point, because you have dwelt most upon it; and because, very obviously, when this is admitted or rejected, no possible objection can be felt to admitting or rejecting the doctrine of the Trinity.

You will not require of me, however, to examine at length every text of the New Testament, which I may suppose to have any connexion with the subject in question. I must be permitted, in order to save time, to select only those texts, the language of which appears to be genuine, and above the condemnation of textual criticism; and such as appear to contain the best and most decisive proof of the point to be discussed. Believing the New Testament to be of divine origin and authority, you will permit me to add, that I cannot think the decision of this or any other question, depends on the number of times in which the terms of that decision are repeated.

I observe, then,

I. The New Testament gives to Christ the appellation of GOD, in such a manner as that, according to the fair rules of interpretation, only the SUPREME GOD can be meant.

A conspicuous passage in proof of this I should find in John, i, 1-3. :-" In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made." Verse 10. "And the world was made by him."

All known manuscripts agree in the text here. Griesbach has indeed recorded, that, foros (Theos, God), there is a conjectural reading Θεον ; and that for και Θεος ην ὁ λογος, there is a conjectural reading of Θεος ην και ο Aoyos. The first of these conjectures was made by Crellius. (Initium Evang. Johan. restauratum per. L. M. Artemonium, P. i. c. 2.) The reason of making such a conjecture Crellius has given.

"The greater Christ is," says he, "compared with other gods (the Father excepted), the less can he be expressly called God, lest he should be taken for the supreme God the Father." And again, "If he (Christ) bad been expressly called God by the sacred writers, and had not always been distinguished from God, the sacred writers would have given an occasion to unskilful men to regard him as the supreme God."-init. Evang. Johan., p. 295.)

To liberate John from being taxed with this imprudence, Crellius proposed to substitute Otov for os, in John, i. 1.; so as to say, the Logos was of God, instead of saying, as John has done, that He was God.

The second conjectural reading is supported by no better authority. Bahrdt (in Neuesten Offenbarungen), proposed it as a happy expedient to relieve the text from the difficulty and embarrassment under which he thought it laboured. For, instead of saying, "the Word was with God, and the Word was God," he might then translate it thus," The Word was with God. God was, and this Word was in the beginning with God," &c.

I have a great regard for the labours and learning of Griesbach; but I am constrained to ask here, why he should have condescended to notice conjectures so gratuitous and unfounded as these?

I proceed to the explanation of the text. Ev agxn (i.e. in the beginning), corresponds exactly with the HebrewGen. i. 1. * I cannot embrace the opinion of those critics, who think that the phrase "ex, of itself simply signifies from eternity. Although I believe that the Logos did exist from eternity, I do not think it is proved directly by this expression. (Compare Gen. i. 1.) That existence from eternity is implied, however, may be properly admitted. Εν aexn is equivalent to ev agxn xooμov, in the beginning of the world, i. e. before the world was made; and so agreeing in this particular with the phrase, John, xvii. 5. "the glory that I had with thee before the world was ;" and Eph. i. 4. «before the foundation of the world." To say, with Crellius, that, by v agxn is meant the commencement of preaching the gospel, or the beginning of Christian instruction, would be making John gravely tell us, that, before the Logos preached the gospel, he had an existence.

Before the world was created, then, the Logos existed. Who or what was this Logos? A real existence, or only an attribute of God? A real substance, or only the wisdom, or reason, or power of God?

The Hebrew words are omitted in this and some other passages, because their insertion would be of little use to the general reader. The Biblical student may, however, consult the original Hebrew.

It is of no importance, in settling this question, that we should know with certainty whence John derived the appellation Logos. In my mind, the most probable account is, that this appellation is bestowed on Christ, in reference to his becoming the instructor or teacher of mankindthe medium of communication between God and them. Be this, however, as it may, the Logos appears to be a real existence, and not merely an attribute. For, first,The attributes of God are nowhere else personified by the New Testament writers,-i. e. the usage of the New Testament authors is against this mode of writing. Secondly, -Logos, if considered as an abstract term, or as merely designating an attribute, must mean either wisdom or word; and in what intelligible sense can the wisdom or the word of God, in the abstract sense, be said to have "become flesh and dwelt among us," verse 14.; or, why should John select either the wisdom or word of God as any more concerned with the incarnation than the benevolence of God, or the mercy of God, which one might suppose would be the attributes more especially displayed in the incarnation? Thirdly,-If Logos mean here the power of God, as many assert, the exposition is attended with the same difficulties. Fourthly,-If it mean, as others aver,

the

power of God putting itself forth, i. e. in creation, it is liable to the same objections. In short, make it any attribute of God thus personified, and you introduce a mode of writing that the New Testament nowhere else displays, and which even the Old Testament exhibits but once, Prov. viii., in a poetic composition of the most animated and exalted nature.

Yet this is not the chief difficulty. To what class of men could John address the asseveration, that the Logos, (wisdom, word, or power of God), "was with God?"

Where did these singular heretics suppose the power of God was, except with him? Or, where his wisdom or his word? A peculiar pertinacity, too, in their strange opinion, they must have had, to have rendered it necessary for the Apostle to repeat, with emphasis, in the second verse, that this Logos was with God. What would be said of a man who should gravely assert that "the power of Peter is with Peter, or that his wisdom or his word is so?"

And suppose he should add, "the power or wisdom of Peter is Peter," with what class of mystics should we rank him? Yet John adds, "The Logos was God." Until, then, some heretics of the apostolic age can be discovered, who maintained that the attributes of God were not with him, I cannot explain how the Apostle could assert twice successively, and of course emphatically, that his attributes were with him.

Equally difficult is it for me to divine how he could say that any attribute (power or wisdom), was God-understanding the word God in any sense which you please. If it mean Supreme God, then it reduces itself to this, either that one attribute is the supreme God, or that there are as many Gods as attributes. If it mean an inferior God, then the wisdom of God being an inferior God, implies that his other attributes are superior Gods; or else that his wisdom holds the place of quasi God, while his other attributes occupy a lower place. Suppose that it should be said that Logos, or wisdom, denotes the essence of God, then how could it be called os, which implies an agent or person—a concrete, as logicians say, and not an abstract? The divine substance or essence is called Θειοτης Οι το Θείον, not ὁ Θεός. What could be meant, moreover, by the essence of God becoming incarnate?

ex

If, however, it should be said, that to suppose the istence of a sect of heretics, who held that the attributes of God were not with him, is unnecessary in order to justify the Apostle for having written the first verse of his gospel, and that we may regard this verse as written simply for general instruction, then I would ask, whether it is probable that a revelation from heaven is made to inform us that the attributes of a being are with that being? or what can be thought of the assertion, that the wisdom or power of God is God himself?

Let us proceed now to the second clause, " and the Logos was with God,"-i. e. as all agree, with God the Father Compare verses 14 and 18; also chapter xvii. 5, and 1 John, i. 1, 2; which make the point clear. Is this expression capable of any tolerable interpretation, without supposing that the Logos, who was with God, was in some respect or other different, or diverse from that God, with

whom he was? This Logos was the same that became incarnate, verse 14; that made the most perfect revelation of the will and character of God to men, verse 18; and was called Christ. He was, therefore, in some respect, diverse from the Father, and therefore by no means to be confounded with him.

"And the Logos was God." It has been proposed (in Impr. Vers. of N. Test.), to render the word Oos, a god. Does then the Christian Revelation admit of gods superior and inferior? And if so, to what class of inferior gods does the Logos belong? And how much would such a theory of divine natures differ from that which admits a Jupiter Optimus Maximus, and gods greater and less?

But it is said, that "os is destitute of the article, and, therefore, cannot designate the Divine Being, who is supreme." This observation, however, is far from being justifiable, either by the usage of the sacred writers or the principles of Greek syntax. Among instances where the Supreme God is certainly designated, and yet the article is omitted, the inquirer may consult the very chapter in question, ver. 6, 13, 18; also, Mat. xix. 26; Luke, xvi. 13; John, ix. 33; xvi. 30; Rom. viii. 8; 1 Cor. i, 3; Gal. i. 1; Ephes. ii. 8; Heb. ix. 14. Besides, every reader of Greek knows, that where the subject of a proposition (which in this case is λoyos), has the article, the predicate, (os), omits it. Such is Greek usage; and from it dissent only propositions of a reciprocating or convertible nature,—as in verse 4, of the chapter in question. It may be added, too, that if the writer had said, xa. ¿ λογος ην ὁ Θεός, it would have conveyed a very different sense from the proposition as it now stands. He would then have said, the Logos is the God with whom he is; whereas I understands here to mean divine nature, simply but not abstractly considered, for which it so often stands in other places. Vide Mark, viii. 33; x. 27; xii. 24; Luke, iii. 8; xi. 20; xviii. 4, 19; John, i. 13; iii. 2; iv. 24; x. 33; Acts, v. 29; vii. 55; x. 33; xi. 18, &c.

I readily acknowledge, that affirmative evidence of the somewhat diverse meaning of Otos here, cannot be drawn from the word itself, but must be deduced from the cir