of flesh and blood. The next phrase is so translated as to produce on many a very erroneous impression. "For he took not on him the nature of angels." The words, "the nature of," are printed, as you may see, in Italics, in our Bibles, signifying that they are not in the original. The literal meaning of this passage is, " He did not assist angels, but the seed of Abraham." "Wherefore in all things it became him to be made like his brethren, that he might be a faithful and merciful high priest, in things pertaining to God, to make reconciliation for the sins of the people; for in that he himself hath suffered, being tempted, he is able to succor them that are tempted." His humanity did not cease with the present life. For the Apostle says of him, "Who shall change our vile body, that it may be made like his glorious body." John says, "When he shall appear, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is." Such are the abundant and overwhelming evidences of the humanity of Christ. Indeed, no persons are more strenuous in their maintenance of the perfect humanity of Christ, than the most zealous Trinitarians. Now there is another class of texts, which the Trinitarian finds it impossible to reconcile with the humanity of Christ, and therefore concludes that there must have been another and higher nature connected with his human nature. He therefore makes that supposition, in the face of all the intrinsic difficulties that attend it. I say difficulties; but not a tenth part of those difficulties are realized by those who use the common phraseology of the divine nature of Christ. Nature, in this case, is a very convenient, because a very indefinite, term. We ture. are told that Christ did or spoke this in his divine nature, and that in his human nature. What is a nature? It is said that Christ's having a human and a divine nature, presents no greater difficulties than man's having a corporeal and a spiritual, a mortal and an immortal naBut this, as it seems to me, is not so. The two parts of man, his material and spiritual, his mortal and immortal parts, are so totally dissimilar to each other, that they do not at all interfere. The mental and moral faculties all reside in the mind, the physical powers all are in the body. The mind, therefore, may use the instrumentality of the body, and the body submit to the guidance and control of the mind. But a divine nature adds to both a third entity, which in its nature is precisely similar to the mind, and therefore calculated to interfere with it, to take its place, to suspend its action, to absorb, or overwhelm it. There must be two consciousnesses, two processes of metal operations, two memories, two wills. And when one of these minds is God, and the other man, such an amalgamation seems to be utterly impossible. A person, to have a unity, must have a unity of consciousness. A human mind, by unity of consciousness with a divine mind, must instantly become omniscient. It must lose the very property which made it human, which is being finite and limited; if the human and divine wills coalesce, the human will becomes omnipotent. If this coalition is perpetual, then the person formed by it, must have all the properties of each, which are consistent with each other, and all that he says must be true of both. If this coalition took place to prepare a proper person for the office of the Messiah, then all that he did and said in that office must be true of both those natures. The distinction, then, that he did and said this as man, and that as God, cannot be allowed. If Christ's superhuman knowledge arose from the junction of the human and divine natures, and not from inspiration, then, whenever this junction was dissolved, and according to the Trinitarian hypothesis it must often have been, we have no guaranty for the infallibility of what he said as man. And his sayings in the Gospels, are partly those of God, which are infallibly true, and partly those of a man, for which we have only human and uninspired authority. But the usual course of argument is to prove that there are certain attributes, names and actions, given to Christ, which cannot belong to humanity under any circumstances, even when aided by divine power. In order to make this discussion as thorough and complete as possible, I shall consider some of these attributes, names, and actions. I have already, in a former lecture, gone over those passages in which he is supposed to be called God. It is thought that a divine nature in Christ is intended by the phrases, "Son," and "Son of God," which are applied to him. Indeed, "Son" is the name his divine. nature is said to bear in the Trinity, and, by a strange license, the "Son of God" is changed into "God the Son," overlooking the infinite distance there is between the meanings of these two phrases. I have already given you Christ's own explanation of this term. He says that he appropriated it to himself, not because of his nature, but because of his mission, because "God had sanctified him and sent him into the world." Jesus prays as "the Son of God," and he prays of course in his human nature, though in his official character, for no other nature could pray. Paul says that Jesus “ was declared to be the Son of God, by his resurrection from the dead." Christ's resurrection from the dead proved him to be a man, and not God. "The Son of God,” in the other sense, could not rise from the dead. Paul says, "If we, being enemies, were reconciled to God by the death of his Son." Son must here, of course, mean his human nature, for "the Son of God," in the other sense, could not die. In the same sense, he says, in another place, "God spared not his own Son, but freely gave him up for us all," to death, of course. The "Son of God," in the other sense, could not be delivered up to death. "Whom he foreknew, them also he foreordained to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the first-born among many brethren.” The divine nature of Christ cannot be the first-born among many brethren. John says, "Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God dwelleth in him and he in God." "Who is he that overcometh the world, but he that believeth that Jesus is the Son of God?" Jesus is the name of a man. The "Son of God" must mean, therefore, an office, and not a nature. This view of things is corroborated by what Paul says in his Epistle to the Galatians. "When the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman," that is, sent the Messiah, a man. The 'sending," of course, is after his birth, for he does not ८८ "sent forth the Son to be made of a woman," but say, made of a woman, who had been born of a woman. He asserts, therefore, that the Son of God was a man. The "sending" cannot go back farther than his birth, for another reason. It is God, the whole Deity, that sent forth his Son, not the Father, the first Person of a Trinity. God, the whole Deity, can have no Son who is the second Person in the Deity. I trust it is necessary to make no further quotations in order to show that the terms "Son," and "Son of God," are applied to Christ's human nature, and therefore prove nothing as to any other. It may be said that the phrases, "sent into the world," "come into the world," &c., imply a divine nature in Christ. His human soul could not have come, or have been sent into this world, because it had no existence before it came into this world. But the same reasoning would prove that we all preëxisted, for it is said of us, that "we brought nothing into this world, and can carry nothing out." Jesus himself has made "being born," and "coming into the world," "To this end synonymous, when applied to himself. was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness to the truth." There is no reference here to a preëxistent state, only a statement of the purposes of his earthly existence. Christ addresses God and says, "Thou lovedst me before the foundation of the world." He must, it is said, have existed then. But it would follow that his human soul must have preëxisted, for only his human soul could pray or be loved. Christians are said to have been |