rules of reason and evidence, and my faith in this proposition is founded upon clear and distinct ideas; for I know clearly whom I mean by Jesus Christ, namely, that person who was born of the Virgin Mary, and crucified under Pontius Pilate; I have a clear and distinct idea of what it is for one thing to be equal to another; and I apprehend very well what is signified by the name of God here, namely, that Divine Being, whose necessary existence I infer from that clear knowledge I have of his creatures; and of whose nature, though I have not the least notion as it is in itself, yet I form the best ideas of him I can, by enlarging all the perfections that are desirable in the creatures. And I have

a clear and distinct idea of what it is for one person to be the son of another. Thus I understand the meaning of the words, nor is there any thing in them contradictory to my reason. And, lastly, I have clear and distinct ideas of those miraculous proofs to the senses of men; and of those completions of prophecies; and the excellency of that doctrine they confirm; the agreeableness of it to the common notions of men; and its natural tendency to make men easy, and pleasant, and useful to one another. All which raise such an evidence or knowledge in my mind of the divinity of his mission, who, revealed this proposition to me, that I must do violence to my reason, if I do not assent to it. And thus far it is not so properly and strictly a mystery.

"But when I think of this proposition, Jesus the Son of God, is God equal with the Father; I must own, at the same time, that I give my assent to it, I have no knowledge of that eternal generation which I form an improper idea of from the procreation of one man from another. Nor have I any notion of this wonderful union of the human nature with the divinity. Nor can I in the least imagine wherein this equality consists. These, and all other things relating to the manner of it, are wholly out of the reach of my capacities, and totally obscured from me. These are the things which make it a mystery, and in respect of this part of it, the authority or veracity of God is the only ground of my persuasion; and my Christian faith of this article consists in thus giving my assent to the existence of things which I have no notion of, when he hath taken care to give me undoubted testimony of the Revelation's coming from him. And I trust he will accept of it, because it is no rash, inconsiderate assent, but that I use those powers of knowledge I have, as strictly and impartially in this, as I would do in any affair which concerned my life." (p. 187-189.)

It would have been much to the credit of orthodoxy, and greatly tended to the spread of the Catholic faith, if all who have written and spoken in vindication of the scriptural doctrine of the Trinity, had treated the subject after the manner of this eminent prelate.

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The manner in which our Lord wrought his miracles, is very properly adduced in this work, as a proof of the doctrine of his Deity." He conducts not himself (saith our author) herein, as Moses and the Prophets, as the Apostles and primitive Christians were wont to do, but rather as the Lord of nature, in whose hand was the life of every thing. Son, saith he to the sick of the palsy, thy sins be forgiven thee-to the raging winds and seas, Peace, be still-to the leprous, Be clean-to the crooked, Be straight-to the deaf, Hear-to the blind, See-to the dumb, Speak to the withered hand, Be stretched out-to the dead, Arise-and to the putrid carcase, Come forth. Now, if our Lord was no more than a mere man, and acted solely by commission from his Father, in like manner as Moses and the prophets did, and in no higher a sense, there was an arrogance and presumption in his manner infinitely unbecoming such a character. It is impossible not to call to mind, on reading the wonderful works of Jesus, the manner of the Almighty when the foundations of the world were laid. Let there be light-let there be a firmament-let the waters be collected-let the earth bring forth grass -let the waters abound with fish, and the earth with animalslet the sun, moon, and stars, enlighten the heavens.' In all this there is a striking similarity. And in the former instances, as well as in the latter, we may say with truth, what the flatterers of Herod said feignedly and blasphemously, IT IS THE VOICE OF A GOD, AND NOT OF A MAN.

"Burnet, of the Charter-House, has expressed this with great elegance. The learned reader will consult the original; my plan obliges me to give a translation. Moreover, says he, when Christ wrought his miracles, he spake not as the apostles, in the name of another; but commandingly, and like a God. Of old, God said, Let there be light, and there was light: Christ said, I will; be thou clean; and the leper was cleansed, Mat. viii. 3. He said to the paralytic, Arise, take up thy bed, and go to thy house; and he went away healed, Matt. ix. 6. He said to the sea, while the tempest was raging, Peace, be still; and the wind ceased and there was a great calm.

"Let us first look at the air and manner (says the learned anthor of the Origin of Arianism disclosed,') in which he executes his great acts of miraculous might. He speaks to the leper, I will, be thou clean. He says to the man with the withered hand, Stretch forth thine hand. He tells the blind man, Receive thy sight. He says to him who had been crippled in his limbs for eight and thirty years, Take up thy bed and walk. He calls Lazarus, lying in the vault of rock before him, and swathed round with sepulchral linen, Lazarus, come forth. And he finally takes upon him, to rebuke the most unruly elements of nature, the winds and the waves; and to address these words to the sea, when wildly

agitated with a storm, Peace, be still. These are imperial acts of authority. They are obviously, in their manner, the operations of inherent and essential Deity. The pointed brevity of the sentences, is the genuine sublimity of power; the easy language of a mind, reposing upon its own dignity, and familiar with the exertions of divinity.*

"This will appear the more remarkable, when it is compared with the manner in which Moses and the prophets wrought their miracles. They were all done, except the one of Moses, which lost him the promised land, with the most profound humility, and direct appeal to the Almighty. This was still more remark ably the case with the apostles of our Lord. Both angels and men have been employed as the agents and instruments of the supreme God: but then they never forgot themselves and their ministerial character so far, as to attempt to work a miracle at their own pleasure, in their own names, and by their own power. None of them ever spake as though they were the Lords of nature. The apostles, in particular, carefully avoided and disclaimed this every where, and upon all occasions. Thus in the case of the impotent man, Peter says, In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise and walk,' Acts iii. 6. So Ananias, Brother Saul, the Lord, even Jesus that appeared to thee in the way, has sent me, that thou mightest receive thy sight,' Acts ix. 17. Peter says again, Eneas, Jesus Christ maketh thee whole,' Acts.ix. 34. His name, (says the same apostle in another place) through faith in his name, hath made this man strong,' Acts iii. 16. In short, as the miraculous operations of the Old Testa ment, were wrought by an appeal to the power of God, so several of those of our Lord were effected in the highest style of self-conscious divinity, and most of those wrought by the hands of the apostles, were professedly accomplished in the name, and by the power of Jesus Christ of Nazareth. Upon the supposition that Messiah was a mere man, this seems altogether unaccountable; but, upon the principle that he was God and man united for the purposes of human redemption, all is plain, natural, and easy." (p. 196-198.)

This reasoning must appear conclusive to all who acknowledge the truth and certainty of Christianity, and admit, at the same time, (which is no affront to the strongest understanding) that any propositions contained in a revelation, acknowledged to have God for its author, are not the less credible on account of not being within the grasp of human intellect. A great master of reason (quoted page 44) thus argues upon this subject. "It is an old and true distinction, that things may be above our reason, without being contrary to it. Of this are the power, the nature, and the universal presence of God, with innumerable other * Page 15.

points. How little do those who quarrel with mysteries, know of the commonest actions of nature! The growth of an animal, of a plant, or of the smallest seed, is a mystery to the wisest among men. If an ignorant person were told that a load-stone would draw iron at a distance, he might say it was a thing contrary to his reason, and he could not believe, before he saw it with his eyes. The manner whereby the soul and body are united, and how they are distinguished, is wholly unaccountable to us. We see but one part, and yet we know we consist of two; and this is a mystery we cannot comprehend, any more than that of the Trinity. God never did command us to believe, nor his ministers to preach, any doctrine contrary to the reason with which he hath been pleased to endue us; but, for his own wise ends, he has thought fit to conceal from us the nature of the thing he commands; thereby to try our faith and obedience, and increase our dependence on him.'

Every one, tolerably acquainted with the Scriptures of the New Testament, knows that they abound with expressions demonstrative of Christ's divinity. Many of these are quoted by our author, and handled in a manner highly to his credit, as a man of sense, and a sound orthodox divine." We will begin (saith he) our further inquiry into the opinions of the apostles and disciples of our Lord, concerning the dignity of his personal character, with the conduct and declarations of Stephen, the proto-martyr. This illustrious saint affords us an eminent example of invocation to the Lord Jesus; who, in the most solemn of all seasons, commits his departing spirit into the hands of his Redeemer; as his Redeemer, a little before, had committed his departing spirit into the hands of his heavenly Father. When Jesus had cried with a loud voice, he said, Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit: and, having said thus, he gave up the ghost,' Luke xxiii. 46. So this good man, after calling our Lord Jesus the Just One, Acts vii. 52, and reproving the people for betraying and murdering him, being full of the Holy Ghost, looked up steadfastly unto heaven, and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing on the right-hand of God; and said, Behold I see the heavens opened, and the Son of man standing on the right-hand of God.' Then they cried out with a loud voice, and stopped their ears, and ran upon him with one accord, and cast him out of the city, and stoned him.' And they stoned Stephen, invoking, and saying, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit. And he kneeled down, and cried with a loud voice, Lord, lay not this sin to their charge! And when he had said this he fell asleep." Acts vii. 55-60.

"Stephen's commission of his spirit into the hands of God, after the example of his great Master, is a proof of the separate existence of the souls of men after death; for if they had no souls, why should they pretend to commit them to the care of the Almighty?

And his dying invocation of Jesus Christ, in like manner as the same Jesus Christ, in similar circumstances, had invoked his Father, is a further proof that he believed him to be possessed of real and proper divinity. We may quibble as long as we please about this conclusion, from this piece of Sacred History, but all the sophistry in the world cannot invalidate the force of it. Jesus is either the real and proper Son of God, and entitled to divine honours, or Stephen, though full of the Holy Ghost,' died in the act of gross idolatry.

"Bishop Horsley, in his reply to Dr. Priestley, says, 'I shall always insist, Sir, that Stephen died a martyr to the Deity of Christ. The accusation against him, you say, was his speaking blasphemous things against the temple and the law.' You have forgotten to add the charge of blasphemy against Moses and against God.' The blasphemy against Moses was probably his assertion, that the authority of Moses was inferior to that of Christ. But what could be the blasphemy against God? What was there in the doctrine of the apostles, which could be interpreted as blasphemy against God, except it was this, that they had ascribed divinity to one who had suffered publickly as a malefactor. That this was Stephen's crime, none can doubt, who attend to the conclusion of the story. He looked up steadfastly into heaven,' says the inspired historian, and saw the glory of God,' (that is, he saw the splendour of the Shechinah, for that is what is meant, when the glory of God is mentioned as something to be seen,) and Jesus standing at the right-hand of God.' He saw the man, Jesus, in the midst of this divine light. His declaring what he saw, the Jewish rabble understood as an assertion of the divinity of Jesus; they stopped their ears; they overpowered his voice with their own clamours: and they hurried him out of the city, to inflict upon him the death which the law appointed for blasphemers. He died, as he had lived, asserting the Deity of our crucified Master. His last breath was uttered in a prayer to Jesus, first for himself, and then for his murderers." (page 208-210.)

In Part III. section vii. we find, with much other important matter, the universal practice of the first Christians, of calling upon the name of the Lord Jesus, urged as an unanswerable argument in vindication of his proper Godhead. "To bind all that call on thy name," Acts ix. 14. "Destroyed them who called on this name," Acts ix. 21. "Follow righteousness, faith, charity, peace, with them that call on the Lord out of a pure heart," 2 Tim. ii. 22. "The same Lord over all is rich unto all that call upon him. Whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved," Rom. x. 12, 13. Numerous other texts, expressive of the same sentiment, might easily be adduced, but these are sufficient at present for our purpose in quoting them, namely, to