Son, or only-begotten, as here in the Creed. In truth, there is but one account which will fully answer for either, or at all answer for the latter; and that is, his being begotten of the Father before the world was. This the Exposition at length comes to, expressing it faintly, in low and lessening terms; "having been from the begin"ning, in the bosom of the Father, a Divine Person." But St. John was not thus shy and reserved; he said plainly, " In the beginning was the Word, and the Word "was with God, and the Word WAS GOD," John i. 1. The Son therefore from the beginning was God of God: and this is that peculiar, that high, that singular and Divine Sonship which the Creed speaks of under the title of only Son, and on account of which he is as truly God, as any son of man is truly man.

The author proceeds, p. 62, to account for the name Christ, which he does very justly: but in the sequel he says, "He was sent to reveal to us the whole will of his "Father, and bring us back unto God," referring to Luke iv. 18. Acts x. 38. " And upon this account he is "called the Word, the Way, the Truth, and the Life," viz. "that Prophet that should come into the world, to "show unto men the way of salvation," &c. The account here given of the name Word is low and flat, and suited only to a Socinian hypothesis. It is evident that St. John meant more by it, (chap. i.) since he speaks not of the Word being incarnate, till afterwards: and what he says of the Word's being in the beginning, with God, &c. is not to be understood of the incarnate Word, but of the Word antecedent to the incarnation. Word then is a name for the Divine preexistent nature of Christ. It would be tedious to enter into the detail of this matter, and therefore I shall content myself with referring to juster accounts of the name Word. Only I may note

* Bishop of Litchfield's Sermon on John i. 14. Vitringa in Apocalyps. xix. 13. My Sermons, vol. ii. p. 3, 4.

that the ancients in general, and St. Ignatius y in particular, (who was St. John's disciple,) had much higher thoughts of what the name Logos, or Word, imports, than the expositor here mentions.

Next, as to the title Lord, he tells us, p. 63, that "it "denotes his having a right of dominion over us, by vir"tue of his having redeemed and purchased us with his "blood," quoting Heb. i. 2. Matth. xxviii. 18. Ephes. i. 17, 21. 1 Cor. xv. 27. Phil. ii. 9, 10, 11. Luke i. 33. Rev. xix. 16. But this is not the sense, or at least not the whole sense of Lord in the Creed; but it is low and lessening, as usual, detracting from the honour due to our blessed Lord. The Exposition says nothing of Christ's being Jehovah z and God, before the world was; nothing of his being Lord in right of creation, the Lord that “in "the beginning laid the foundation of the eartha," and by "whom all things were made b;" and who coming into the world, the world that was made by him, "came "unto his ownc." It is observable, that the eastern Creeds, in this place, have one Lord, as they have one God in the first article. The form was taken from 1 Cor. viii. 6. "One God, the Father, of whom are all things-and one "Lord, Jesus Christ, by whom are all things." Now it is evident, that Lord in that text, and therefore in the Creed also, has respect to Christ's dignity, antecedent to the redemption, and antecedent to the creation itself, as he was "the image of the invisible God, begotten before "the whole creation: for by him were all things created, "that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and in"visible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, "and for him: and he is before all things, and by him

γ Ὅς ἰσιν αὐτῷ Λόγος, ἀΐδιος, ἐκ ἀπὸ σιγῆς προελθών. Ignat. Epist. ad Mag nes. c. 8. Of this place of Ignatius, see Bull, D. F. sect. iii. c. 1. Dr. Berriman's Sermons, p. 49.

* See Pearson on this second article, p. 148.

"all things consist." To his high, antecedent, supereminent dignity, belongs the title of Lord in the Creed. For as to what Christ did in redeeming mankind, and his new dominion and glory accruing from it, that comes afterwards in the following articles: and it stands to sense, that Lord in this place, spoken of as prior to the incarnation, should be understood of what was antecedent to it. It is the constant manner of all the ancient Creeds, first to set forth the Oxoyía, the doctrine of our Lord's Divinity, and then to descend regularly to the Oixovoμía, his Incarnation, &c. And so if we look into d Ruffinus, or other ancient expositors, we shall find it to be a ruled case, a fixed and settled method with them. It is not justly interpreting a Creed, to put a sense upon it only to serve an hypothesis, against the known, certain intention of the compilers, and against the very form, structure, and composition of the Creed itself: this is not showing what meaning the words of the Creed really bear, but what they may be violently wrested to, to serve a cause.

The next article of the Creed begins with the words, WHO WAS CONCEIVED BY THE HOLY GHOST. Under this and the eighth article, (which we shall consider both together,) the author has expressed his sentiments of the Holy Ghost, as far as he thought proper. The subject is important, and will deserve considering. The Expositor says, (p. 113.) "What the metaphysical nature of the Holy Spirit is, the Scripture has no where defined." He made the like observation of the Holy Spirit formerly in Scripture Doctrine, prop. xxif. and of the Son in prop. xiiis. and of all the three Persons in prop. iv h. However, what Scripture has not done, the author himself has presumed to do; for he has not scrupled to determine, that the

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e

d Ruffin. in Symb. p. 20. edit. Oxon.

Cyrill. Hierosol. Catech. x. c. 4, 5, 6, &c. See also Bull, Judic. cap. 5. p. 321.

f Clarke's Script. Doctrine, p. 290, first edit. p. 258, second edit.

Ibid. p. 272, first edit. p. 239, second edit.

Ibid. p. 243, first edit. p. 210, second edit.

Father alone is self-existenti; and that neither the Son nor Holy Ghost are self-existent k; and he understands by self-existent, necessarily existing1; so that he has defined and determined (with or without Scripture) that the metaphysical nature of the Holy Ghost is not necessarily existent, but contingent, precarious, or in a word, created. And, indeed, nobody can now make any doubt of his making both Son and Holy Ghost creatures, since he has plainly excluded, or however dropped, the worship of both. Such being the principle he sets out with, it is obvious to imagine what kind of colours he must lay upon all such texts of Scripture as speak highly and honourably of the Holy Ghost, above what belongs to creatures. He begins with the famous text before mentioned, of Luke i. 35. interpreting it after the common way, and maintaining that Christ is called Son of God, because conceived by the Holy Ghost, but not admitting the inference from thence, that the Holy Ghost is God. I have intimated another construction of the text above: but if the common construction be thought preferable, I may here insist upon it, that the inference drawn from thence for the Divinity of the Holy Ghost is right and just. I shall express it in the words of Bishop Pearson m.

"He by whose operation Christ was conceived in the "womb of the Virgin, was no created Person; for by "virtue of that conception, he was called the Son of God; "whereas, if a creature had been the cause of his concep❝tion, he had been in that respect the Son of a creature." Now the turn which the author takes (p. 67.) to evade the force of this, and other yet more express Scripture texts, is as follows; "Whatsoever God does of this kind, "from the beginning to the end of the whole dispensa"tion, the Scripture generally represents as being done by the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven: and be

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i Script. Doctrine, prop. v. Modest Plea, p. 5.

* Ibid. prop. xii. xix. Modest Plea, p. 6.

Clarke's Modest Plea, p. 216, 217.

m Pearson on the Creed, art. viii. p. 315.

"cause what God does thus by his Holy Spirit, is in "event the same as if he had done it immediately by "himself, in his own Person, hence the same individual "works are frequently ascribed both to God himself, 66 even to the God and Father of all, who works them by "his Spirit, and at the same time they are ascribed also "to the Spirit by which God works them." This is easily said, but comes not up to the purpose. Admit that the Father acts in and through his Holy Spirit, (which indeed is a principle that the Catholics themselves allow and contend for,) the more and oftener he is represented in Scripture as so acting, the less likely is it that the Holy Ghost should be a creature. The Father acts by angels, and by men, sometimes, and often changing hands but when or where has he ever acted without his Holy Spirit? Wherever he is present, (and he is present every where,) he is present by his Spirit". And whenever he performs wonders, or does any mighty works, he does them by his Spirit. Whatsoever he knows, (as he knows all things,) he knows them in and with his Spirit: "For the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things "of God; and what man knoweth the things of a man, "save the spirit of man which is in him? even so the "things of God knoweth no one, but the Spirit of God." What kind of a creature can this be, that is in God, as much as the spirit of man is in him, and which as intimately knows the mind of God as any man knows his own mind? What kind of a creature can that be, which always is where God is, knows what God knows, does what God does? Indeed, when we consider the Scripture representations of this matter, the first and most natural thought a man might have is, that God and the Spirit of God are only different names or phrases for the same Person, and that God's acting by his Spirit, is only an

n Psalm cxliii. 7, 12. See Dr. Knight's Sermons, p. 277.

• Acts ii. 4, 17, 18, 33. Rom. xv. 19. 1 Cor. ii. 4, 5. xii. 4, 8, 11. Heb. ii. 4.

P 1 Cor. ii. 10, 11. See Dr. Knight's Sermons, p. 282.