no mighty work ;'-and 'he marvelled because of their unbelief. The faith of the sick was made necessary to his own cure; but we are not to conclude from hence, that our Saviour could not have healed him, though he had not believed, because he sometimes healed the absent, and raised the dead, who could not believe; but rather, that he would not, or could not consistently with the designation of his mission and office. Would it be unnatural to understand Christ in this passage as we do St. Paul, where he says to the Corinthians,' I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified?' But, whether we can reconcile these words to our belief of Christ's prescience and divinity, or not, matters little to the debate about his divinity itself, since we can so fully prove it by innumerable passages of Scripture, too direct, express, and positive, to be balanced by one obscure passage, from whence the Arian is to draw the consequence himself, which may possibly be wrong; whereas the true and proper divinity of our blessed Saviour depends not on consequences of our drawing, but on such assertions of God himself as common sense cannot mistake the meaning of. If Christ is the true God,' he must know all things.' If there are some things, which, as man, he does not know, or which, as the commissioner of his Father, he is not empowered to reveal, this will not prove him to be a mere creature; for, in that case, how could it be true, that he is the wisdom of God,' and God himself? Again; if there are some things, which, as man, and a commissioner, he cannot do, neither will this prove him to be a mere creature, since 'he is able to subdue all things to himself,' and 'upholdeth all things by the word of his power.' If there is but one true God, as I have already shewn; and if Christ is that one true God, as I hope soon to shew; no consequences drawn by us, though from Scripture, can ever prove he is not truly God. But this matter must be left to the next opportunity. Let us, in the mean time, proceed with such other objections as seem to merit an answer.

Our adversaries farther insist, that Christ, John xvii. 3, calls the Father, in contradistinction to himself, the only true God.' Christ, it is true, there addressing the Father, calls him the only true God; but there is nothing in the

passage to shew, that he does this in contradistinction to himself. He only names himself afterward; but puts not the least sign of a negative on his own divinity, nor at all compares himself with the Father. Indeed he could not have done it, without contradicting what the Holy Ghost says of him in many places, particularly John i. 1, where he says, 'The Word was God;' and, 1 John v. 20, where he calls Christ the true God.' The opposers of our Saviour's divinity object to these latter words as not spoken of Christ, but without the least colour of reason, as any one may see who reads the whole verse, which runs thus: 'We know the Son of God is come, and hath given us an understanding, that we may know him that is true; and we are in him that is true, even in his Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God, and eternal life.' The whole connexion evidently shews the words to be spoken of Christ. Besides he is peculiarly called 'eternal life' in other places, as at ver. 12, He that hath the Son, hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life.' Christ calls himself 'the resurrection and the life,' John xi. 25. Our adversaries allow Christ to be truly God, in some sense or other; for the Scriptures often expressly call him God; and he calls himself Jehovah, and God, as we shall hereafter see. If, therefore, this passage in the seventeenth of St. John's Gospel, proves any thing for the objectors it proves too much; for, if the Father only is the true God, then Christ is either no God at all, or a false God. But the passage sets forth no such thing. It only says, ' the Father is the only true God,' and we say the same; but it does not say, the Father alone is the true God. Between these two there is a wide difference. The first leaves it undetermined whether Christ is God, or not; and is the very expression itself of our Saviour, both in terms and meaning; whereas the last would exclude the divinity of the Son. The same observations, in substance, may serve to baffle the like objection founded on the words of St. Paul, 1 Cor. viii. 6, To us there is but one God, the Father, of whom are all things, and we in him: and one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we by him.' Here the Son is not excluded, in the application of the words 'one God' to the Father, from the divinity; no more than the Father is excluded, by the words one Lord,' applied to Jesus Christ, from dominion,

The Father is still Lord, though all power is given to the Son; and the Son is God, though that appellation is, in this place, connected immediately with the Father, from whom the Son, by eternal generation, hath his essence. In that passage, likewise, Eph. iv. 4-6, where it is said, 'There is one Spirit-one Lord-one God and Father of all,' the Son is not excluded from the divinity. If he were, how could St. Paul expressly call him God, as he does, Rom. ix. 5, Christ, who is over all, God blessed for ever;' and 1 Tim. iii. 16, Without controversy, great is the mystery of godliness; God was manifested in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory?' Or how could the Arians call him God in any sense, were his divinity here denied in a passage which tells us, To us there is but one God?'

Again, it is objected, that Christ distinguished himself from God, when he refused the appellation of 'good,' Matt. xix. 17, and ascribes it to God only. But does Christ really reprove him who called him 'good master?' All he says, is, 'Why callest thou me good? There is none good but one, that is God.' Was it more improper, or more untrue, in this man to call him 'good master,' than in him to call himself 'the good shepherd?' John x. 14. Was he not truly good, who was without sin, and went about doing all the good the people he was sent to would suffer him to do? Why then did he ask this question? No doubt, it was to try whether the man who had called him good, would confess him, according to the prophecies, to be the Messiah, and God. He probably saw the man was convinced of this in his heart; and we may guess the same by his question, 'Good master, what shall I do that I may have eternal life?' On this supposition, he could not, by any other method, have so naturally thrown it in his way to confess the divinity of him whom he had already applied to with so much respect, and for so important a piece of information. This passage, therefore, instead of derogating in the least from the divinity of our blessed Saviour, can bear no other rational interpretation, than such as strongly insinuates that very divinity.

But, farther, it is objected, that Christ cannot be God, since God calls him his servant' more than once, particularly Isaiah xlii. 1; quoted by St. Matthew xii. 18. How,

say they, can the same person be God, and the servant of God?

I answer, he was the servant of God his Father, inasmuch as he was his angel or messenger, who came not to do his own will, but the will of him who sent him.' In order to this, he who was in the form of God, made himself of no reputation, or rather emptied himself, and took on him the form of a servant,' that he might become 'obedient to death, even the death of the cross;' that is, he became man, for as such it is that he is called a servant; but while, in this respect, he is said not to differ from a servant,' he is styled also the Heir and Lord of all;' Gal. iv. 1. Under this head, the supremacy of the Father, and the subjection of the Son, are urged from various passages of Scripture, on which our adversaries ground their opinion, that the Son is but a creature; and consequently not, in the proper sense of the word, God. Of these the chief are, There is one God and Father of all, who is above all,' Eph. iv. 6; and, The head of Christ is God,' 1 Cor. xi. 3. And is it not said of Christ, that he is ' over all, God blessed for ever?' Rom. ix. 5. There is, surely, but one God, one God who is over all. Christ, therefore, and the Father, are one, one in nature, one in Deity, although the Son, as such, is subject to his Father, as Father; and still more so, as he is the Son of man; in which latter sense it is that God is said to be his head; for it is, no doubt, in that sense that our Saviour, in the same verse, is said to be 'the head of every man' or ' of the church,' Eph. v. 23; for he being God, hath purchased it,' as man, with his own blood;' Acts xx. 28. Wherein the supremacy of the first Person, in regard to the second, consisted, before the latter took our nature on him, we cannot determine; we only know, that the first is called the Father, and the second the Son; and that the Father, in virtue of his paternity, sent the Son to instruct, and die for us. But we know also, that the Son, having, by the gift of his Father, that is, by generation, or a communication of nature, life in himself, as the Father had life in himself, freely and voluntarily laid down his life, as man, for the sheep, having power to lay it down, and to take it again. Although he did this, as he tells us, by the command of his Father,' yet, were he not God, as well as man, he could not have a right to dispose of his own life. As no

man hath given life to himself, so no man hath the disposal of it in his own power; for the issues of life and death belong to God only. What then could have given the man Christ Jesus a property in his own life? It must, no doubt, have been that infinitely higher life, which, although held by ineffable communication from the Father, of whom are all things,' yet belonged to the Son of God, by whom are all things, by and for whom all things were created.' On the whole, if there is but one God, and Christ is God, he can in no sense be of a nature inferior to that of his Father; for there cannot be a superior and an inferior God; and, therefore, the supremacy of the Father cannot possibly be founded on any difference of nature or essence, but only on that relation which Christ bears to him as his Son, of one and the same nature; or as a distinct person, voluntarily undertaking and holding an office under the Father. The truth is, the subjection or subordination of the Son is seldom or never mentioned in Scripture but with an eye to his humiliation; that is, to the assumption of human nature, and its consequences. Thus it is only that he is called a servant. Before it, he was in no sense a servant. No, he was in the form of God, and thought it not robbery to be equal with God,' at that time when he vouchsafed to humble or empty himself, in order that he might become a servant, or man. Now we know, that the highest angels of light, and every creature, although of the most exalted dignity, are all the servants of God. Christ, therefore, could not have been a creature before he became man; for it is plain he only then became a servant. As we may look on Christ as the greatest of men, though subject to Joseph and Mary, so we may regard him as the greatest of beings, though subject to his Father. His subjection no more derogates from the dignity of his nature in the one case, than it does in the other.

It is still farther urged by the Arians, that Christ cannot properly be called God, since he himself says, John v. 30, 'I can of mine own self do nothing: as I hear, I judge; and, my judgment is just, because I seek not mine own will, but the will of the Father which hath sent me.' Were this passage to be taken strictly, Christ must be less than the weakest of men; for every man can do something. Or, were the entire dignity of his person to be estimated by these words