is in direct opposition to all such vain and skeptical speculations, that Christianity always represents and speaks of the Deity as participating, so far as infinity and perfection may participate, in those feelings and affections which belong to our rational natures.” (GRINFIELD’S Vindiciæ Analogicæ.)

ft20 How can we confess God to be just, if we understand it not? But how can we understand him so, but by the measures of justice? and how shall we know that, if there be two justices, one that we know, and one that we know not, one contrary to another? If they be contrary, they are not justice; for justice can be no more opposed to justice, than truth to truth: if they be not contrary, then that which we understand to be just in us, is just in God; and that which is just once, is just for ever in the same case and circumstances: and, indeed, how is it that we are in all things of excellency and virtue to be like God, and to be meek like Christ; to be humble as he is humble, and to be pure like God, to be just after his example, to be merciful as our heavenly Father is merciful? If there is but one mercy, and one justice, and one meekness, then the measure of these, and the reason, is eternally the same. If there be two, either they are not essential to God, or else not ignitable by us: and then how can we glorify God, and speak honour of his name, and exalt his justice, and magnify his truth, and sincerity, and simplicity, if truth and simplicity, and justice, and mercy in him is not that thing which we understand, and which we are to imitate?” &c. (Bishop TAYLOR’S “Ductor Dubitantium.”)

ft21 Ray’s “Wisdom of God.”—Derham’s Astro and Physico-Theology.— Paley’s Nat. Theol.—Sturm’s Reflections.—Kirby and Spence’s Entomology; and, though not written with any such design, St. Pierre’s “Studies of Nature” open to the mind that can supply the pious sentiments which the author unfortunately wanted, many striking instances of the wisdom and benevolence of God.

ft22 “A few undecompounded bodies, which may perhaps ultimately be resolved into still fewer elements, or which may be different forms of the same material, constitute, the whole of our tangible universe of things.” (Davy’s Chymistry.)

ft23 It is not intended here to countenance the opinion that the difference between the highest instinct and the lowest reason, is not great. It is as great as the difference between an accountable and an unaccountable nature; between a being under a law of force, and a law of moral obligation and motive; between a nature limited in its capacity of improvement, and one whose capabilities are unlimited. “The rash hypothesis, that the negro is the connecting link between the white man and the ape, took its rise from the arbitrary classification of Linnæus, which associates man and the ape in the same order. The more natural arrangement of later systems separate them into the bimanous and quadrumanus orders. If this classification had not been followed, it would not have occurred to the most fanciful mind to find in the negro an intermediate link. (PRITCHARD on Man.)

ft24 Scott’s Remarks on the Refutation of Calvinism.—Few have been so daring, except the grosser Antinomians of ancient and modern times. The elder Calvinists, though they often made fearful approaches in their writings to this blasphemy, yet did not, openly and directly, charge God with being the author of sin. This Arminius, with great candour, acknowledges; but gives them a friendly admonition, to renounce a doctrine from which this aspersion upon the Divine character may, by a good consequence, be deduced: a caution not uncalled for in the present day. “Inter omnes blasphemias quæ Deo impingi possunt, omnium est gravissima qua author peccati statuitur Deus: quæ ipsa non parum exaggeratur, si addatur Deum idcirco authorem esse peccati à creatura commissi, ut creaturam in æternum exitium, quod illi jam antè citra respectum peccati destinaverat, damnaret et deduceret: sic enim fuetit causa injustitiæ homini, ut ipsi æternam miseriam adferre posset. Hanc blasphemiam nemo Deo, quem benum concipit, impinget: quare etiam Manichæi, pessimi hæreticorum, quum causam mali bono Deo adscribere vererentur, alium Deum et aliud principium satuerunt, cui mali causam deputarent. Qua de causa, nec allis Doctoribus reformaturum Ecclesiarum jure impingi potest, quod Deum authorem peccati statuant exprofesso; imo verissimum est illos expresse id negare, et illam calumniam contra alios egregiè confutasse. Attamen fieri potest, ut quis ex ignorantia aliquod doceat, ex quo bona consequentia deducatur, Deum per illam doctrinam statui authorem peccati. Hoc si fiat, tum quidem istius doctrinæ professoribus, non est impingendum quod Deum authorem peccati faciant, sed tantum monendi ut doctrinam istam, unqe id bona consequentia deducitur, deserant et abjiciant.”

ft25 The accomplished Quinctilian may be given as an instance of this, and also of what the apostle calls their sorrowing “without hope.” In pathetically lamenting the death of his wife and sons, he tells us, that he had lost all taste for study, and that every good parent would condemn him, if he employed his tongue for any other purpose than to accuse the gods, and testify against a Providence. “Quis enim bonus parens mihi ignoscat, ac non oderit hanc animi mei firmitatem, si quis in me est alius usus vocis, quam ut incusem deos, superstes omnium meorum, nullam terras despicere providentiam tester?” (Instit Lib. 6.) ft26 “Potentia, Intellectus, et Voluntas,” or “Potentia, Sapientia, et Amor.”—(Campanella, Richardus, and others.)

ft27 It is defined by Oceam, “Suppositum intellectuale.” ft28 “Nonnunquam upostasiv pro eo quod nos ousian dicimus et vise versâ vox ousia pro eo quod nos upostasin appellamus, ab ipsis accepta fuit.”—Bishop Bull. upostasiv, it ought, however, to be observed, was used in the sense of person before the council of Nice, by many Christian writers, and, in the ancient Greek Lexicons, it is explained by wroswpon, and rendered by the Latins persona. ft29 St. Paul says, that all Scripture is given by inspiration of God; but Dr. Priestley tells us, that this signifies nothing more than that the books were written by good men, with the best views and designs. ft30 To this purpose, Witsius, who shows that there can be neither religion nor worship, unless the trinity be acknowledged. “Nulla etiam religio est, nisi quis rerum Deum colat; non colit verum Deum, sed cerebri sui figmentum, qui non adorat in æquali divinitatis majestate Patrem, Filium, et Spiritum Sanctum. I nunc, et doctrintan eam ad praxin inutilem esse clama, sine qua nulla Fides aut, Pietatis Christianæ praxis esse potest.”

ft31 “Equidem rem attentius perpendenti liquebit, ex hypothesi sive Sociniana, sive Ariana, Deum in hoc negotio amorem et dilectionem suam potius in illum ipsum filium, quam erga nos homines ostendisse. Quid enim? Is qui Christus dicitur, ex mera Dei eudokia et beneplacito in eam gratiam electus est, ut post bievem hîc in terris Deo præstitam obedientiam, ex puro puto homine juxta Socinistas, sive ex mera et mutabili creatura, ut Ario-manitæ dicunt, Deus ipse fieret, ac divinos honores, non modo a nobis hominibus sed etiam ab ipsis angelis atque archangelis sibi tribuendos assequeretur, adeoque in alias creaturas omnes dominium atque imperium obtineret.” (Bull. Jud. Eccl. Cathol.)

ft32 Oikonwmia, quæ ipsi tribuitur, Qeologian necessario supponit, ipsumque omnino statuit. Quid enim? Messiam sive Christum prædicant sacræ nostræ literæ et credere nos profitemur omnes, qui sit animarum sospitator, qui nobis sit sapientia, justitia, sanctificatio et redemptio— qui preces suorum, ubivis sacrosanc tum ejus nomen invocantium, illico exaudiat—qui ecelesiæ suæ per universum terrarum orbem disseminatæ, semper præsto sit—qui Deo Patri, sunqronov et in eadem sede collocatus sit—qui denique, in exitu mundi, immensa gloria et majestate refulgens, angelis ministris stipatus, veniet orbem judicaturus, non mode facta omnia, sed et cordis secreta omnium quotquot fuere hominum in lucem proditurus, &c. Hæccine omnia in purum hominem, aut creaturam aliquam competere? Fidenter dico, qui ita sentiat, non modo contra Fidem, sed et rationem ipsam insanire. (Bull. Judic. Eccl. Cath.)

ft33 Maimonides tells us, that it was not lawful to utter this name, except in the sanctuary, and by the priests. “Nomen, quod, ut nosti, non proferre licet, nisi in sanctuario, et a sacerdotibus Dei sanctis, solum in benedictione sacerdotum, ut et a sacerdote magno in die jejunii.” ft34 The argument for the trinity drawn from the plural appellations given to God in the Hebrew Scriptures, was opposed by the younger Buxtorf; who yet admits that this argument should not altogether be rejected among Christians, “for upon the same principle on which not a few of the Jews refer this emphatical application of the plural number to a plurality of powers or of influences, or of operations, that is, ad extra; why may we not refer it, ad intra, to a plurality of persons and to personal works? Yea, who certainly knows what that was which the ancient Jews understood by this plurality of powers and faculties?” ft35 The word triav, trinitas, came into use in the second century. ft36 “No man, except myself, ever was in heaven” (Pearce.) ft37 From this remarkable passage it appears to me very clear, that the Messenger or Angel of God, whom he here promises to be the leader of his people, is not a creature, much less Moses or Joshua, but an uncreated Angel. For (1) the clause, He will not pardon your sins, is not applicable to any created being, whether Angel or man: (2) The next words, My name is in him, cannot be explained to signify, he shall act in my name, that is, under my command or by authority received from me, for in that case another word, he will act or he will speak, or the like would have been added: (3) The same conclusion is established by a comparison of this passage with chapter 32:34, (and 32:2,) where God expresses his indignation against the Israelites for their idolatry, by declaring that not himself, but an angel, should be henceforth their guide: but this, the people and Moses most earnestly deprecate [as a calamity and a judgment, whereas the present instance is a promise of favour and mercy, and is so acknowledged in Isaiah 62:8.] “That angel, therefore, is perfectly different from him who is spoken of in this passage before us, who is the same that appeared to Moses, chapter 3:2, and there likewise both speaks and acts as God himself.” (Dathii Pentateuchus.)

ft38 “An earthly ambassador indeed represents the person of his prince, is supposed to be clothed with his authority, and speaks and acts in his name. But who ever heard of an ambassador assuming the very name of his sovereign, or being honoured with it by others? Would one in this character be permitted to say, I George, I Louis, I Frederic? As the idea is ridiculous, the action would justly be accounted high treason.” (JAMIESON’S Vindication.)

ft39 —histrioniam exercuisse, in qua Dei nomen assumat, et omnia quæ Dei sunt, sibi attribuat. (Bishop Bull) ft40 Imperscrutabilem Dei essentiam et majestatem. (Vatable.) ft41 The same word is often applied to magistrates, and even fathers; but J. H. Michaelis says, that when it occurs as in this place with the prefix, it is appropriated only to God.

ft42 Holden’s Testimonies. See this text, so fatal to the Socinian scheme, triumphantly established against the liberty of their criticisms, in Dr. Magee’s Postscript to Appendix, p 211, &c.

ft43 Bishop Pearson, on the second article of the Creed, thus concludes a learned note on the etymology of Kuriov Lord: “From all which it undeniably appeareth, that the ancient signification of Kurw is the same with eimi, or uparcw sum, I am.”

ft44 It is very obvious to perceive where the impropriety of such expressions lies. The word substance, according to the common use of language, when used in the singular number, is supposed to be intrinsic to the thing spoken of, whose substance it is; and, indeed, to be the thing itself. My substance is myself; and the substance of Israel is Israel. And hence it evinces to be improper to join substance with the relative terms, understanding it of any thing intrinsic.

ft45 Exodus 7:1: “See I have made thee a god to Pharaoh.” This seems to be explained by Exodus 4:16: “Thou shalt be to him instead of God.” Psalm 82:1: “God standeth in the congregation of the mighty: [Hebrews of God:] he judgeth among the gods.” This passage is rendered by Parkhurst, “The Aleim stand in the congregation of God; in the midst the Aleim will judge.” And on verse 6, “I have said ye are gods,” he supposes an ellipsis of Caph, “I have said ye are as gods.” As this is spoken of judges, who were professedly God’s vice-gerents, this is a very natural ellipsis, and there appears nothing against it in the argument of our Lord, John 10:34. The term, as used in all these passages, does not so much appear to be used in a lower sense, as by figurative application and ellipsis.

ft46 “Formula citandi qua Evangelista utitur cap. 1:22, touto de olon gegonen( ina plhrwqh to rhqen manifeste este argumentantis, non comparantis, quæ magnopere diversa est ab alia ejusdem Evangelistæ, et aliorum,” &c. (Dathe, in Isaiah 7:4.)

ft47 So dia is used throughout St. John’s Gospel; and in Hebrews 2:10, it is said of the Father, di, ou ta panta, “by whom are all things.” So also Romans 11:36: “Of him, and through him (di, autou,) and to him are all things.”

ft48 See Middleton on the Greek article; also, remarks at the close of the Epistle to the Ephesians and the Epistle to Titus, in Dr. A. Clarke’s Commentary; Wordworth’s Letters to Sharp: Dr. P. Smith’s Person of Christ.

ft49 “Omnes (Patres) uno consensu o qeuv hoc in loco vocative acceperunt, prout in Psalmis frequente a LXX usurpatur, et alioqui familiare est Græcia, Atticis præsertim, nominandi casum vocative sumere.” (Bishop Bull.)

ft50 This notion appears to have originated with Calvin. ft51 These were the docetæ, who taught that our Lord was a man in appearance only, and suffered and died in appearance only. On the contrary, the Cerinthians, and others believed that the Son of God was united to the human nature at his baptism, departed from it before his passion, and was reunited to it after his resurrection. According to the former, Christ was man in appearance only; according to the latter, he was the Son of God at the time of his passion and death in appearance only. We see, then, the reason why St. John, who writes against these errors, so often calls Christ, “him that is true,” true God and true man, not either in appearance only.

ft52 “He came into his own country, and his countrymen received him not.” (Capp’s Version.)

ft53 Venit ad sua, et sui non receperunt eum, id est, venit ad possessionem suam, et qui possessionis ipsius erant, eum non receperunt: quod explicatur, Matthew 21, ubi filius dicitur missus ad ecclesiam Judaicam wv kchronomov eis thn klhronomian autou. (Ludov. de Dieu, in loc.)

ft54 Holden’s Testimonies. “Non dicit Deus adoptavi, sed generavi te: quod communicationem ejusdem essentiæ et naturæ divinæ significat, modo tamen prorsu ineffabile.” (Michaelis.)

ft55 Holden’s Translation of Proverbs. In the notes to chapter viii, the application of this description of wisdom to Christ is ably and learnedly defended.

ft56 So the LXX, and the Vulgate, and the critics generally. “Antiquissima erit origine, ab æternis temporibus.” (Dathe.) “Imo a diebus æternitatis, i.e. priusquam natus fuerit, jam ab æterno extitit.” (Rosenmuller.)

ft57 The word axy to come forth, is used in reference to birth frequently, as Genesis 17:6; 2 Kings 20:18; and so the Pharisees understood it, when referring to this passage, in answer to Herod’s inquiry, where Christ should be “born.”—The plural form, his “goings forth” from eternity, denotes eminency. To signify the perfection and excellency of that generation, the word for birth is expressed plurally; for it is a common Hebraism to denote the eminency or continuation of a thing or action by the plural number. God shall judge the world “in righteousness and equity;” or most righteously and equitably Psalm 98:9.— “The angers of the Lord,” Lamentations 4:16, &c. ft58 Dr. A. Clarke, in his note on this text, evidently feels the difficulty of disposing of it on the theory that the term Son is not a Divine title, and enters a sort of caveat against resorting to doubtful texts, as proofs of our Lord’s Divinity. But for all purposes for which this text has ever been adduced, it is not a doubtful one; for it expresses, as clearly as possible, that God has a SON, and makes no reference to the incarnation at all; so that the words are not spoken in anticipation of that event. Those who deny the Divine Sonship can never, therefore, explain that text. What follows in the note referred to is more objectionable: it hints at the obscurity of the writer as weakening his authority. Who he was, or what he was, we indeed know not; but his words stand in the book of Proverbs; a book, the inspiration of which both our Lord and his apostles have verified, and that is enough: we need no other attestation.

ft59 Though the argument does not at all depend upon it, yet it may be proper to refer to Campbell’s translation of these verses, as placing some of the clauses in this passage in a clearer light. “Now the Father, who sent me, hath himself attested me. Did ye never hear his voice, or see his form? Or, have ye forgotten his declaration, that ‘ye believe not him whom he hath commissioned?’” On this translation, Dr. Campbell remarks, “The reader will observe, that the two clauses, which are rendered in the English Bible as declarations, are, in this version, translated as questions. The difference in the original is only in the pointing. That they ought to be so read, we need not, in my opinion, stronger evidence than that they throw much light upon the whole passage. Our Lord here refers to the testimony given at his baptism; and when you read the two clauses as questions, all the chief circumstances attending that memorable testimony are exactly pointed out. ‘Have ye never heard his voice, fwnh ek twn ouranwn; nor seen his form?’ the swmatikon eidov, in which, St. Luke says, the Holy Ghost descended. ‘And have ye not his declaration abiding in you:’ ton logon, the words which were spoken at that time.”

ft60 “Thou art my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased, that is, have always been well pleased, am at present well pleased, and will continue to be well pleased” (Macknight.)

ft61 “The glory as of the only begotten,” &c. “The particle wv, as, is not here a note of similitude, but of confirmation, that this Son was the only begotten of the Father.” (Whitby.) “This particle sometimes answers to the Hebrew ach, and signifies certe, truly.” (Ibid.) So Schleusner, in voc. 15, revera, vere. The clause may, therefore, be properly rendered, “The glory indeed, or truly of the only begotten of the Father.”

ft62 “This argument, which is from the less to the greater, proceeds thus: If those who having nothing Divine in them, namely, the judges of the great sanhedrim, to whom the psalmist there speaks, are called gods for this reason only, that they have in them a certain imperfect image of Divine power and authority, how much more may I be called God, the Son of God, who am the natural Son of God.” (Bishop Bull.) ft63 See this argument largely and ably stated in Wilson’s “Illustration of the Method of explaining the New Testament, by the early opinions of Jews and Christians concerning Christ.”

ft64 “We have observed so often before, that the SPIRIT in Christ, especially when opposed to the flesh, denotes his Divine nature, that it is needless to repeat it. Nor ought it to seem strange, that Christ, as the Son of God, and God, is here called the Spirit of holiness, an appellation generally given to the third person of the Divinity, for the same Divine and spiritual nature is common to every person of the trinity. Hence we have observed, that Hermas, a cotemporary of St. Paul, has expressly called the Divine person of the Son of God, a Holy Spirit.” (Bull.) “When the term Spirit refers to Christ, and is put in opposition to the flesh, it denotes his Divine nature.” (Schœttgen.) The same view is taken of the passage by Beza, Erasmus, Cameron, Hammond, Poole, and Macknight. The note of Dr. Guyse contains a powerful reason for this interpretation. “If ‘the Spirit of holiness’ is here considered as expressive of the sense in which Christ is ‘the Son of God,’ it evidently signifies his Divine nature, in opposition to what he was according to the flesh; and so the antithesis is very beautiful between kata pneuma, according to the Spirit, and kata sarka, according to the flesh. But if we consider it as the principle of the power by which Christ was raised from the dead, for demonstrating him to be the Son of God, it may signify either his own Divine nature or the Holy Spirit, the third person in the adorable trinity; and yet, unless his own Divine nature concurred in raising him from the dead, his resurrection, abstractedly considered in itself, no more proved him to be the Son of God, than the resurrection of believers, by the power of God, and by ‘his Spirit who dwelleth in them,’ Romans 8:11, prove any of them to be so.” it is also in corroboration of this view that Christ represents himself as the agent of his own resurrection. “I lay down my life, and I HAVE POWER to take it again.” “Destroy this temple, and in three days I WILL RAISE IT UP.”

ft65 It may be granted, that klhronomew is not always used to express the obtaining of a thing by strict hereditary right; but also to acquire it by other means, though still the idea of right is preserved. The argument of the apostle, however, compels us to take the word in its primary and proper sense, which is well expressed in our translation to obtain by inheritance. “The apostle’s argument, taken from the name Son of God, is this—he hath that name by inheritance, or on account of his descent from God; and Jesus, by calling himself the only begotten of the Father, hath excluded from that honourable relation angels and every other beings whatever.” (Macknight.)

ft66 “Imago majestatis Divinæ, ita, ut, qui Filium videt, etiam Patrem videat.” (Schleusner.)

ft67 Many interpreters understand by “the POWER OF THE HIGHEST,” which overshadowed the virgin, the second person of the trinity, who then took part of our nature. See Wolfii Cur. in loc. Most of them, however, refer both clauses to the Holy Spirit. But still, if the reason why the “holy thing,” which was to be born of Mary, derived its special and peculiar sanctity from the personal union of the Divinity with the manhood, the reason of its being called the Son of God will be found rather in that to which the humanity was thus united than in itself. The remarks of Professor Kidd, in his “Dissertation on the Eternal Sonship of Christ,” are also worthy consideration. “Our Lord’s human nature had never subsistence by itself.” “That nature never had personality of itself.” “Hence our Lord is the Son of God, with respect to his Divine nature, which alone was capable of Sonship. The question to be decided is, what object was termed the Son of God? Was it the human nature considered by itself? This it could not be, seeing that the humanity never existed by itself, without inhering in the Divinity. Was it the humanity and Divinity, when united, which, in consequence of their union, obtained this as a mere appellation? We apprehend that it was not. We conceive, that the peculiarly appropriate name of our Lord’s Divine person is Son of God—that his person was not changed by the assumption of humanity, and that it is his eternal person, in the complex natures of Divinity and humanity, which is denominated Son of God.”

ft68 “According to the opinion of the ancients, which is also the voice of common sense, if there were two unbegotten or independent principles in the Divinity, the consequence would be, that not only the Father would be deprived of his pre-eminence, being of and from himself alone; but also, that there would necessarily be two Gods. On the other hand, supposing the subordination, by which the Father is God of himself, and the Son God of God, the doctors have thought both the Father’s pre-eminence and the Divine monarchy safe.” (Bishop Bull.) “As it is admitted, that there are three persons in the Godhead, these three must exist, either independently of each other, or in related states. If they exist independently of each other, they are, then, each an independent person, and may act independently and separately from the rest; consequently, there would be three independent and separate Deities existing in the Divine essence” (Kidd.)

The orthodox faith keeps us at the utmost distance from this error. “The Father,” says Bishop Bull, “is the principle of the Son and Holy Spirit, and both are propagated from him by an interior production, not an external one.—Hence it is, that they are not only of the Father, but in him, and the Father in them; and that one person cannot be separate from another in the holy trinity, as three human persons, or three other subjects of the same species are separate. This kind of existing in, if I may so say, our divines call circumincession, because by it some things are very much distinguished from one another without separation; are in, and as it were, penetrate one another, without confusion.” (Judgment of the Catholic Church.)

ft69 See Bull’s Defensio Fidei Nicaenae, and the notes of Bishop Pearson’s most excellent work on the Creed.

ft70 “Per ton logon intelligi Christum, caret dubio, Nam 5. 6, 7, Scriptor dicit, Joannem Baptistam dehoc logw testimonium dixisse; constat autem eum de Christo dixisse testimonium; et 5. 14, sequiter, logon hominem esse factum et Apostolos hujus logou, hominis facti, vidisse dignitatem; atqui Christi majestatem quotidie oculis videbant.” (Rosenmuller.)

ft71 Et fuit Verbum Domini ad me, &c. Fieri quoque potest meo judicio ut 0nkelos per vocem Elohim, Angelum intellexerit, &c. (More Nevochim. par. i, c. 27, p. 33.)

ft72 “Quotiescunque fit principii mentio, significationem illius ad id de quo accommodare necesse est.” (Beza.)

ft73 “Valde errant, qui en arch interpretantur de initio Evangelio; haic enim sententiæ consilium Joannis, et sequens oratio aperte repugnat. Si vero o logov fuit jam tum, quum mundus esse cæpit, sequiter eum fuisse ante mundum conditum; sequitur etiam eum non esse unam ex ceteris creatis rebus, quæ cum munde esse cæperunt, sed alia natura conditione” (Rosenmuller.)

ft74 “Attributa Divina arctissimo copulari vinculo, sic, ut nullum seperatim concipi queat, adeoque qui uno pollet, omnibus ornetur.” (Doederlein.) ft75 Raphelius in loc. See also Parkhurst’s Lex.

ft76 “Non deerat peculiaris ratio, cur Filium Dei sic vocaret, cum ad Hebræeos scriberet, qui eum illo nomine indigitare solebant: ut constat ex Targum, cujus pars hoc tempore facta est, et ex Philone aliisque Hellenistis.” (Poli Synop.)

ft77 Kairoiv idioiv, tempore, quod ipse novit. Erat itaque tempus adventus Christi ignotum Apostolis.” (Rosenmuller.)

ft78 “The world was enlightened by him,” says the New Version; which perfectly gratuitous rendering has been before adverted to. ft79 “Si non facio ea ipsa divina opera, quæ pater meus facit; si quæ facio, non habent divinæ virtutis specimen.” (Rosenmuller.) “Opera Patris mei, i.e. quæ Patti, sive Deo, sunt propria: quæ a nemine alio fieri queunt.” (Poli. Synop.)

ft80 “Psalmos omnes a XCIII ad CI in se continere mysterium Messiæ, dixit David Kimshi.” (Rosenmuller.)

ft81 “Ceterum recte argumentatur apostolus: si angeli Regem ilium maximum adorare debent; ergo sunt illo inferiores.” (Rosenmuller in loc.)

ft82 “1. Forma, externus, habitus, omne quod in oculos occurrit, imago, simlitudo.” (Schleusner.)

ft83 “Non rapinam, aut spolium alicui, detractum, duxit.” (Rosenmuller.) So the ancient versions. “Non rapinam arbitratus est.” (Vulgate.) “Non rapinam hoc existimavit.” (Syriac.)

ft84 See Pearson on the Creed, Art. 2, note; Schleusner, Erasmus and Schmidt.

ft85 “Swmatikwv h. e. vere, perfectissime, non typice, et umbraliter, sicut in V. T. Deus se manifestavit. Est autem inhabitatio illa et unio personalis, et singularissima.” (Glassius.)

ft86 See also Wilson’s Illustration of the Method of explaining the New Testament by the early Opinions of Jews and Christians concerning Christ; and Dr. Jamieson’s Vindication, &c.

ft87 Dr. Samuel Clarke’s hypothesis was, that there is one Supreme Being, who is the Father, and two subordinate, derived, and dependent beings. But he objected to call Christ a creature, thinking him something between a created and a self-existent nature. Dr. C. appealed to the fathers; and Petavius, a learned Jesuit, in his Dogmata Theologica, had previously endeavoured to prove that the ante-Nicene fathers leaned to Arianism. Bishop Bull, in his great work on this subject, and Dr. Waterland may be considered as having fully put that question to rest in opposition to both.

ft88 “The Father hath relation to the Son, as the Father of the Son; the Son to the Father, as the Son of the Father; and the Holy Ghost being the spirit, or breath of the Father and the Son, to both.” (Lawson’s Theo. Pol.) But though breath or wind is the radical signification of pneuma, as also of spiritus, yet, probably from its sacredness, it is but rarely used in that sense in the New Testament.

ft89 The baptism of Jewish proselytes is a disputed point. It was strenuously maintained by Dr. Lightfoot, and opposed by Dr. Benson. Wall has, however, made the practice highly probable, and it is spoken of in the Gospels as a rite with which the Jews were familiar. Certainly it was a practice among the Jews near the Christian era.

ft90 See Wall’s History of Infant Baptism and Bingham’s Antiquities. ft91 The covenant of works, a term much in use among divines, is one which is not in so much use as formerly; but, rightly understood, it has a good sense. The word usually translated covenant in the New Testament, more properly signifies a dispensation or appointment, which is, indeed, suited to the majesty of law, and even the authoritative establishment of a sole method of pardon. But in both there are parties, not to their original institution, but to their beneficent accomplishment, and in this view each may be termed a covenant.

ft92 This phrase does not occur in the canonical Scriptures; but is, probably, taken from Wisdom 10:1, “She preserved the first formed father of the world that was created, and brought him out of his fall.” ft93 Holden’s Dissertation on the Fall of Man, chap. 2. In this volume the literal sense of the Mosaic account of the fall is largely investigated and ably established.

ft94 We have no reason at all to suppose, as it is strangely done almost uniformly by commentators, that this animal had the serpentine form in any mode or degree at all before his transformation. That he was then degraded to a reptile, to go “upon his belly,” imports, on the contrary, an entire alteration and loss of the original form—a form of which it is clear no idea can now be conceived.

ft95 “‘And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food,’ &c. Now Eve could plainly know, by her senses, that the fruit was desirable to the eye, but it was impossible she could know that it was good for food, but from the example and experiment of the serpent. It was also impossible she could know that it was desirable to make use of it, but by the example of the serpent, whom she saw from a brute become a rational and vocal creature, as she thought by eating that fruit. The text says she saw it was good for food, and that it was desirable to make wise, and seeing does not imply conjecture or belief, but certain knowledge; knowledge founded upon evidence and proof; such proof as she had then before her eyes. And when once we are sure that she had this proof, as it is evident she had, the whole conference between her and the serpent is as rational and intelligible as any thing in the whole Scriptures.” (DELANY’S Dissertations.)

ft96 “Impulsus etsi vehemens valde atque potens esset, voluntatis tamen imperio atque arbitrio semper egressus ejus in actum subjiciebatur. Poterat enim voluntas, divines voluntatis consideratione armata, resistere illi, eumque in ordinem ista vi redigere; alioquin enim frustanea fuisset legislatio, qua affectus circumscribebatur et refrænabatur.” (Episcopius, Disputatio 9.)

ft97 “Accessit in Adamo specialis quidam conjugis propriæ amor, quo adductus in gratiani illius, affectui suo proclivius indulsit, et tentationi sathanæ facilius cossit auremque præbuit.” (Episcopius, Disputatio 9.) ft98 “Diabolus causa talis statui non potest; gina ille suasione sola usus legitur: suasio autem necessitatem nullam affert, sed moraliter tantum voluntatem ad se allicere atque attractiere conatur.” (Episcopius.) ft99 “Legem tamen hanc idcirco homini latam fuisse arbitramur, ut ei obsequendo et obtemperando, palam publiceque veluti testaretur, se, cui dominium rerum omnium createrum à Deo delatum erat, Deo tamen ipsi subjectum obnoxiumque esse; utque obsequio eodem suo tanquam vasallus et cliens, publico aliquo recognitionis symbolo, profiteretur, se in omnibus Deo suo, tanquam supremo Domino, obtemperare et parere velle; id quod æquissimum erat.” (Episcopius.)

ft100 The former word signifies a traducer and false accuser, the latter an adversary.

ft101 See tenets of the remonstrants, in Nichol’s “Calvinism and Arminianism compared.”

ft102“Omnia in omnibus vitri sunt sed non omnia in singulis extant.” (Seneca.)

ft103 “Hâc conditione nati sumus, animalia obnoxia non paucioribus animi quam corporis morbis.” (Seneca.)

ft104 “Videamus quanta sint quæ a philosophiâ remedia morbis animorum adhibeantur; est enim quædam medicina certè,” &c. (Cicero.) ft105 The term “original sin” appears to have been first introduced by St. Augustine, in his controversy with the Pelagians.

ft106 “Qui studet optatam cursu contingere metam, Multa tulit fecitque puer; sudavit et alsit; Abstinuit venere, et vino.” (Horace.) ft107 “Non resipiscentibus veniam non concedere, id domum naturæ divinæ, et decretis ejus, et propterea rectitudini, et equitati debitum et ac consentaneum.” (Socin. de Servat.)

ft108 The writers of the New Testament, say some, derive this mode of expression from the force of the Hebrew word hxd transferred to the Greek word; but Palairet, Grotius, and Schleusner, give instances of the use of the term, in the same signification, in writers purely Greek. ft109 “Nam Mosis cum Christo instituta collatio, responsione vix indiget, cum omnis similitudo certos habeat terminos, quos extra protendi nequeat. Comparantur illi, qua liberatores, non ob liberandi modum. Neque magis ex eo sequitur, Christum satisfaciendo nos non liberasse, quia Moses id non fecerit, quam Christum nos liberasse per hominum mortem, quia id fecetit Moses. Quod si ad modum quoque liberandi comparatio pertineret, ea ut rectius procederet, dicendum esset, Christum nos liberasse miraculis, (ut Moses,) non autem sua morte suoque sanguine, quod Mosi nec adscribitur, nec adseribi potest. Sed præcipium est, quod vox lutron, de cujus vi hic agimus, liberationi per Mosen partæ nusquam additur. Quid quod ne est Socini quidem sententia modus liberandi idem est? Nam Moses, Josue, et alii liberarunt, non aliquid faciendo circa liberandos, (quod Christo Socinus tribuit) sed amovendo eos qui libertati obstabant, hostes scilicet.” (Grotius, De Satisfactione. cap. 8.)

ft110 See Nare’s Remarks on the New Version, Magee on the Atonement, Whitby and Doddridge in loc. Righteousness is indeed sometimes used for veracity; but only when some principle of equity, or some obligation arising from engagement, promise, or threat, is implied. ft111 “Quod autem Socinus argumentatur, quia divinitas ipsa non patiatur, ideo hanc in pœnæ considerationem non venire; perinde est ac si dicas, nihilcreferre privatum an Regem, item ignotum, an patrem verberes, quia verbera in corpus dirigantur, non in dignitatum, aut cognationem.” (De Satisfactione.)

ft112 On this subject, see Outram De Sacrificiis.

ft113 Vide Outram De Sac.; Hallet’s Notes and Discourses; Hammond and Rosenmuller in Hebrews ix; Richie’s Pec. Doctrine.

ft114 Nearly all that can be said on this interpretation will be found in Magee’s Discourses on the Atonement, and Davison’s Reply to his criticism, in his Inquiry into the Origin of Primitive Sacrifice. ft115 Mr. Davison, in pursuance of his theory, that the patriarchal sacrifices were not expiatory, has strangely averred, that this transaction is “a proof of the efficacy of Job’s prayer, not of the expiatory power of the sacrifice of his friends.” Why, then, was not the prayer efficacious, without the sacrifice? And how could the “burnt offering” of his friends give efficacy to his prayer, unless by way of expiation? What is the office of expiatory sacrifice, but to avert the anger of God from the offerer? This was precisely the effect of the burnt offering of Eliphaz and his friends: that it was connected with the prayer of Job, no more alters the expiatory character of that offering, than the prayers which accompanied such offerings under the law.

ft116 “Illius esse duritiem humani cordis emollire, cum aut per salutiferam prædicationem Evangelii, aut alia quacunque ratione in pectora hominum recipitur; illam eos illuminare, et in agnitionem Dei atque in omnem viam veritatis et in otius vitæ novitatem, et perpetuam salutis spem perducere.” (Bishop Jewel.)

ft117 See note in Nichol’s translation of the works of Arminius, vol. i, p. 634. ft118 “To be released from the damnatory sentence is one thing, to be treated a righteous person, is evidently another.” (Hervey’s Theron and Aspasio.)

ft119 The reader will also recollect Romans 6:23, “The wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life, through our Lord Jesus Christ.” The following passages expressly make the atonement of Christ the ground of our title to eternal life “By his own blood he entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for us.” “He is the Mediator of the New Testament, that, by means of death, they which are called might receive the promise of eternal inheritance,” Hebrews 9:12-15. “Christ died for us, that whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with him,” 1 Thessalonians 5:10.

ft120 To these might be added all those passages which ascribe the abolition of bodily death to Christ, who, in this respect, repairs the effect of the transgression of Adam, which he could only do in consequence of having redeemed that body from the power of the grave. This argument may be thus stated. It is taught in Scripture, that all shall rise from the dead. It is equally clear from the same authority, that all shall rise in consequence of the interposition of Christ, the second Adam, the representative and Redeemer of man—”as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.” It follows, therefore, that if the wicked are raised from the dead, it is in consequence of the power which Christ, as Redeemer, acquired over them, and of his right in them. That this resurrection is to them a curse, was not in the purpose of God, but arises from their wilful rejection of the Gospel. To be restored to life is in itself a good; that it is turned to an evil is their own fault; and if they are not raised from the dead in consequence of Christ’s right in them, acquired by purchase, it behooves those of a different opinion to show under what other constitution than that of the Gospel a resurrection of the body is provided for. The original law contains no intimation of this, nor of a general judgment, which latter supposes a suspension of the sentence inconsistent with the strictly legal penalty, “in the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.”

ft121 The scholastic terms are voluntas signi, and voluntas bene placiti, a signified or revealed will, and a will of pleasure or purpose. ft122 “Having conquered the Edomites, or Idumeans,” says Prideaux, “he reduced them to this necessity, either to embrace the Jewish religion, or else to leave the country, and seek new dwellings elsewhere; whereon, choosing rather to leave their idolatry than their country, they all became proselytes to the Jewish religion,” &c. (Connex. vol. iii, pp. 335, 366.)

ft123 Sententia de Divina Prœdest. Art. 7. Est autem Electio immutabile Dei propositum, &c.

ft124 “The true reason why they did not believe was, the want of that simple, teachable, and inoffensive temper, which characterized his sheep, FOR not being of that CHOSEN remnant, they were left to the pride and enmity of their carnal hearts.” (SCOTT’S Com.)

ft125 Holden translates the verse, “Jehovah hath made all things for himself; yea, even the wicked he daily sustains;” and observes, “should the received translation be deemed correct, ‘the day of evil’ would be considered by a Jew of the age of Solomon, to mean, the day of trouble and affliction.”

ft126 See Whitby’s Paraphrase and Annot. and his Discourse on the Five Points, chap. 1.

ft127 Calvin puts the matter in much the same way. Inst. lib. iii, c. 24. ft128 This Calvin scruples not to say, “The supreme Lord, therefore, by depriving of the communication of his light, and leaving in darkness those whom he has reprobated, makes way for the accomplishment of his own predestination.” (Inst. lib. iii, c. 24.)

ft129 Quoted in Bishop Womack’s Calvinist Cabinet Unlocked p. 34. ft130 Amyraldus tamen, ut eum infra lapsum substitisse probet, in constituendo reprobationis objecto, profert quædam loca in quibus ille corruptæ massæ meminit, et hujus decreti æquitatem ab originali peccato arcessit. Sed facilis est responsio Nam Calvinus ipse, qua ratione ista cum iis quæ attuli sint concilianda nos docet nimirum adhibita distinctione inter propinquam reprobationis causam, quam residentem in nobis corruptionem esse vult, et remotam, quæ sit unicum Dei bene placitum. Et quanquam variis in locis causam propinquam, veluti ad sententiæ suæ duritiem emolliendam aptiorem, magis videatur urgere; ita tamen id facit ut non raro consilii arcani, voluntatis occultæ, judicii inscrutabilis, et similium, quibus primam rejectionis causam solet designare, ibidem simul meminerit. (De Jure Dei, &c, cap. 10.)

ft131 “The Reformed Church, in the largest import of the word, comprises all the religious communities which have separated themselves from the Church of Rome. In this sense the words are often used by English writers; but having been adopted by the French Calvinists to describe their Church, this term is most commonly used on the continent as a general appellation of all the Churches who profess the doctrines of Calvin. About the year 1541, the Church of Geneva was placed by the magistrates of that city under the direction of Calvin, where his learning, eloquence, and talents for business, soon attracted general notice. By degrees his fame reached to every part of Europe. Having prevailed upon the senate of Geneva to found an academy, and place it under his superintendence; and having filled it with men, eminent throughout Europe for their learning and talent, it became the favourite resort of all persons who leaned to the new principles, and sought religious and literary instruction. From Germany, France, Italy, England, and Scotland, numbers crowded to the new academy, and returned from it to their native countries, saturated with the doctrine of Geneva; and burning with zeal to propagate its creed.” (Butler’s Life of Grotius.)

ft132 This was the view of Melancthon, who, in writing to Peucer, says, “Lœlius writes to me, and says, that the controversy respecting the STOICAL FATE is agitated with such uncommon fervour at Geneva, that one individual is cast into prison because he happened to differ from Zeno.”

ft133 “It is pleasing,” says Dr. Copleston, “and satisfactory, to trace the progress of Melanthon’s opinions upon the subject. In the first dawning of the reformation he, as well as Luther, had been led into those metaphysical discussions which Calvin afterward moulded into a system, and incorporated with his exposition of the Christian doctrine. But so early as the year 1529 he renounced this error, and expunged the passages that contained it from the later editions of his Loci Theologici. Luther, who had in his early life maintained the same opinions, after the controversy with Erasmus about free will, never taught them; and although he did not, with the candour of Melancthon, openly retract what he had once written, yet he bestowed the highest commendations on the last editions of Melancthon’s Work, containing this correction. (Preface to the first volume of Luther’s Works, A D. 1546.) He also scrupled not to assert publicly, that at the beginning of the reformation, his creed was not completely settled: (Laur. Bampt. Lect. note 21 to Sermon ii:) and in his last work of any importance, he is anxious to point out the qualifications with which all he had ever said, on the doctrine of absolute necessity, ought to be received.” “Vos ergo, qui nunc me audistis, memineritis me hoc docuisse, non esse inquirendum de Prædestinatione Dei absconditi, sed in illis acquiescendum, quæ revelantur per vocationem et per ministerium verbi… Hæc eadem alibi quoque in meis libris protestatus sum, et nunc etiam viva voce trado: Ideo sum excusatus. (Op vol. vi, p. 325.) ft134 This statement of the supralapsarian and sublapsarian theories, as given by Arminius, might be illustrated and verified by quotations from the elder Calvinistic divines: the reader will, however, find what is amply sufficient in those given in Bishop Womack’s Calvinistic Cabinet Unlocked.

ft135 The question as to the object of the decrees has gone out, as Goodwin says, among our Calvinistic brethren into “endless digladiations and irreconcilable divisions:—some of them hold, that men simply and indefinitely considered, are the object of these decrees. Others contend, that men considered as yet to be created, are this object. A third sort stands up against both the former with this notion, that men considered as already created, and made, are this object. A fourth disparageth the conjectures of the three former with this conceit, that men considered as fallen, are this object. Another findeth a defect in the singleness or simplicity of all the former opinions, and compoundeth this in opposition to them, that men considered both as to be created, and as being created and as fallen, together, are the proper object of these troublesome decrees. A sixth sort formeth us yet another object, and this is, man considered as salvable, or capable of being saved. A seventh not liking the faint complexion of any of the former opinions, delivereth this to us as strong and healthful, that men considered as damnable, are this object. Others yet again, superfancying all the former, conceit men, considered as creable, or possible to be created, to be the object so highly contested about. A ninth party disciple the world with this doctrine, that men considered as labiles, or capable of falling, are the object; and whether all the scattered and conflicting opinions about the objects of our brethren’s decrees of election and reprobation, are bound up in this bundle or not, we cannot say.” (Agreement of Brethren &c.)

In modern times these subtile distinctions have rather fallen into desuetude among Calvinists, and are reducible to a much smaller number.

ft136 “Non solent enim supralapsarii dicere Deum quosdam ad æternam damnationem creasse et prædestinasse; eo quod damnatio actum judicialem designet, ac proinde peccati meritum præsupponat; sed malunt uti voce exitii, ad quod Deus, tanquam absolutus Dominus, jus habeat creandi et destinandi quoscunque voluerit.” (Curcellæus De Jure Dei, &c, cap. 10. See also Bishop WOMACK’S Calvinistic Cabinet. &c, p. 394.)

ft137 The title of it is, “The Confession of Faith agreed upon by the Assembly of Divines at Westminster, with the assistance of Commissioners from the Church of Scotland.” The date of the ordinance for convening this assembly is 1643. The Confession was approved by the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland in 1647.

ft138 The Augsburg Confession says, “Non est hic opus disputationibus de prædestinatione et similibus. Nam promissio est universalis et nihil detrahit operibus, sed exsuscitat ad fidem et vere bona opera.”—Act

20. And the Saxon Confession is equally indifferent to the subject. “Non addimus hic quæstiones de prædestinatione seu de electione; sed deducimus omnes lectores ad verbum Dei, et jubemus ut voluntatem Dei verbo ipsius discant sicut Æternus Pater expressa voce præcipit, hunc audite.” (Art. de Remiss. Pecc.)

ft139 Of Camero, or Cameron, Amyraldus, Curcellæus, and the controversy in which they were engaged, see an interesting account in Nichol’s Arminianism and Calvinism Compared, vol i, appendix c; a work of elaborate research, and rebounding with the most curious information as to the opinions and history of those times.

ft140 “Ordo autem hic ut recte intelligi possit, observandum est triplicem Deo scientiam tribui solere: unam necessariam, quæ omnem voluntatis liberæ actum naturæ ordine antecedit, quæ etiam practica et simplicis intelligentiæ dici potest, qua seipsum et alia omnia possibilia intelligit. Alteram liberam, quæ consequitur actum voluntatis liberæ, quæ etiam visionis dici potest; quâ Deus omnia, quæ facere et permittere decrevit ita distincte novit, uti ea fieri et permittere voluit. Tertiam mediam, qua sub conditione novit quid homines aut angeli facturi essent pro sua libertate, si cum his aut illis circumstantiis, in hoc vel in illo rerum ordine, constituerentur.” (Disputat. Episcopii. part i, disp. 5.) ft141 A few divines, and but few, have also been found, who, still admitting the essential distinction between body and spirit, have thought that their separation by death incapacitated the soul for the exercise of its powers. This suspension they call “the sleep of the soul.” With the Materialist death causes the entire annihilation, for the time, of the thinking property of matter. Both opinions are, however, refuted by the same Scriptural arguments.

ft142 Genesis 39:9, Pwv poihsw, How shall I,—how is it possible that I should do this great wickedness? “How, then, can I,” say our translators. Exodus 6:12, “Behold, the children of Israel have not hearkened unto me; how, then shall Pharaoh hear me?”—pwv eisakousetai mou Faraw;—how is it likely, or possible, that Pharaoh should hear me? See also verse 30. Judges 16:15, “And she said unto him, Pwv legeiv, How canst thou say I love thee?” 2 Samuel 11:11, may also be considered in the LXX. 2 Kings 10:4, “But they were exceedingly afraid, and said, Behold, two kings stood not before him: kai pwv, how then shall we stand?”—how is it possible that, we should stand. Job 9:2, Pwv gar estai dikaiov brotov;—For how shall mortal man be just with, or in the presence of GOD?—how is it possible? See what follows. Psalm 72, (73,) 11; Pwv egnw o Qeov; “How doth GOD know?”—how is it possible that he should know? See the connection. Jeremiah 8:8; Pwv ereite, “How do ye say,”—how is that ye say,—how can ye say, We are wise? Jeremiah 29:7, (47:7,) Pwv hsucasei: “How can it,”—the sword of the LORD,—”be quiet?” Ezekiel 33:10, “If our transgressions and our sins be upon us, and we pine away in them, pwv zhsomeqa how should we then live?” Matthew 7:4, “Or how, pwv, wilt thou say to thy brother?” where Rosenm. observes that pwv has the force of negation. Ibid. 12:26, “If Satan cast out Satan, he is divided against himself; pwv oun staqhsetai how shall then,”—how can then,—”his kingdom stand?” See also Luke 11:18. Luke 23:33, “Ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, pws fughte, how can ye escape the damnation of hell?” “qui fieri potest?” Rosenm. Mark 4:40, Pwv ouk exete pistin; “How is it that ye have no faith?” Luke 1:34, may also be adduced. John 5:47, “If ye believe not his writings, pwvÄpisteusete; how shall ye,”—how can ye—”believe my words?” Romans 3:6, “GOD forbid: for then pwv krinei how shall GOD judge the world?”—how is it possible? See the preceding verse. Romans 8:32, PwvÄcarisetai; “How shall he not,”—how is it possible but that he should,—”with him also freely give us all things,” Romans 10:14, PwvÄepikalesontai, “How then shall they,”— how is it possible that they should,—”call on him in whom they have not believed?” &c. 1 Timothy 3:5, “For if a man know not how to rule his own house, pwv, how shall he take care of the Church of GOD?” Hebrews 2:3, “How shall we escape,”—how is it possible that we should escape,—”if we neglect so great salvation?” 1 John 3:17, Pwv “How dwelleth the love of GOD in him?”—how can it dwell? Comp. 1 John 4:20, where dunati is added. ft143 The present indicative verb is here used, as it is generally throughout this chapter, for the future.