wretched condition. And a sense, a realizing sense, of our lost and ruined state, must fill our souls with ‘indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish.' How can we then escape the natural consequences of our profligate course? Can we then flee from our own thoughts? Can we then desert our own reflections? Can we then escape from our own souls? Can we then hide from the inspection of an omniscient and omnipresent God? Oh no. there is no escape from misery but in innocence or reformation. It is not in the power of Jesus to deliver us from the punishment of sin in any other way. He came not to make us happy in our iniquities. This he could not do. This God himself will not do. He must first aid us in becoming good, before we can possibly be happy. Sin and unhappiness are eternally inseparable. As well may we expect to unite heaven and hell, as hope to make a depraved soul happy in any way but by reformation. Let me therefore beseech all who are guilty, and who is not ?-let me entreat you, as you value your present and eternal salvation, to forsake and avoid sin, to acquire and exhibit holiness. For without holiness no man shall see the Lord.' THE DIVINITY OF JESUS CHRIST. SECOND EDITION. PRINTED FOR THE American Unitarian Association. BOSTON, GRAY AND BOWEN, 135 WASHINGTON STREET. 1830. Price 5 Cents. THE DIVINITY OF JESUS CHRIST. It is proposed in this tract to explain the scriptural doctrine of our Lord's divinity. We address it to those Christians, who are prejudiced against the Unitarian system, on account of its supposed rejection of this doctrine. We trust that a candid examination of our real views will convince them that we believe in the divinity of our blessed Lord, as taught in the record which God hath given of his Son. I. Let us inquire what is the divinity which the scriptures attribute to Jesus Christ. The leading ideas which they inculcate on this point, as we expect to prove, may be comprehended under the following heads. 1. Jesus is divine, because he came with a divine commission. He was sanctified by the Father, and sent into the world as his immediate messenger. The offices which he bore, for the redemption of the world, were not assumed upon his own authority, but were assigned him by the authority of the Father. He was not like those benefactors, who confer favors upon their country or upon mankind, through the impulses of a patriotic or benevolent spirit; but he was divinely set apart for the momentous service which he was to perform, and received his commission from the inspiration of God. 2. Jesus is divine, because he was divinely instructed. The wisdom with which he spake was not his own, but was given him by his Father. The system of truth, which he revealed, was communicated to him from heaven. His words are to us the words of God, his commands the commands of God; since we believe that God spake by him; entrusted him with his commandments; and taught him the doctrines which he revealed to the world. 3. Jesus is divine on account of the divinity of his character. In his moral excellence he was a ray of the divine brightness, and the express image of the divine perfections. He was sanctified to a degree, which though men may emulate they cannot fully attain. So holy, so spiritual, so divine, was his character, that it conveys to us the best idea we can form of the character of the Deity. In his disposition, his feelings, his affections, he was one with the Father; God dwelt in him, and he in God. Such is the divinity which the scriptures attribute to our Savioura divinity of commission, of doctrine, and of character. You may ask, if in addition to this, the doctrine of our Lord's divinity does not imply that he was the true God. By no means. In the first place, this is not required by the meaning of the language. According to the common use of words, there is an important distinction between deity and divinity. apply the term deity only to the self-existent and independent God. We apply the term divinity to whatever is peculiarly and intimately related to the self-existent and independent God. Thus we speak of the divinity of the Holy Scriptures; meaning, that they contain doc We |