who is therefore God; for Jesus Christ is not faid to have been the means of salvation, which would have better described the instrument of God in our redemption, but he is one and the same Saviour with God. Of the man Chrift Jesus of the feed of David, it is indeed faid that he was raised from the dead, 2 Tim. ii. 8. But Jesus Christ as God, clothed with eternal glory, is he by whom we have obtained eternal salvation, 2 Tim. ii. 10.

LXXXVIII.

"I give thee charge in the fight of God, who quickeneth all things, and before Christ Jesus, who before Pontius Pilate witnessed a good confeffion; that thou keep this commandment without spot, unrebukeable, until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ: which in his times he shall shew, who is the blessed and only potentate, the King of kings, and Lord of lords; who only hath immortality, dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto, whom no man hath seen, nor can fee: to whom be honour and power everlasting. Amen," Tim. vi. 13, 14, 15, 16. Here even the glory of God, unapproachable by man, is ascribed to Jesus Christ; and this is only ascribable to his divinity, as many men had seen the man Jesus; and St. Paul says, " yea, though we have known Chrift after the flesh, yet now henceforth know we him no more," 2 Cor. v. 16, That he is the King of kings, and Lord of lords, is not only asserted here, but is in fo many terms declared to be the name of Jesus Chrift by St. John, Rev. xix. 16. His Godhead is therefore incontrovertibly established here. That St. Paul should speak of the Son only, is an inference naturally resulting from the confideration that he was making out an appointment to Timothy to go and to preach Jesus Chrift, of whom he speaks in such terms in the first chapter of this epistle, that I choose to refer to it, rather

rather than make a partial quotation, and the whole is too long to infert. The pious wish, or rather let me have liberty to call it the benediction of the apostle, is "grace, mercy, and peace from God our Father, and Jefus Christ our Lord;" a wish, which I cannot well imagine how he should expect to have gratified by a mere creature; nay, he says more, that the grace of our Lord was exceeding abundant, sets forth, that to his trust was committed the glorious gospel of God, and instantly thanks Jesus for putting him into the ministry; declares Jesus Christ to have come into the world (a phrase extraordinary, if the commencement of our Saviour's life was in the flesh) to save sinners; and having recounted the particular mercy and longsuffering of Jesus Christ toward himself, his gratitude breaks out into a doxology, the object of which must evidently appear to be the fame as the Being from whom he received the benefits that invite his praise. "And now" he says "unto the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only wife God, be honour and glory, for ever and ever. Amen." He must be a perverse interpreter who can understand these words in any other sense than that of a declaration that the merciful and long-fuffering Jesus, the abundance of whose grace had pardoned his multitudinous perfecutions and blafphemies, for a pattern to all who should hereafter believe to life everlasting, " is the King eternal, the only wife God, to whom he ascribes honour and glory, in confideration of the exceedingly great benefits which he had received of him, and which were now so strongly impressed upon his mind, as at once to call forth his acknowledgments and his exulting praise."

LXXXIX.

St. Paul says to Timothy, whom he is fending to " do the work of an Evangelist," " I charge thee therefore before God and the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall judge the quick and the dead at his appearing,

and

and his kingdom: preach the word, &c." 2 Tim. iv. 1. And "unto all them that love his appearing," he says, "the Lord the righteous Judge shall give a crown of righteousness at that day," ver. 8. Here the kingdom, the judgement-feat, and the appearing, are affigned to Jesus Chrift, and the crown of righteousness is conferred on all those who love his appearing, according to what he says to Titus, to whom he is giving a like charge: "looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God, and our Saviour Jesus Chrift," Titus ii. 13. That these then are all synonimous terms I shall not affront the understanding of my reader by an attempt to make more evident than it must at once appear; and our Saviour Jesus Chrift is therefore one with the Father, God.

XC.

In the charge to Titus last cited, St. Paul holds out " this blessed hope, and glorious appearing of the great God, and our Saviour Jesus Christ," to such as deny worldly lufts, and who, by so doing, "adorn the doctrine of God our Saviour," Titus ii. 10. Jesus Chrift was the doctrine committed to Titus, and more particularly " how our salvation arose from his having given himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity;" " that having been disobedient, serving lufts and pleasures, not our merits, but his mercy shone forth in saving us:" that therefore, "Jesus Christ having loved us, and washed us from our fins in his blood," Rev. i. 5. "the kindness and love of God our Saviour appeared, by washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost; which was shed on us abundantly, thro' Jesus Christ our Saviour," Titus iii. 4, 5, 6. Here, speaking to a man who was to act under him, and whose discharge of the office conferred on him, must in a great measure depend upon the accuracy of St. Paul's expreffion, this apostle, preaching that which was committed to him, according to the commandment of God our Saviour," falls into a mode of expreffion, which, if Jesus Christ be not God, must perpetually miflead Titus, keep him wandering in con- . tinual errour, and utterly incapacitate him to "exhort and convince by found doctrine." That mankind had obtained salvation, is the committed doctrine; that God is our Saviour, and that Jesus Christ is our Saviour, are sentences occurring every where through the epistle, nay, in contiguous verses; for, after declaring himself an apostle by the commandment of God our Saviour, St. Paul proceeds to say, "To Titus mine own Son after the common faith: grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ our Saviour," Titus i, 3, 4. Did he mean to distract him? if not, he is very defective in his address; but if he meant to inculcate the divinity of Christ, and to shew that the Father and the Son are one God, our Saviour, he has spoken to the purpose, and consistently with the coherent stile that so exceedingly diftinguishes the writings of St. Paul,

XCI.

"Verily, he took not on him the nature of angels; but he took on him the feed of Abraham," Heb. ii. 16. This is urged as a perfuafive to us to lay hold of and embrace the great salvation, afforded to us by fo wonderful an instance of condescension as that of our Saviour's having taken our nature upon him, which he is declared to have done, that he might, as man, become the Captain of our salvation, by fuffering death for all men. But St. Paul fays, that he took not on him the nature of angels, but defcended a little lower: What is this but saying, that out of two things equally poffible to him, he has made a choice? and to that which is not yet ushered into being, we know that there is not any thing possible; therefore Jefus Chrift had preexiftence to the time he came in the flesh: But he verily

S

rily took not on him the nature of angels; therefore, in his pre-exiftent state, he was not an angel. But while the power of making choice among all inferior natures which he would take was his, he assumed that in which a purpose beneficial to mankind was to be answered; and we are accordingly invited to offer up the tribute of our gratitude and confidence to him who had been thus merciful. But who was he to whom fuch a choice belonged? Certainly God, to whom alone all things are subservient, " by whom and for whom all things were created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth," Col. i. 16. who can exalt, as well as debase, the works of his own hands, and take into himself whatsoever nature it shall please him to honour. This stupendous dignity he has conferred upon ours; and for our advantage has become man, even the man Jefus Christ. This adopted nature, this progeny of his power and mercy he has declared his Son; and for the sake of this his " holy child Jefus," who, notwithstanding that he was in all points tempted like as we are, continued to the end doing the will of God, spotless, without fin, became obedient to the death for our redemption, and having fuffered, thereby to become the Author and Captain of our salvation, accompanied the * reascending God into heaven, there for ever to pemain our Mediator and Intercessor; for his fake, I fay, has God been pleased to extend salvation to us; " for this beloved Son, in whom he is well pleased," and whom therefore he has eternally united with himself, has undertaken the cause of our infirmities, and has gracioufly condescended to call us brethren; he has even called us fons; and having taken part in that flesh and blood whereof we are partakers, pronounced

"*

us

Now, that he afcended, what is it but that he also de scended first into the lower parts of the earth?" Eph. iv. 8.