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Dr. Morgan, as we have already feen, does not mean to determine any thing about the doctrine of the Jews relative to the Divine Nature, in the time of Phils. But our Saviour and his cotemporaries were all Jews, and all" in the time of Philo." Yet he actually fleps out of his way to answer an argument, urged in favour of the doctrine of the Jews, relative to the Divine Nature, and urged from the Gofpels themfelves. "An animated and ingenious writer, he fays, of the prefent day," whom a note tells us to be "Whitaker, in his Hiftory [real Origin] of Arianifm," has advanced an interpretation concerning the popular belief among the Jews in the Godhead of their Meffiah, which he thinks it proper to controvert; though, with a proper caution, he does not enter into the general merits of the queftion difcuffed by this learned author. He controverts the interpretation, by what the logicians call the fallacy of disjunction; by fhowing the Gofpels to contain no hints of a difference between " external profeffion and internal fentiments," in the Scribes, though the hints were really collected by Mr. Whitaker from the Acts of the Apoftles, and from Jofephus. He thus, however, violates his own rule, when he thinks he fpies an advantage; and practically shows that he means, whatever he may fay theoretically, to determine any thing he can determine, about the doctrines of the Jews in the time of Philo: and as the doctrines of the common people muft have been derived from their Scriptures (however the opinions of the Scribes might have been) Dr. Morgan by thus difputing an argument which went to fhow, that the Godhead of the Meffiah was believed by the common people, or (as Dr. Morgan himself fpeaks for that author) "was the received opinion of the Jews in general at that time, p. 78, plainly means to deny what he would, leaft of all, be fuppofed to deny, "that many paffages of the Old Teftament refer to the fecond perfon of the ever-bleffed Trinity." In fuch a maze of contradictions has the doctor involved himfelf, and fo has a third time annihilated his own arguments.

But let us now take up the whole doctrine, by the regular handle which the author presents to us. With this defign, let any man of common fenfe open his New Teftament, and notice what he finds there. He inftantly finds, that the Meffiah was to be born of a Virgin, "and they fhall call his name Immanuel, which, being interpreted, is "God with Us*;" a declaration of fomething abfolutely unintelligible in itfelf, and conveying no one idea to the Jews who heard it, unless they

* Matt. i. 23.

previously

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previony believed the Godhead of their coming Meffiah. Thus alfo, a little before, when he finds an angel telling Jos feph concerning the Melliah, then in the womb of the Virgin, "that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghoft*" he must be fure that Jofeph knew of and believed in a Holy Ghost, or the annunciation must have been a mere mockery in itself. In the fame manner will he find the faith of the Jews apparent, in the affertion of John the Baptift to the Jews, that the coming Meffiah fhall baptize you with the Haly Ghet and with firet;" in the teftimony of the Evangelift, that our Saviour faw the Spirit of God defcending like a dove, and lighting upon him," in the further teftimony of the Evangelift, lo! a voice from Heaven, faying, This is my beloved Song" and in the two addreffes of the Devil to our Saviour, "if thou be the Son of God, command that thefe ftones be made bread," or, "if thou be the Son of God, caft thyfelf down. From thefe he fecs very clearly, in all the fteadiness of a light purely historical, yet, in the paffages merely incidental, that the New Teftament is built and founded upon a belief in the Jews before, and at our Saviour's appearance, concerning a Son of God, who as fuch was God, and who by a human birth became Immanuel, God with Us, or God-Man; and concerning a Holy Ghoft, who was the Spirit of God, who defcended upon our Saviour in the vifible form of a dove at his baptifm, yet was to be fent by our Saviour in the vifible form of fire upon feme of the Jews. As he reads further, he beholds that very anomaly of language, which incidentally speaks of God as a plurality, and is therefore fo ftriking a circumftance in the compofition of the Jewish Scriptures, actually continued, and continued as incidentally, in the Chriftian; this exhortation of our Saviour, "make to yourselves friends of the Mammon of Unrighteoufnefs, that, when ye fail, THEY may receive you into everlasting habitations," and this other, "give and it fhall be given unto

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you," by God, " good meafure-fhall man," fhall THEY, give into your bofom," anfwering to thofe pallages in the Jewish, "let us make man in OUR image, and after OUR likenefs," or "Adam is become as one of us," or "let us go down and confound their language." As a late author has faid, to the preclufion furely of all reafonings to the contrary,

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"The venerable founder of our faith, and the dignified preacher of it to the world, as late as St. John himself, do never propofe the doctrine of Chrift's divinity, as a new article of faith, as one that had been hitherto unknown to the church of God, and that was now brought to light by the Gofpel. They do not lay it before their hearers or their readers, in formal propofitions. They bring it not forward to their understandings with a folemnity of introduction, that should show their own fenfe of its furprifing nature, and prepare the minds of their people for the firft reception of it. No! They pafs imperceptibly into the fubject. They infinuate rather than pro claim it. They fpeak of it in fuch a manner, as proves it to have been familiar to their own minds, and familiar to the minds of their Countrymen. Whenever they notice it, they notice it as a doctrine which has always been profeffed by the church of God, had always been believed by its members, and now wanted only to be applied to the perfon of Jefus. This remark, which is fo neceffary to the right understanding of our fcriptures, is additionally demonstrated to be true, by the evident contraft which appears in the writings of St. John, compared with all the other writings of the New Teftament concerning the prefent article *."

In this ftate of faith among the Jews, Philo could not poffibly avoid, as a Jew, writing about a Logos; all intimations concerning the perfonal, the deified Logos of his faith, and a thoufand veils of allegory, could not poffibly conceal his figure from the eyes of readers. Philo, indeed, we must ever remember, though it is totally forgotten by Dr. Morgan, could never have allegorized concerning a Logos, if he had not known of a perfonal Logos before; and could never have spoken allegorically in fuch magnificent terms concerning the former, if he had not acknowledged, revered, and worshipped the latter. Thus the very fhadow befpeaks the fubftance near; and that muft furely be an inverted understanding, which fhould argue against the existence of the fubftance from the appearance of the shadow, or deny any perfonal Logos in Philo, becaufe an allegorical one is there feen. Philo allegorized about him, whom St. John knew equally with Philo under Philo's appellation of the Logos, whom St. John revered equally with Philo as God, and whom St. John introduced under Philo's appellation, as God, from the Jewish church to the Chriftian.

Yet Philo fpeaks at times fo very plainly of the Logos, that the Deity comes forth from behind the veil of allegory, and the fun bursts out in radiance through the mifts that were fhrouding it. This has been shown (we think) by a late author, who, with fome affectation of exhaufting the fubject,

* Whitaker, 442, 443.

has

has collected every intimation concerning the Logos in Philo. We fhall take a much thorter course, and felect only three or four pallages out of his mafs; choofing rather to take them from him than collect them ourselves, because they thus appear actually preclufive of Dr. Morgan's reafonings. "The Logos of God, the divine Logos," as Philo tells us, "is very tharp-fighted, even to be a Being fufficient for the inspection of all things;" a paffage only lefs luminous because lefs ample than St. Paul's," the word of God is quick and powerful, a difcerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart, neither is there any creature that is not manifeft in his fight, but all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him." But, as Philo fays in another place, "an employment is not the caufe of thy participating in good or evil, but He is, who is the rudder- holder and governor of the universe, the Divine Logos;" God " having fet over the whole his firft begotten Son, the right Logos," and "the divine Logos, palling at his cafe through cities, and nations, and countries, diftributes the poffeffions of these to thofe, and of all to all t." Just so, He who is equally called "the Word of God," in the Revelations, equally hath on his vefture and on his thigh a name written, King of Kings and Lord of Lords ;" and he, "the Lamb, shall overcome them, for he is Lord of Lords and King of Kings;" being alfo afferted in other fcriptures as our Saviour, to be "upholding all things by the word of his power," even to be he by whom all things confift." But ye belong," adds Philo in a third place," to one and the fame parent, who is not mortal but immortal, the Man of God, who, being the Logos of the Eternal, is of neceffity alfo himfelf incorruptible" and as our Saviour, immediately before his birth, is more briefly predicted to be Immanuel, which being interpreted, is God with us." And, as Philo in the fourth place mentions, "the eternal Logos of the everlasting God" fo in the Revelation we have "one like unto the Son of Man," fpeaking thus, "I am Alpha and Omega, the Beginning and the Ending, faith the Lord, which was, and which is, and which is to come." We have thus felected paffages in Philo, that not only fpeak explicitly to the points, but are repeated by the fcriptural writers; as the explicitnefs is highly enhanced by the repetition, proves bis fentiments to be equally with the fcriptural derived from the very fources of the Jewith faith, and in fome meafure communicates the ftamp of infpiration from thefe to thefe.

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• P. 67.

+ P. 69, 70, 71, 72.
E 2

P. 81.

P. 86.

Having

Having thus reviewed the two grand articles in Dr. Morgan's work, we stay not to dwell upon any of the fubordinate, or to urge any evidences from Ezekiel, from Ariftobulus, or others," who were equally Jews with Philo, and dwell equally with Philo, upon the perfonal Godhead of the Logos. We haften to conclude our long examination of the work, in a few general remarks upon it and the author. We have already feen him to be orthodox himself, in his belief of the Trinity; though, from fome ftrange turn in the temperament of his mind, he rejects thefe collateral, thefe almoft fundamental, evidences in its favour. Yet he once speaks fo unwarily, as, with that conduct, might induce a fufpicion of his faith, in oppofition to his avowal. He fays thus, in p. 169, "the Chriftian opened the facred volume, and, as he read, he found, or believed that he found, the profound doctrine of the Trinity of perfons in the Godhead, revealed in it." But we believe this to be mere unwariness, and rest secure on the author's declaration, against all fufpicion. Dr. M. has even taken pains, to the grief (we believe) of fome Arians, to vindicate the doctrine of the Trinity from a charge, frequently adduced by Arians against it, and adduced with a confidence at times equalled only by its falfity; that Juftin Martyr first introduced the doctrine into the church, from the writings of Plato. This the reafonings of the author compel him to deny of course, as he denies that any Trinity appears in thofe writings. But the vindication is as unnecellary for the doctrine, as it is unfounded in itself. To form a fuppofition fo wild and extravagant, as that any one man could introduce fuch a doctrine into the church, fix it abfolutely in the creed of all his cotemporaries, and tranfmit it abfolutely to the faith of all his fucceffors; is to fuppofe what even the credulity of Arian incredulity (we fhould think) must reject with proud difdain; to rest heaven upon the fhoulders of an Atlas, or to fix Hercules as a substitute for him in his wearinefs. Nor, even if all Arians could believe what fome of them have certainly affirmed upon thè fubject, can fuch a vindication be useful for their conviction. They who can refift obftinately all the fcriptural evidences of the Trinity, as a doctrine there held up to our faith; and against all evidences of the Fathers prior to Juftin for it, as actually received by them in the creed of the church, will hardly be affected with Dr. Morgan's reafonings. What reafonings, indeed, can poffibly affect them? They are beyond the reach of reafon, though profeffing to uphold it. But, before we take leave of our author, we must say, in justice to him and to ourselves, that we refpect him as a scholar of extensive learning and of deep thinking, though we cannot compliment

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