preach the doctrine of the trinity to the jews, carr appear to them in no other light, than an attempt to feduce them into idolatry, a thing which they dare not entertain the most distant thought of.

The great creed of the mahometans is, that there is one God, and Mahomet is his prophet. Now that Mahomet is not the prophet of God, it is to be hoped, they may, in time, be made to believe; but we must not expect that they will fo eafily give up their faith in the unity of God. To make the gospel, what it was originally, glad tidings of great joy; and as at laft it certainly will be to all the nations of the world, we must free it from this moft abfurd and impious doctrine, and alfo from many other corruptions which have been introduced into it. It can no otherwife appear worthy of God, and favourable to the virtue and happiness of mankind.

Left fome common objections should hinder the reception of the great truth here contended for, I fhall briefly confider and reply to the principal of them. It is often faid that Christ speaks of his humanity only, whenever he reprefents himself as inferior to the Father, and dependent upon him. But the fcriptures themselves are far from furnishing the least hint of any fuch method of interpretation, though, according to the trinitarians, it is absolutely neceffary to the true understanding of them.

Befides, when it is applied to the paffages in queftion, it is far from making them either true in them

felves,

felves, or agreeable to the obvious purport and defign of the places in which they are introduced. I fhall just mention a few. Could our Lord fay with truth, and without an unworthy prevarication, that the Father is the only true God, John xvii. 3. if any other perfon, not implied in the term Father, was as much the true God as himself? Now the term Father being appropriated to what is called the first perfon in the godhead, cannot comprehend the fan, who is called the fecond. This key, therefore, is of no service in this cafe, and our Lord, by expreffing himfelf as he has done, could not but lead his hearers into what is called a dangerous mistake.

When our Lord faid that his Father was greater than he, did he make any reserve, and fecretly mean, not his whole felf, but only part, and the inferior part of himself, the other part being equal in power and glory with the Father? How mean the prevarication, and how unworthy of our Lord!

When our Lord faid that the time of the day of judgment was not known to himself, the fon, but to the Father only, could he mean that his humanity only did not know it, but that his divinity (which is supposed to be intimately united with his humanity) was as well acquainted with it as the Father himself? If the human nature of Christ had been incapable of having that knowledge communicated to it, the declaration would have been needless: but as that was not the cafe, his hearers must neceffarily understand

him as fpeaking of himself in his highest capacity; as he certainly muft do, if at all, when he speaks of himself as the fon, correfponding to the Father.

If Chrift had not fatisfied the jews that he did not mean to make himself equal with God, would they not have produced it against him at his trial, when he was condemned as a blafphemer, because he confeffed that he was the Chrift only: and yet no jew expected any thing more than a man for their Meffiah, and our faviour no where intimates that they were miftaken in that expectation. It is plain that Martha confidered our Lord as a different perfon from God, and dependent upon God, when fhe faid to him, John xi. 22. I knew that even now, whatsoever thou wilt afk of God, God will give it thee.

VI. OF ATONEMENT FOR SIN BY THE DEATH OF CHRIST.

You have been taught by divines, that if Chrift be not God, he could not have made an infinite fatisfaction for the fins of mankind. But, my brethren, where do you learn that the pardon of fin, in a finite creature, requires an infinite fatisfaction; or, indeed, any fatisfaction at all, befides repentance and reformation, on the part of a finner? of a finner? We read in the fcriptures that we are justified freely by the grace of God, Rom. iii. 34. but what free grace, or mercy, does there appear to have been in God, if Chrift gave a full price for our juftification, and bore the infinite

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weight of divine wrath on our account. We are commanded to forgive others, as we ourselves hope to be forgiven, Matt. vii. 14. and to be merciful, as our Father, who is in heaven, is merciful. But furely we are not thereby authorised to infist upon any atonement, or fatisfaction, before we give up our resentment towards an offending and penitent brother. Indeed, how could it deferve the name of forgiveness if we did? If he only repent, we are commanded to forgive him. Luke xvii. 4.

You read in the fcriptures that Chrift died a facrifice for our fins. Heb. ix. 26. So he did, and a facrifice it was of a sweet smelling favour to God. To die, as Chrift did, in the glorious cause of truth and virtue; to die, as he did, in order to show us an example of patiently suffering death for our religion, and the good of mankind, and in a firm hope of a refurrection to a future and eternal life; to die, as he did, in express atteftation of his own divine miffion, by his manifest resurrection from the dead, and as the fulleft proof of that doctrine, by means of which finners are continually reconciled unto God, was a noble facrifice indeed. We alfo are commanded to prefent our bodies a living facrifice. Rom. xii. 1. And we are required to offer the facrifice of praife to God continually. Heb. xiii. 15. But it is plain that all thefe are only figurative expreffions, and used by way of comparison. Neither our bodies, nor our prayers, can be confidered as real facrifices; nor, are we, there

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fore, obliged to suppose that Chrift was a real facrifice. And though we, like him, fhould be called actually to lay down our lives for our brethren, 1 John iii. 16. which, in imitation of him, we are enjoined to be ready to do, we should be facrifices only in the figurative sense of the word.

It is true, that no man who is a finner (and all men have finned) can be justified by his works. We all ftand in need of, and must have recourse to, free grace and mercy; but it is a great difhonour to God to fuppofe that this mercy and grace takes its rife from any thing but his own effential goodness; and that he is not of himself, and independent of all foreign confiderations whatever, what he folemnly declared himself to Mofes, at the time of the giving of the law, to be, namely, a God merciful and gracious, longfuffering, abundant in goodness and in truth. Exod. xxxiv. 6. or that he requires any other facrifices, than the facrifices of a broken fpirit, and a contrite heart, which he will never defpife. Pf. li. 17.

Can we wish for a more distinct and perfect representation of the manner in which God forgives the fins of his offspring of mankind, than our faviour has exhibited to us in that most excellent parable of the prodigal fon; in which the good father no fooner fees his child, who had abandoned him, and wafted his substance in riotous living, returning to him and to his duty; but without waiting for any atonement or propitiation, even while he was yet a great way off, he

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