by the Lord Jefus Chrift. There was no popery, or Romish explication; no modern tritheifm, in the account I had given him: No trinity in unity: No God in a wafer: but to be for ever happy by virtue of a scheme of religion, the most rational and noble, and therefore he found the greatest pleasure in entertaining it. He confeffed that there was fomething vaftly beautiful and useful in the perfect example of a Mediator's piety and virtue; and in fending a redeemer, deliverer, and Savior, in an inferior fenfe, to offer the appointed redemption of Jehovah to his -ple. This makes chriftianity of the greatest advantage to the readieft reasoners. It renders it unspeakably fo to the bulk of man

kind.

peo

But tell me (Mr. Hanmer continued) one thing more, that I may have every thing cleared to me in this article for my whole life. You have several times called Jefus Chrift the most glorious of creatures, do you mean thereby that he is a creature like us, as to his nature, but endowed with heavenly gifts beyond all other men?

I replyed; far be it from me to fay fo. As in regard to truth and the fcriptures, I fhall ever maintain, that God is not three perfons in the Godhead, Father, Son, and Holy Ghoft, as the Athanafian beretics, commonly called orthodox divines, do, in a multitude of

words,

words, and bitter wranglings, affirm, in an obftinat oppofition to the facred letters; but that he is one Spirit, one Lord, one God, and Father of all, who is above all; one fupreme perfon, or perfonal unity, one fupreme invifible God, the Father of mercys, and the God of the univerfe; fo do I likewife declare, in regard to truth and reveled religion, that the Son, fent by this propitious God, for the redemption of men, to reveal his gracious will and purpofe of falvation to the world, was not created like one of us of a precarious and perishable existence, but of a permanent, immortal, and immutable nature. With refpect to God, he was undoubtedly a creature; but with refpect to men, his origination was so tranfcendent, that we cannot say he was created, or a creature. I believe the unoriginated and fupreme God exerted his utmoft power in the production of Jefus Chrift, and caused his exiftence to be the perfect image of the invifible Deity; that in all perfections, his mind comes as near the Almighty, as it was poffible for the power of a felfexiftent God to make a derived Being; and that his body was formed by infinite power out of the body of the Virgin Mary, as Adam was made out of the duft of the earth: Therefore he shall be called the Son of God. This appears to be the fcripture account of the nature and perfon of Jefus Chrift;

1

and

and fure I am, that such a belief of him, is honouring him as highly as it is poffible for us to do, if we talk like people in our fenses; and revere as we ought, the peerless majesty of the first cause. What can be more fatisfactory and serviceable to us, than our having an exprefs image of the invifible God, as St. Paul tells the Coloffians, in his account of Jefus Chrift? How charming and beneficial to behold, as it were, the Deity in this bright, perfect, and compleat image of the invifible Supreme Spirit. Our glorious Lord represents to the life the infinite power and wisdom, the love, the holyness, and the purity of the bleffed God; and angels and men, the fpirits of just men made perfect, must be transported when they see the Father in him, and know that all he fays and does is the very fame thing as if the Deity had made himself vifible to us, or us capable of seeing him, and had fo fayed and acted in a visible perfon. This is what I declare, in relation to the nature of Jefus Chrift. I adhere to St. Paul's account. The apostles must be preferable to the modern doctors. Our priests have speculated till they have diftracted mankind with their metaphyfical pieties, and by means of their high-wrought myflery, have even prevailed on chriftians to fmite christians with the fift of wickedness. Unhappy theologers. They devote a tradition and

Dd

and ecclefiaftical authority to give sanction to the greatest errors.

But the conclufion is, my dear Hanmer, that fpeculation, as to the perfon of the great christian legislator, is to be the least part of his difciples work. Our business is to love and honor our creator, and fhew a reverend sense of him in all our actious. This is life eternal, to acknowledge thee, O Father, to be the only true God, and Fefus Chrift to be thy apostle, messenger, or mediator. With grateful hearts we must accept that mercy, which the bleffed God hath offered us by him; that mercy which forgives our fins, if we repent and amend; and that is for ever ready to encourage and affift us in the course of our duty. We are to endeavor to come as near the perfection of the chriftian morals as we can, and imitate fo far as we are able the fpotless example of the preacher's life. We must be just aud righteous, meek and gentle, kind and benevolent, and abstain from every thing that can defile the flesh or spirit.

In a word, we must believe in one propitious God, the Father almighty, and in one Mediator, the image of the invifible God, Chrift Fefus; our inftructor, reformer, and Savior, our king, and our judge; who brought us the gofpel of peace, and did always thofe things that pleafed his God and Fa

thers

ther; not feeking his own will, but the will of the Father who fent him and commiffioned him (a). And our practice must be, so to act in every relation, by a steady course of right conduct, that we may be able with unmixed joy to look forward to that important future hour, when we shall appear before God, and offer him a whole life spent in his fervice. This is true chriftianity. This is the golden religion of Jefus. This is the ticket by which we are to get admittance into the mansions of eternal glory.

Here ended the conversation; and as the bottle was by this time out, we shook hands, and parted.