to prove the two doctrines of the preexiftent dignity of Chrift, and his having performed a higher fervice for us than any being merely human could have performed. But this I must reserve for fome future difcourfes,

SERMON IV.

OF THE PRE-EXISTENCE AND DIGNITY

OF CHRIST.

I JOHN iv. 14.

We have feen, and do teftify, that the Father fent the Son to be the Saviour of the world.

'N difcourfing to you on the different schemes of Christianity you may remember that (after fhewing that we are all agreed with refpect to the essentials of it, and the information which it was intended principally to communicate, and which is most interesting to us as finful and dying creatures) I arranged the different fentiments which have been enter

tained

tained concerning it under three schemes, each of which I stated, giving the preference to that which I did not know how better to diftinguish than by calling it the middle scheme between Calvinism and Socinianifm.

My defign, in what is to follow of these difcourfes, is to ftate the reasons which feem to me to fhew that this scheme comes nearest the truth. At the clofe of my last discourse, I made fome preparatory observations which I thought neceffary; and with this view, I

First pointed out to your notice a coincidence which there is, on the fubject of Christ's dignity, between the opinions of Trinitarians and Socinians. Both make the Jefus who bled and died on the cross a mere man, but diftinguished from common men by a miraculous conception and a particular communication of Divine powers. In opposition to this doctrine I have proposed to state the reasons which lead me to believe, that he was more than

a man,

á man, and that he not only was endowed with extraordinary powers, but had existed before his appearance in this world in a state of dignity and glory.

Secondly; I defired you to observe, that, while I believe this to be the truth, I do not mean to affert any thing with respect to the degree of our Lord's preexiftent dignity, this being a point about which the Scriptures are filent except by faying that God made this world by him.

Thirdly; I defired you to obferve, that whatever may be the dignity of Chrift or our obligations to him, the only object of our religious worship is that one Supreme Being who sent him into the world; and that all prayer directed to other beings is an idolatry which we ought anxioufly to avoid.

I shall now proceed to state my reafons for receiving that account of the Gospel to which I have given the preference. It differs, I have faid, from Socinianism in

two