Befides, it is an Expedient that the common Modes of fcriptural Language will by no means warrant: Our Saviour ufually delivers his great Doctrines with the Plainnefs and Perfpicuity of ordinary Conversation; and even when he speaks in a parabolical or mysterious Manner, every Difficulty is either cleared up by his own subsequent Explication; or by the plain Scope and Import of the Context itself. As many, and as strong as the Prejudices were, which the Jews had conceived against the Perfon of Jefus Chrift, the most infuperable, we find, (as we have already hinted) was that which was raised in them by his repeated and manifest Declarations of his Divinity. The Jews fought the more to kill him, because he had not only broken the Sabbath, but faid also that God was his Father, making himself equal with God.

And it is very obfervable here, that these peremptory Declarations of our Saviour were confidered by the Jews as fo many plain and direct Affertions of his Divinity, notwithstanding the many Expreffions he made ufe of in his Difcourfes with them, which the Anti-Trinitarians are ever ready to triumph in as qualifying ones, and importing the Inferiority of the Son to the Father; as, The Son can do nothing of himself; (John v. 19.) I can of mine own felf do nothing; &c. (Ver. 30.)

upon

-Again, when he declared in a following Paffage that He and his Father were one, (John x. 30, &c.) the Jews took up Stones to ftone him; and the Reason they gave for it was, because they looked that Expreffion to be tantamount to an Affertion of his Equality with God the Father; For a good Work we ftone thee not, faid they, but for Blafphemy, and because thou being a Man makest thyself God. And lastly, we know, it was his explicit Affertion to the fame Purpose, that was the immediate Occafion of the Sentence which was paft upon him. 'Tis certain therefore the Jews understood our Saviour according to the literal Signification of his Expreffions; and if he himself had not intended they should do fo, it was not only his Duty, but his plain Intereft alfo, to have undeceived them. In Truth, he who fhall affect to doubt the Sense of fuch Expreffions must be an Enemy to intelligible Language, and a Sceptic in Matters of Fact; he may with equal Reafon pretend that our Saviour fuffered by Figure, and was allegorically nailed to the Crofs. Upon the whole, how ftrong and emphatical foever certain Paffages may be which exprefs the Unity and the Privileges of Chriflians, (fee particularly John xvii. 11. 21. &c.) it is abundantly clear from Multitudes of Texts that no created Being can be called the Son of God in the fame Senfe in which Jefus Christ is often declared to be, or be united to the

Divine Nature literally and effentially like himself. In short, either the Holy Scripture is to be understood in the fame Manner, and by the fame Rules with all other Compofitions, or it is not; if it is, the Debate will be foon ended; if it is not, the AntiTrinitarian will be found to lend a very strong Argument to Catholicks themselves; fince nothing more is requifite than this Conceffion, to prove not only the Defireablenefs, but even Neceffity of an infallible Guide for the right understanding the true Sense and Purport of the facred Writings.

Those who cannot, or will not fee the Force of the Texts we have referred to, will probably 'attend little to any thing more that may be faid upon this most important Subject; it will however be a Satisfaction to true Believers to obferve the corroborating Evidence we have of the Doctrine of the Trinity, and the rational Deductions we are enabled to make in Support of it, upon the Authority of the facred Writings.-St. Paul tells us, that Christ took not on him the Nature of Angels; but he took on him the Seed of Abraham ; (Heb. ii. 16.) Chrift exifted therefore before he took on him our Nature, or the Seed of Abraham: for Existence was neceffarily previous to the taking it on him; if he exifted before this, he existed not in the human Nature; for it would be abfurd to say he invested himself with a Nature in which

he

he existed at the fame Time: Neither could he exift in the angelical Nature, because it would be abfurd to say he declined affuming a Nature which he must have laid down in order to have affumed; and confequently he existed in the divine Nature, on which the human was fuperinduced: For the Scriptures afcertain but three Natures that can poffibly come within the Compass of the present Question, the human, the angelical, and the divine. -Again, the Author of the Epistle to the Hebrews distinguishes the Nature of Chrift from that of Angels by Characters peculiar to the Deity, and thofe Attributes which our first and most obvious Reasonings, as we have obferved, naturally afcribe to him; as eternal Exiftence, and infinite Power: Unto the Son he faith, thy Throne, O God, is for ever and ever; (Chap. i. 8.) and, Thou, Lord, in the Beginning haft laid the Foundation of the Earth; &c. &c. (Ver. 10, &c.) If then there be no intermediate Nature between the angelical and the divine, the latter muft neceffarily be ascribed to Jefus Chrift; and till this intermediate Nature be clearly proved from Scripture, it will neither be rational, nor fafe, to facrifice fuch a Number of plain and pofitive Texts as the Doctrine under Confideration is fupported by, to the chimerical Suppofitions, or palpable Evafions and Mifreprefentations of Infidels, under what Names or Colours foever they may be disguised.-Once more; the Refurrection

Refurrection of Jefus Chrift is an Event to be attributed no doubt to Almighty Power; nor is there any Occafion, was there any Pretence, to dif femble that this Event is very frequently attributed in Scripture to the Power of God the Father: (Acts ii. 24. iii. 15. Rom. iv. 24. Cor. i. 6, 14. &c. &c.) But then it is to be remembered likewise, that our Saviour foretold his Resurrection by virtue of his own Power; (John ii. 19, &c.) that he ftiles bimfelf emphatically the Refurrection and the Life; (John xi. 25.) and that this great Event is represented in Scripture as a necessary Confequence of the Plan concerted before the World by the Deity, or rather the Three Persons in the Deity, for the Salvation of Mankind. Ought not Chrift (fays himself to the Disciples going to Emmaus) to have fuffered thefe Things, and to enter into his Glory? (Luke xxiv. 26.) He tells his Apostles afterwards that thus it behoved Chrift to fuffer and to rife from the Dead the third Day; (Ver. 46.) And St. Paul, reasoning out of the Scriptures with the Jews at Theffalonica, opened and alledged, that Christ must needs have fuffered, and rifen again from the Dead; (Ats xvii. 2, 3.) Agreeably to all this, when St. Peter tells the Jews that God had raifed up Fefus whom they had crucified and flain, he does in effect refolve the fame into the Divine Power of Christ himself, and the abfolute Neceffity of the Thing: Him God hath raised up, having loofed the