being constantly subject to the control or the will of another Person: never exhibited as a distinct object of worship or of love; never addressed in prayer as a Person, either by the saints, cr by Jesus Christ, though the Father was often addressed?

2. If you, and those with you in sentiment, do really view the Holy Spirit as a distinct Person equal with the Father, are you not justly chargeable with want of respect, yea with disrespect, towards the Holy Spirit? How seldom do we hear the Spirit mentioned in prayer, otherwise than as something which is subordinate to the will of God, which may be given, sent, or poured out, for our benefit? At the close of your prayers, you often mention the Spirit, as though you thought it to be a Person; but this is frequently the only instance in which, through the whole course of a prayer, there is the least intimation that the Spirit is viewed as a Person. But if, in your view, the Scriptures do really authorize the belief that the Holy Spirit is a distinct Person, and of equal dignity with the Father, how will you be able to answer for your inconsistency in treating the Father with so much more respect than you do the Holy Spirit? Has not the Holy Spirit reason to accuse you of partiality? But in vindication of your conduct, you may say, and that with great propriety, that the Holy Spirit is not so much as named as a Person in any prayer recorded in the Bible; and that we are not required to address prayers to the Spirit as a distinct Person. But, sir, if you have such ample ground on which you may justify your apparent neglect of the Spirit, have you not reason to examine the grounds of your faith? Does not the very ground on which

you would justify your conduct, afford reason to doubt the correctness of your theory?

3. Do not your habitual, practical, and devotional views of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, harmonize much better with my present theory, than they do with your own? This may seem to you an extraordinary question; but it is proposed, sir, with considerable confidence, that, on due reflection, if you answer it at all, it must be in the affirmative. My confidence in this matter results partly from experienee, and partly from observation. When you ap

proach the throne of grace, and pour out your HEART before God without any studied respect to theory, do you not address God as one Person only? Do you not use the terms God, and Father, as perfectly synonymous? When you thank God for the manifestation of his love, in sending his dear Son to die for our offences, do you not naturally consider the Son as a Being properly distinct from the Father, naturally subordinate to the Father, but exalted with the Father's right hand? When you pray to God that he would pour out HIS HOLY SPIRIT, is not this your real prayer, that God would make a display of his power, wisdom, and love, for the production of some desirable effect? Do you not mean to ask for some efficient, productive emanation of his fulness? If, in your habitual and devotional views, the Spirit were a distinct Person, co-equal with the Father, would it not be more natural for you, in praying for the Spirit, to address your petitions directly to the Holy Spirit, than to pray the Father to send or pour out HIS SPIRIT? Does it not then appear that your devotional and habitual views are conformable to the theory I have adopted, and in opposition to your own? How then will you be able to vindi

cate your conduct before God, from a charge of inconsistency, in supporting a theory which is repugnant to your own habitual and devotional views, or in indulging habitual and devotional views which are repugnant to the theory which you profess to believe? And permit me to ask, which does God consider the real sentiments of your heart, those which you express in advocating your theory, or those which you habitually and naturally express in your daily prayers to him?

It is, sir, most sensibly felt, that the theories, prepossessions, and learning, of the Christian world, are at present not on my side. But no small consolation is derived, by considering the general tenor and natural import of Bible language very clearly in favor of each part of the theory set forth in the foregoing Letters. It is also consoling to consider the language of Christian devotion in such agreement with my views, that whatever may be objected against them, may, with equal propriety, bo objected against the most devout feelings and language of my brethren. And as long as these things shall appear so much on my side, nothing can deprive me of the pleasing expectation that the theory, now exposed to public view, will be found substantially correct, approved of God, and that which the whole family of Christ will ultimately receive, and rejoice in forever.

PART IV.

AN EXAMINATION OF DIFFICULT PASSAGES OF SCRIPTURE.

LETTER I.

Rules of Interpretation stated and applied.

REV. SIR,

IN the preceding Letters, my views of many passages of Scripture, which have been supposed to favor the Athanasian theory, have been occasionally given. But there are others to which no distinct attention has been paid. It is my wish to have error detected, if there be any in my views. Suffer me, therefore, to lay before you my adopted rules of interpretation, and give you a specimen of their application.

Rule I. "The Scriptures were inspired, to instruct common readers, by using words according to their common acceptation, and not to confound them by an abuse of language."

The language in which this rule is expressed, is borrowed from Dr. Spring's sermon on the self-existence of Christ, and is applied to the many thousands of texts in which personal pronouns of the singular number are used as substitutes for the nouns Go»,

LORD GOD, &c. and the inference is, that God is one Person only.

The same rule is applied to the numerous texts in which Christ is represented as the Son of God, God's OWN and ONLY SON; and the inference is, that Christ is not the self-existent God, but the Son of the selfexistent God.

Rule 11. The terms used in Revelation must be understood in a sense corresponding with some analogy known to men.

According to this rule, also, it is inferred, that the Son of God cannot be a self-existent Person. It is likewise concluded, that there are no passages of Scripture which were designed to teach us that three Persons are but one intelligent Being; nor that there may be two intelligent Beings in one Person., As extraordinary as it may seem, both of these contradictory hypotheses pertain to your theory. God you suppose to be three distinct Persons; and yet but one intelligent Being. You also suppose that Christ is both God and a Man united in one Person. This, it is thought, amounts precisely to the hypothesis of two intelligent Beings in one Person. Is it not, sir, extraordinary, that great and good men should adopt two hypotheses so manifestly contradictory, while neither of them can be supported by Scripture, nor illustrated by any analogy in nature ?

But did not Christ say, I and my FATHER are ONE? Yes, sir; but he never said, I and my Father are but one intelligent Being. Nor have we any analogy which can justify such an interpretation of the words. There are many senses in which a Father and a Son may be one, besides that of one Being. And in no other case, in which the words are used by a Son,