the honour of a divine Person is given to him as God, though considered as Mediator, he is not to be looked upon as representing the Father, or transferring the divine glory that he receives, to the Father, but as having the same right to it as the Father has, inasmuch as he has the same divine nature, otherwise we cannot account for those modes of speaking, in which the glory of a divine Person is ascribed to him, without restriction or limitation, as it oftentimes is in scripture.

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Object. 4. To what has been said in defence of Christ's divinity, from our being baptized in his name, it is objected, that it does not follow, that because we are baptized in the name of the Son, as well as of the Father, that therefore he is God equal with the Father; for though this ordinance, as it respects the Father, contains, properly, an act of divine worship, in which we consider him as the great Lord of all things, to whom divine worship, in the highest sense is due; yet we consider the Son, as well as the Holy Ghost, only as having a right to an inferior kind of worship, in proportion to the respective parts which they sustain, by the will of the Father, in the work of our salvation; and, in particular, to be baptized in the name of Christ, implies in it nothing else but a declaration that we adhere to him, as the Father's Minister, delegated by him to reveal his mind and will to us, and to erect that pel-dispensation, which we, in this ordinance, professedly submit to; and accordingly to be baptized in the name of Christ, is to be taken in the same sense, as when, in 1 Cor. x. 2. the Israelites were said to be baptized into Moses, in the cloud, and in the sea; as they signified thereby their consent to be governed by those laws, which Moses was appointed, by God, to give them; upon which account, they were denominated a particular church, separated from the world, and obliged to worship God in such a way, as was prescribed in the ceremonial law: even so, by baptism, we own ourselves Christians, under an obligation to adhere to Christ, as our Leader and Come mander, who has revealed to us the gospel, which, by subjecting ourselves to, we are denominated Christians; and to this they also add, especially the Socinians, that as baptism was first practised as an ordinance, to initiate persons into the Jewish church, and was afterwards applied by our Saviour, to signify the initiating the heathen into the Christian church; so it was designed to be no longer in use among them, than till Christianity was generally embraced; and consequently we being a Christian nation, are not obliged to submit to it, since we are supposed to adhere to the doctrines of Christianity, and therefore it is needless to signify the same by this ordinance. It was upon this account that Socinus, and some of his followVOL. I.

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ers, not only denied the baptism of infants, but that of all others, who were supposed to be Christians.

Answ. 1. As to the first part of this objection, to wit, that baptism does not signify the same thing when it is administered in the name of Christ, as when administered in the name of the Father, this is founded on a supposition, that the Son has not a right to the same honour that is due to the Father, which ought to be proved, and not taken for granted; and it altogether sets aside the consideration of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost's being herein co-ordinately represented, as the objects of this solemn dedication, which tends very much to derogate from the Father's glory. As it supposes the Son and Spirit to have a right to that glory which belongs to him, while they deny them to be divine Persons; and according to this method of reasoning, God might as well have ordained, that we should have been baptized in his name, together with the name of any of his prophets and apostles, which were ap-pointed to be his ministers, in revealing his will to us, as in the name of the Son and Spirit, unless they were accounted worthy of having an honour infinitely superior to that which is given to any creature given to them herein.

2. When it is supposed that our professed subjection to Christ in baptism, is nothing else but our consent to be governed by those laws, which he has given us in the gospel, and so is compared with that declaration of subjection to the law of Moses, which was contained in the baptism of the Israelites into Moses;

To this it may be replied; that this supposes Christ to be no other than a Lawgiver; and that to be a Christian, is nothing else but to be professedly a member of that society, which goes under that denomination; and that to put on Christ is not to consecrate or devote ourselves to him as a divine Person; which is a very low idea of Christianity; and consequently the character of a Christian does not imply in it so much, when assumed by an Anti-trinitarian, as when applied to those who suppose that they are hereby obliged to honour him, as they honour the Father, or to submit to his government, as truly and properly divine. A Christian is not barely one who is of Christ's party, in the same sense as a Mahometan, who adheres to the laws of Mahomet, is of his; for Christianity contains in it an obligation to perform those religious duties, of trust, universal obedience, and love, that are due to Christ as a divine Person.

3. As to the supposition, that baptism being an ordinance of Proselytism to the Christian faith, therefore a Christian nation is no longer obliged to submit to it, this is directly contrary to what our Saviour says in the words immediately fol

lowing the institution thereof, in Matt. xxviii. 20. Lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world, that is, you may expect my presence with you in administering this ordinance, as well as preaching the gospel, not only during the first age of the church, till Christianity shall obtain in the world, but as long as there shali be a society of Christians in it. And, indeed, if Christianity were nothing more than a public declaration of our obligation, to adhere to the laws of Christ; it does not follow, that because we are born in a Christian nation, therefore such a profession is no longer necessary. But since more than this is contained therein, as hath been before observed, namely, our professed subjection to Christ, in a religious way, as a divine Person, this extends the baptismal obligation much farther than to our being calied Christians, and argues the necessity of our engaging in this ordinance, as long as Christ is the object of faith, or to be acknowledged to be the Prophet, Priest, and King of his church, and, as such, the object of religious worship, namely, unto the end of the world.

Object. 5. There is another objection against the argument in general, relating to Christ's being the object of divine worship, taken from his having refused to have one of the divine perfections ascribed to him, and directing the Person that gave it, to ascribe it to the Father, in Matt. xix. 17. He said unto him, Why callest thou me good, there is none good but one, that is God; q. d. there is but one Person who is good, as goodness is properly a divine attribute, and that is the Father: therefore he alone is the object of that worship, which consists in the ascribing the perfections of the divine nature to him, in which sense we have before supposed religious worship to be understood.

Answ. 1. As to what our Saviour says, concerning the divine unity, when he asserts, that there is none good but one, that is God; it is, doubtless to be understood in the same sense with all other scriptures, that deny a plurality of gods, in opposition to the principles and practice of idolaters; but it does not follow from hence, that the Father is the only Person who is God, or the object of divine worship. This has been before considered, and therefore all that I shall reply to this part of the objection is, that the word God is sometimes taken for the Godhead, without a particular restriction or limitation thereof, either to Father, Son, or Holy Spirit, but may be equally applied to them all. In this sense it is to be taken, when the being of a God is demonstrated by the light of nature; as from the effects of the divine power, we argue, that there is a God, who is the Creator of all things; but this can

See page 322, 323. ante.

not, if we have no other light to guide us herein but that of nature, be applied to the Father, as a distinct Person in the Godhead, for the distinction that there is between the divine Persons is a matter of pure revelation; therefore all that our Saviour intends by this expression is, that no one has a right to have divine perfections ascribed to him, but he that has a divine nature, which whether it be meant of the Father, Son, or Holy Ghost, he is denominated the one only living and true God.

It follows from hence, that when such modes of speaking are used in scripture, though the Father be called the one or only God, the Son is not excluded, as a late judicious writer well observes.*

2. As to that part of the objection, which concerns our Saviour's blaming the man for calling him good, there are two senses given of it; one is taken from a different reading of the words, namely, Why dost thou ask me concerning good. But it will not be much to our purpose either to defend or disprove

See Dr. Waterland's defence of the divinity of Christ, serm. iv. pag. 127. & seq. where he proves, that the exclusive terms of One, only, &c. do not except the Son, so as to deny him to have the same Godhead with the Father: this he prover from several scriptures, viz. Mat. xi. 27. No one knoweth the Son, but the Father; nor any one the Father, save the Son; it does not follow from hence, that the Father does not know himself nor the Son himself: and when it is said, in 1 Cor. ii. 11. The things of God knoweth no one, but the Spirit of God; this does not exclude the Son, for that would contradict the scripture but now mentioned; no more than the Son's only knowing the Father excludes the Holy Ghost, which would be contrary to this scripture; so in Rev. xix. 12. it is said, that the Son had a name written which no one knew but he himself: none ever thought that the Father ras excluded by this exclusive term; so when God the Father suith, in Isa. xliv. 24. I am he that maketh all things, that stretcheth forth the heavens alone, that spreadeth abroad the earth by myself: this would contradict many other scriptures, which speak of the Son as the Creator of all things, if he were to be excluded by it. Again, when the Psalmist suith, concerning the Father, in Psal. lxxxiii. 18. that his name alone is Jehovah, we must set aside all those scriptures in which our Saviour is called Jehovah, if he is contained in this exclusive term. See more to this purpose in the said sermon, in which this argument is managed with a great deal of judgment. I shall only take leave farther to cite what is well observed in page 33. That, perhaps the word God, in those places, namely, such in which there are these “exclusive terms, is to be understood in the indefinite sense, abstracting from the particular consideration of this or that person, in like manner as the word man of "ten stands not for any particular human person, but the whole species, or human "nature; as when we say, man is frail; man is mortal, or the like.”

† Τι με κραίας περί τε αγαθε, Beza speaks of two or three of the most ancient copies in which this reading is found; and Grotius also adheres to it, from the credit, as he says, of the most ancient and correct copies; and it is also observed, that the vulgar Latin version renders it so; and Augustin read it so in the copy that he made use of: and whereas the evangelists, Mark and Luke, read it, Why callest thou me good, he endeavours to reconcile this different reading therewith as supposing there was a seeming contradiction between them which he might better have done, by referring to some copies which had it, as we read it, why callest thou me good; from whence, it is probable, he saw none that so rendered it in his time. Vid. Agust. de Consensu. Evan. lib. ii. cap. 63. It is also thus translated in the ancient Hebrew version of the gospel of Matthew

this reading, since Mark and Luke read it, Why callest thou me good, &c. therefore, passing this over and supposing that it ought to be read, as we generally do; the common answer that is given to this objection, which, I humbly conceive, may be well acquiesced in, is; that our Saviour considers the man, as ascribing a divine perfection to him, whom, at the same time, he concluded to be no more than a creature; and therefore it is as though he should say; either, first, acknowledge me to be a divine Person, or else do not ascribe divine honours to me, for then by consequence, thou mightest as well ascribe them to any other creature. And accordingly, by the same method of reasoning, had he conversed with any Anti-trinitarian, in his day, who had given divine worship to him, and yet denied his proper deity, he would have reproved him for this mistake arising from an erroneous conscience, as much as he does the man, whom he reproves, in the same sense, for styling him good.

That Christ does not exclude himself from having a right to this divine perfection, is not only evident, from those several scriptures, which have been before referred to, that ascribe perfections to him that are equally divine, inasmuch as he that has a right to one divine perfection, has a right to all; but he also styles himself, in John x. 14. The good Shepherd, which certainly imports as much as good Master, which expression was used by the man before-mentioned; and that his being the good Shepherd argues him to be the Fountain of blessedness, which is certainly a divine perfection, is evident, because he speaks of himself, as communicatively good in the highest sense, ver, 28. I give unto them, viz. my sheep, eternal life. (a)

(a) "If Dr. Priestley, in his celebrated efforts to establish the Unitarianism of the primitive church against Dr. Horsley, fell so short of "complete victory;" it may be presumed, that the failure would, in some degree, affect his greater work, The History of Early Opinions concerning Jesus Christ. Many parts of that elaborate performance are merely a republication of the Letters, excluding the personalities. Their merits and their fate must, therefore, be closely, inter

woven.

This large and capital work was given to the world under circumstances which appeared very promising for bringing the controversy to a satisfactory issue. With great and long continued diligence the indefatigable author collected his materials. He digested and arranged them, with that lucid perspicuity for which he was so justly distinguished. He tried every method to call forth into the field of preparatory discussion, some learned and able Trinitarians and Arians. He waited for some years after the publication of the work; and then renewed his public challenge, affording an additional period for the fate of the question. It was, of course, implied, and the obligation was frankly avowed by the Doctor; that he would in proper time duly notice what any fair and candid opponents should produce.

It is to be lamented, however that the expectations thus excited have not been completely answered; and the decease of Dr. Priestly excludes every hope that they will be so.