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habituated? Hath not this been the progress of the corruption (you will call it reformation, but I must speak my own language) in later times: Socinius, although he denied the original divinity of our Lord, was nevertheless a worshipper of Christ, and a strenuous assertor of his right to worship. It was left to others to build upon the foundation which Socinius laid; and to bring the Unitarian doctrine to the goodly form, in which the present age beholds it.

5. But, Sir, my supposition is not only free from improbability; it is highly probable. Ebion in his notions of the Redeemer, as I have already had occasion to observe, seems to have been a mere Cerinthian. Epiphanius and Irenæus say, that he held the Cerinthian doctrine of a union of Jesus with a superangelic being. The Cerinthian doctrine was,-that this union commenced at our Lord's baptism; was interrupted during the crucifixion, and at the time of our Lord's interment, but restored again after his resurrection; and being restored, it rendered the man Jesus an object of divine honours, As Epiphanius says in general of Ebion, that he held the Cerinthian doctrine concerning Christ, without specifying parts that he received, and parts that he rejected; the probability is, that he received the whole; and of consequence, that he worshipped Christ as a deified man, notwithstanding that he denied his originat

divinity. This supposition of mine hath, you see, a probability of its own; which is quite distinct from that which accrues to it from its use in reconciling Eusebius with the historian that he quotes; and is founded on the acknowledged agreement of Ebion with Cerinthus.

6. For my other supposition, that Theodotus might be the first person who taught the Unitarian doctrine at Rome, you think it highly improbable, "because Tertullian says, that in his time the Unitarians were the greater part of believers."* At Rome therefore," where there was a conflux of all religions, and of all sects," the probability is little, that there should be no Unitarians. Sir, I will grant-I am liberal, I am sure, in my concessions-I will grant, that Rome swarmed with Unitarians in the time of Tertullian. Not for the reason which you assign; that Tertullian says, the Unitarians were the majority of believers. For this Tertullian hath not said; with whatever confidence you may ascribe to him the dreams of Zuicker and his credulous disciples. I must take the liberty to say, Sir, that a man ought to be accomplished in ancient learning, who thinks he may escape, with impunity, and

* Letters to Dr Horsley, p. 103.-See also cond Letters, p. 71.

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without detection, in the attempt to brow-beat the world with a peremptory and reiterated allegation of testimonies that exist not. But, Sir, although I deny that Tertullian says, that the Unitarians were in his time the majority of believers; yet I will grant, that they were numerous at Rome in the time of Tertullian. I profess I know not how numerous, or how few they were. But to shew the strength of my cause, since you are pleased to have it so, let them be numerous. How will their numbers affect my supposition, that Theodotus was the first person who at Rome taught the Unitarian doctrine? Might not this be, although the Unitarians swarmed at Rome in the time of Tertullian? Believe me, Sir, it well might be; for the times of Tertullian were the very times of Theodotus. About the year of our Lord 185, Tertullian embraced Christianity. About the year of our Lord 190, came Theodotus the apostate, the tanner of Byzantium, preaching at Rome the doctrine of antichrist.

7. My learned ally has a third conjecture for the reconciling of Eusebius and his author. It is by no means necessary to our argument, that either of my suppositions, or that his, or that any particular conjecture which may be made upon the subject, should be brought to a certainty. You tax Eusebius with want of candour and consistency. The charge rests upon an assumption, that

what Eusebius relates of the antiquity of the Ebionites, and what his author affirms of the first assertion of our Lord's mere humanity, by Theodotus, cannot be interpreted but in contradictory senses. If we have shewn, by a variety of probable conjectures, that the two assertions admit consistent interpretations, that each may be true in the sense in which each writer understood himself, without contradiction of the other, the whole evidence of your accusation is demolished, and the charge of temerity and presumption lies heavy on yourself for an attack, which you cannot support with proof, upon the character of a grave and respectable historian.

I am, &c.

LETTER FIFTEENTH.

In Reply to Dr Priestley's seventh.-The metaphysical difficul ties stated by Dr Priestley, neither new nor unanswerable.— Difficulties short of a contradiction no objection to a revealed doctrine.-Difficulties in the Arian and Socinian doctrine.The Father not the sole object of worship.-Our Lord, in what sense an image of the invisible God, and the first-born of every creature.-Not the design of the evangelists to deliver a system of fundamental principles.-The doctrine of the Trinity rests on the general tenor of the sacred writings.-The inference, that Christ is not God, because the apostles often speak of him as man, invalid.-The inference, from the manner in which he sometimes speaks of himself, invalid.— ' The Athanasians of the last age no Tritheists.

DEAR SIR,

AFTER the declaration which I have made, that I will not enter into a regular controversy with you, upon the subject of the Trinity, you will not wonder, if you receive only a general reply to some parts of your seventh letter. A particular answer to the several objections which it contains, would lead me into metaphysical disquisitions, which I wish to decline, because in that subject I forsee that we should want common principles and a common language. The questions which you propose in the second and the fourth sections of this letter, are not new, and have been answer

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