found in the scripture, nor in the first three centuries. We believe, say they, what the fifth century believed, and because the church of that age believed. The reason of this is obvious. Priestly power was not fully established before the fifth century. To find a system suited to their taste, they must come away from the Bible and from the early church, and turn to an age in which salvation. was doled out for pence; when priestly excommunication was a sentence of death; when pardon, grace, and eternal life were granted or withheld at the option of the clergy; when the doctrines of episcopal grace, and sacramental religion, had subjected all classes of men and all departments of life to ghostly domination. We do not say that the modern traditionists love this system, merely or mainly because of the power it gives the clergy; but we say that the system which they love, has ever had, and from its nature must have, the effect of exalting the priesthood and of degrading the people. Where the Spirit of the Lord is there is liberty. The men who read the Bible and hear there the voice of God, cannot but be free. It commands their assent and secures their homage. They cannot be subject to men in things whereof God has spoken. All the traditionists in the world cannot persuade them that the Bible is not the intelligible voice of God, or that there is either duty or safety in closing their ears to that voice, in order to listen to the mutterings of tradition. Our blessedness is to be free from men, that we may be subject to God; and we cannot be thus subject, without being thus free. We have reason then still to assert and defend the position that the Bible, the Bible alone, is the religion of Protestants; we want no other and we want no more. It is the rule of our faith. It is infallible, perspicuous, complete, and accessible. It is able to make us wise unto salvation; being inspired of God, it is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness; that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto every good work. A better, surer rule than inspired scripture we cannot have; and it must stand alone, or fall. If men bring their torches around the pillar of fire, the sacred light goes out, and they are left to their own guidance; and then the blind lead the blind. ESSAY II. THE SONSHIP OF CHRIST. PUBLISHED IN 1829. ONE of the most difficult points of knowledge is, to know how much may be known; to decide where the limits are to be placed to the speculations of the inquisitive mind of man. Neither philosophers nor theologians have, in any age, observed these limits, and the consequence has been, that philosophy and theology, instead of being a systematic arrangement of the phenomena of the material and spiritual world, so far as they come within the range of our observation, or of the facts revealed in the word of God, are to so great an extent the useless and contradictory speculations of men on things beyond the reach of our feeble powers. These speculations, as it regards divine things, are so mixed and inwoven with the facts and principles contained in the sacred scriptures, that it is no easy task to determine, in every instance, what is revelation, and what is human philosophy. Yet, with respect to almost every doctrine of the Christian faith, this is a task which every sincere inquirer after truth is called upon to perform. The modes of conceiving of these doctrines, in different minds and in different ages, are so various, that it is evident at first view, that much is to be referred to the spirit of each particular age, and to the state of mind of every individual. The history of theology affords so much evidence of the truth of this remark, that it probably will not be called in question. It must not be supposed, however, that everything, either in philosophy or theology, is uncertain; that the one and the other is an ever-changing mass of unstable speculations. There are in each fixed principles and facts, which, although frequently denied by men whose minds have so little sense of truth, that evidence does not produce conviction, have maintained, and will maintain, their hold on the minds and hearts of men. With regard to theology, the uniformity with which the great cardinal doctrines of our faith have been embraced is not less remarkable than the diversity which has prevailed in the mode of conceiving and explaining them. The fact, that there is one God, and that the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost are this God; that there is such a distinction between the Father, Son, and Spirit, as to lay a sufficient ground for the reciprocal use of the personal pronouns, has been the faith of the Christian church. from first to last. And yet there is probably no one doctrine contained in scripture which has been so variously defined and explained as this. In the earlier ages of the church, when the religion of the gospel was glowing in the hearts of all the followers of Christ, when it was peculiarly a religion of feeling, it was not to be expected that this mysterious doctrine should be very accurately defined. To the early Christians, Jesus Christ was God; to him their prayers were directed, their praises given-in him all their confidence was reposed. In their preaching, sermons, and apologies, they presented God the Father, Son, and Spirit, as the great object of their worship,-as the Christian's God. It is true, that very early some few of the fathers, who had previously been speculative men, introduced their speculations into the doctrine of the Trinity, but this was far from being the prevalent character of this period. Irenaeus is a much better representative of this age than Justin Martyr, and we find him expostulating against the various attempts which had been made to explain the inexplicable mysteries of the Godhead. When religion had, in some measure, passed from the heart to the head; when the different modes of thinking and speaking on the subject of the Trinity, which had long prevailed, began to give rise to serious evils; and when opinions were adopted inconsistent with the great Bible-fact, which had previously been almost universally admitted; then a necessity arose for those in authority to state with more precision what was the faith of the church on this important point. That the modes of expression employed in their authoritative exposition of this doctrine were derived from the prevalent modes of thought of that age, and were intended to meet particular forms of error, may be readily admitted; while we maintain that the truth which they meant to convey was nothing more than the great fundamental doctrine of the Christian church. It need not be concealed, that the expressions which, in various ages, and by distinguished writers, have been employed on this subject, have often been infelicitous and improper; expressions which, if strictly interpreted and urged, would imply either Tritheism on the one hand, or Sabellianism* on the other. While, at the same time, to the minds of those who used them, they implied only what all Christians recognise as the corner-stone of their faith. It is much to be lamented that so much animosity has been excited, and so much time and labour wasted on points of dispute, which arose from the imperfection of human language, or the weakness of the human mind. There has this good effect, however, resulted from these controversies, that the Church has been driven from one unguarded mode of expression to another, until it has come back to the simple statement of the word of God, and consented to leave the inexplicable unexplained. It is to be remarked, too, that this advantage has been derived mainly from the opposers of the doctrine in question. They have seen and exposed the difficulties attending the various definitions of the doc im throw new of god enity Relieved sine met me dobe, The trine of the Trinity, and have falsely imagined, that in showing the inconsistency of a theological definition they have thereby refuted the doctrine itself. It would certainly be very unjust to accuse the modern defenders of the doctrine of the Trinity of having renounced the faith of the church, because in their statement of this article they abstain from the exceptionable or unintelligible terms which, in former times, have been employed to set it forth. The Bible-fact has ever been, and still is, by the great body of the Christian community, maintained and defended, although we have been taught to confine ourselves more closely to what the scriptures more immediately teach. The same series of remark may be applied, with equal propriety, to the doctrine of the Sonship of Christ. With regard to this doctrine, even in a greater degree than the one just alluded to, it is true that the explanations and definitions of which it has been the subject have obscured the great truth meant to be taught. It may be stated, with the consent of the opposers of what is called the eternal generation of the Son, that in every age of the church the great body of Christians have believed that Christ is called the Son of God, on account of the relation existing between him as God and the first person of the Trinity. Whether this doctrine is taught in the word of God, is disputed; but that it has been the faith of the church, is admitted. In the early ages, it is not impossible that the ideas attached to the expression were more vague even than those which, from the nature of the case, are still entertained by those who maintain the common doctrine on this point. Christians were taught to believe in the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, and they were led to consider these terms as the appropriate names of the several persons of the Trinity as such. As soon, however, as men began to ask what was the nature of the relation indicated by these terms, we find the same variety of modes of thinking, and the same diversity of language, which have been exhibited in the explanation of most other leading doctrines of the Scriptures. In the first few centuries, almost every mode of explanation and illustration was adopted, which has ever been employed since. Some of the Fathers had recourse to the distinction between the Logos ενδιάθετος, and the Logos προφορικός. Το what extent this philosophical theory prevailed in the church, it is not our object to inquire. We merely wish to note the diversity which obtained among those who all united in believing that Christ, as Logos, was the Son of God. Irenaeus objected to this and all other explanations of the doctrine, while he maintained the doctrine itself. What the nature of Christ's Sonship, or generation, was, he pretended not to say, and complained of those who did. "When any one asks us," he says, "how the Son is produced from the Father? we answer, no one knows. Since his generation is inexplicable, they who pretend to explain it know not what they say. That a word proceeds from the understanding everybody knows. What great discovery, then, is made by those who apply what is familiar to every one, to the only begotten Word of God, and undertake to explain so definitely his incomprehensible generation."* Origen's explanation was derived from the Platonic doctrine of the relation of the vous to the iv, as the latter was always revealed in the former, so the Father is from eternity exhibited in the Son, as the effulgence of his glory. He maintained an eternal generation of the Son, but rejected every mode of expression, and every illustration borrowed from material objects, as utterly inconsistent with the spirituality of the Supreme Being. He objected to the expression," generation from the divine essence” (yívvnois ik тns oialas To Oco), as implying that God was capable of division. Tertullian's mode of thinking was far less refined. "He could," as Neander (Kirchengeschichte, p. 1035) says, "very well conceive, according to his emanation theory, how a being could emanate from the Godhead, possessed of the same substance, though in a less degree; just as a ray emanates from the sun. He maintained, therefore, one divine essence in three intimately united persons." Una substantia in tribus cohaerentibus. And says of the Son, Deus de Deo, modulo alter, non numero. The mode of explaining this doctrine, adopted by the Nicene fathers, is familiar to every one. "We believe in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the only begotten of the Father, that is, of the essence of the Father, God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten, not made, of one essence with the Father, by whom all things were made," &c. Since this period, this has been the general, though by no means the universal, method of speaking on this subject. Amongst Protestant divines, there is a general coincidence as to the manner of explaining the generation of the Son of God. It is commonly defined to be, "an eternal and incomprehensible communication of the same numerical essence, from the Father to the Son." Not that the divine essence produces another divine essence, but the Father as a Person, communicates the same divine essence to the Son. It will be seen at once, that this is not a simple statement of a Bible fact, but a philosophical explanation of what the scriptures are supposed to teach, viz., that Jesus Christ is the eternal Son of God. This definition is founded almost exclusively on the idea of generation itself, and has arisen from urging unduly the analogy of the relation between Father and Son, among men, when applied to God. De Moor expressly says, we must consider the generation of Christ, as including all that is essential to the idea of generation; and as, among men, generation * Adv. Haer., lib. ii., c. 28. Aeterna et incomprehensibilis, ejusdem numero divinae essentiae communicatio a Patre facta Filio. De Moor, Com. in Markii Comp., tom. i., p. 742. Generatio inquam Filii à Patre, non enim essentia gignit essentiam-sed Persona generat personam. De Moor, Commentarius in Joh. Markii Compendium, Theol. Christ., caput v., § 8. |