playing like a fountain on the mountain's side, in its passage of desolation-converting the blooming fertility of a garden, into the sterility of a scorched-up and calcined wilderness. Oh! no: We are called upon to wrestle with the first rising of the obdurate and rebellious will. We are called upon to tread out the first spark that kindles in the storehouse of our affections. We must strangle the Hercules in his cradle, or like a blind giant, he will stalk over the empire of our hearts, trampling upon the promise of all that is bright, and encouraging, and cheering, in the moral aspect of our lives-withering the bloom of our kindest, and purest, and most exalted sensibilities-and crushing out the fruits ripe for the harvest, that we had nurtured with so assiduous a guardianship, and superintended with so anxious and patient a solicitude.

(To be Continued.)

Matthew the Evangelist, a Unitarian.

[From "The Unitarian," a periodical, recently commenced in New-York, by the Rev. William Ware, the respected Minister of the First Unitarian Church in that City. Two excellent Numbers of "The Unitarian" have been published.-Edit.]

THE title to this article has not been assumed for its singularity, but because it expresses a most solemn and important truth. If his own words, as the professed historian of our Lord, are to be taken in evidence, then was Matthew a Unitarian; then is his Gospel strictly Unitarian; and its doctrine is—there is but one God, the Father, and one Lord, Jesus Christ. If his own statements, and the whole tenor of his Gospel are to be taken in evidence, then is it equally certain, that he has not taught the doctrine of the Trinity, or that of the Deity of Jesus Christ; and, therefore, never heard of them from the mouth of his Divine Master, nor did ever believe them. These things, it appears to me, may be established by arguments sufficiently conclusive to satisfy the mind of an honest, impartial inquirer.

I shall endeavour to establish my position, first, by some general observations bearing on the subject, then by an examination of those passages which have been thought to teach the doctrine of the Trinity; and, lastly, by bring

ing forward all that evidence of a positive nature, in favour of the strict of Unity of God, which the Gospel presents. And in doing this, I shall be as brief as the subject will allow.

I. I would remark, in the first place, that as the doctrine of the Trinity is confessedly one not to have been antecedently expected, at which, as an Orthodox writer has himself observed, "reason stands aghast, and faith herself is half confounded," it is right to expect, and demand, before receiving it is an article of belief, evidence that shall bear some proportion to its apparent intrinsic incredibility. It is not enough that such a doctrine be darkly hinted at, obscurely implied, doubtfully expressed. If man deals justly by himself, and acts with due reverence to God and his own reason, he will not feel himself justified in embracing such a truth, without the clearest and most ample testimony; like that, for example, on the strength of which, he believes in the divine authority of Jesus, in a future life, and a state of retribution. But such testimony, it cannot be pretended that the Bible itself, much less the Gospel of Matthew, does any where furnish. There is nothing distinct, clear, definite, on the subject. Not a single verse in the whole Bible lays down the doctrine in terms. It is a thing of remote, dark, uncertain inference.

It is here worthy to be remarked, that in relation to the doctrine of the Trinity, the Deity of Christ, and many other supposed doctrines of revelation, the common principles of evidence have been totally reversed. For, while on other subjects, it is a universal principle for the conduct of the understanding, that in proportion to the apparent intrinsic incredibility and improbability of a fact or proposition, must be the force, clearness, and abundance of the evidence which is brought to establish it-in religion, men have eagerly received, and implicitly believed doctrines, against which there was a strong previous presumption that they could not be true, doctrines of the most momentous import if true-on a show of evidence the least that can be supposed possible in a case of the kind, and which, in other matters, would be rejected as wholly inadequate, or as warranting only the lowest degree of assent. That which is seemingly impossible, and on the face of the thing incredible or highly improbable, we reasonably require to be substantiated by a proportional ful

ness and distinctness of testimony; while that which is in accordance with other known facts, and other received knowledge, is in itself highly probable and likely to be true, we admit on a lesser weight of evidence. These just and obvious principles have, I repeat, in religious things been abandoned, if not reversed. Evidence which, in a court of human justice, neither judge, nor lawyer, nor jury, would take as competent testimony to a fact of even ordinary occurrence and character, or to a point of law— only change the ground to that of controversial divinity, and it becomes with these same persons most ample and decisive, to establish doctrines in themselves the most extraordinary, and most unlikely to be true. In religion, men have been ever ready to believe any thing and every thing, with or without evidence, as the case might be. It has seemed as if they took a strange delight in doing violence to the dictates of reason and common sense, and imagined themselves devout and meritorious before Heaven, in proportion to the easy credulity with which the most monstrous and revolting dogmas were engrafted into their creed. There has been nothing so essentially absurd, so obviously fabricated and false, that multitudes have not in every age of the Church been found to believe it as a part of the revelation of God, at the mandate of a priest, a pope, or a council. Evidence has not been asked for. It has rather been despised. Has it the authority of orthodox fathers? does it revolt reason and sense? does it task faith to the uttermost? these have virtually been the preliminary inquiries. Hence, it has happened that doctrines of a purely pagan or human origin, have been handed down from age to age, from church to church, and are unhesitatingly received at the present time, throughout all Christendom as vital truths of the Gospel, without even a decent show of evidence in their behalf, and so far, indeed, as Scripture is concerned, without being so much as named in it. Of this description, I apprehend, is the doctrine of the Trinity. Though so deep and high a mystery, so difficult to comprehend, so impossible to explain and teach, so little to have been looked for in a revelation, and, therefore, so natural and necessary to have been distinctly stated, and often repeated this doctrine, has St. Mathew, as it seems to me, wholly overlooked, and, as I hope will appear in the sequel, closed his Gospel not only without furnishing that proof which the mind ought to demand in

the case, but without so much as naming it; nay, without having by chance written but one* sentence, which, when the doctrine has been otherwise established, can be tortured so as to favour it. Now, I put it to the conscience of every reflecting person, if it be credible that the Evangelist could have left such a doctrine in such uncertainty, in any uncertainty? Is it credible, that in writing an account of a religion which contained a doctrine like that of the Trinity-one which every dictate of reason assured him would meet with the bitterest opposition, would be received by the intelligent only on the amplest evidence, which he felt at the same time to be the crowning doctrine of the new faith-is it credible, that he should have left it to be doubtfully gathered from a few dark and equivocal expressions, which will bear, and on every just principle of criticism require, an interpretation fatal to the truth he intended to teach?

II. I remark, in the next place, that in taking the evidence of Matthew to the doctrine of the Trinity, we are to remember that he was once a Jew, and would have written with the feelings of one who had been so, and therefore if he had believed the doctrine himself, he would have given it a prominent place in his Gospel.

As a Jew, the most cherished article of his faith had been the strict unity of God. It was the distinctive feature of his ancient belief. It was that which gave to it its superiority to the surrounding polytheism. The Heathens had as imposing ceremonies-as splendid temples as the Jews; but they did not know and worship the ONE God. This was the exclusive glory of Judaism. This tenet was guarded with most especial jealousy. Idolatry-the having and worshipping more Gods than one-was with the

* Mat. xxviii. 19.-"Baptising them in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Ghost." But who that had not elsewhere learned the doctrine of the Trinity, would ever, by the utmost stretch of the inventive power, construct out of this the catholic doctrine of the Trinity, "there are three persons in the Godhead, the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, and these three are one God, the same in substance, equal in power and glory." How should one uninstructed in orthodoxy guess, in the first place, that God's Holy Spirit was a person, and not an influence? 2, That he was a person equal to God? 3, That the Son was not the Messiah simply, but a divine person, equal also to the Father? 4, That these three infinite Gods were not three Gods, but only one? The verse does not even hint at these things. I am borne out fully, I conceive, in the assertion that the only verse in the Gospel, which it is contended contains an allusion to the Trinity, is tortured in order to yield it.

Jews the unpardonable sin. The devoted attachment of the Jews to the strict unity of God, stands out more prominently than any other feature in the character of that people. And yet, notwithstanding the plain language of the Old Testament on this subject, men can be found, theologians, too, to maintain that the Trinity was a doctrine of the Jewish Church! But the opinion is too void of even a semblance of honesty, or fairness, or, shall I say, of common sense, to deserve any other notice than that of silence. I will only say, that the man who, after reading or studying the Old Testament, could rise from his labour with a conviction that the Trinity was taught or implied in it, is to be as much regarded as he who should affirm, after a similar inquiry, that Judaism was a system of Atheism. The Jew of the present day, as did the Jew of former days, believes God to be one, without division or distinction in name or nature, and now as ever, regards that as the most vital blow at his faith, which invades the purity and integrity of this primary article of his creed; and so far, is he more of a Christian than the believer in the Trinity.

With these feelings, and with such a belief, did Matthew join himself to our Lord. From him, says orthodoxy, as the first and most important lesson, did he receive an account of the mystery of the Trinity. Through his public preaching and private instruction, he must have heard this amazing doctrine often explained and enforced. He must have heard it laid down as the corner-stone of the new religion; for, if it made a part of it at all, Trinitarians are right in saying, that it formed and still forms its most distinguishing feature. He must have regarded it in that light himself. Its novelty and awful nature, its direct opposition to that great truth which he had been accustomed to venerate, the Divine Unity, must have deeply impressed his mind. When sent forth by our Saviour as a preacher of the Gospel, it must very often have formed the subject of his discourse, especially as he was addressing Jews, who would need to have it distinctly stated and argued, since, at first sight, it would seem to them but an ingenious covert system of polytheism. After our Lord's resurrection, when he became one of the great heralds of the new faith, he must have continued to preach and enforce it to the day of his death. He is commonly supposed to have written his Gospel in the year 65. He had, of course,