3. C. II.

Manhood into God, and in strict and proper Sence become our Brother? Yes: For, as I now come to fhew in the

n

II. Place: He is Born. Born this Day in Bethlehem, the City of David, according to that of the Prophet Mican; And thou Bethlehem in the land of Judah, art not the leaft among the princes of Judah for out of thee fhall come a Governour, that fall rule my people Ifrael. He is born, fays the Angel; He was made Ev.1.44 feb, fays St. John; and from both the Nicene Fathers, He was made Man. • Vid. Ire- And indeed that he did (whatever Cenæum, lib. rinthus and his Difciple Neftorius dream to the contrary) really affume our Na ture into the Unity of his Divine Perfon; and confequently is not only perfect God, but also perfect Man, of a reafonable Soul and Human Flesh subsisting. Saint Paul affures us the fecond Chap. to the Hebrews, v. 14. 17. afmuch, fays he, as the Children were par takers of Flesh and Blood, he also himself Likewife partook of the fame: And, He became in all things like to bis Brethren. The Circumstances of his Life, as they are deliver'd to us by his Apoftles and

For

Evan

Evangelifts, do indubitably demonftrate the fame Truth. He increafed in wisdom and ftature, fays P St. Luke; But this can p.c.2.v.52, be faid only of his Humanity He, as to his Divine Nature, being absolutely perfect, and utterly incapable of Improvement or Augmentation. He hun gred and thirfted; was weary and faint; afflicted and forrowful; yea, forrowful, as he tells us himself, even unto Death. But these things (as 4 Fulgentius, q ad Thra* s St. Cyril, and Damafcene obferve) fimund. 3. evinced beyond all poflibility of Con- Thefaur. tradiction, that he took upon him thes De fide whole Human Nature with all its paffi- orthodoxa ons and Infirmities, Sin only excepted. Laftly, He fubjected himself to Death, ¿.e. to a Separation of his Soul from the Body, which therefore must before have been united, and confequently our Lord in very Deed been perfect Man.

How powerfully then did the God of this World, the Prince of the Power of the Air, work in those Children of Disobedience and Infidelity, Marcion, Manes, and Apollinaris, when the two firft denied the Reality of our Lords Human Body, and the laft defpoil'd him likewise of his Rational Soul? Alas!

If

lib.10.c.3.

lib. 3.

If these Heretical Tenents be true, how is Mankind totally and compleatly Redeemed? Nay, how are we poor Sinners, redeem'd at all? He redeemed, say the Ancients truly, that only, which be Affum'd; what he did not Affume, that he did not Redeem. If then the firft be true, he did not Redeem our Bodies: If the second, he did not Redeem our Souls: If both, (and why not both, if one) He Redeem'd neither Bodies nor Souls, and confequently the New Covenant is entirely Annihilated, and the whole Oeconomy of the Gospel, (I tremble to speak it) á Fable, a Romance, an idle Story, Nothing. But the Humanity, (I fay) as well as the Divinity of our Lord, is fo fully and clearly display'd by his Apostles and Evangelifts, that it could not fhine with a greater Light, tho' 'twas written with the united Rays of all the Stars and Planets in Heaven. Father, fays He, upon the Crofs, into thy Hands I commend my Spirit. But what Spirit, I pray, was this? That which in his younger Years increas'd as you have heard) in Wifdom and Knowledge, which afterwards, upon the Apprehenfions of his approaching Sufferings, was exceeding forrow

A

forrowful, even unto Death, and which confequently could not be an unintelligible, unconceivable Spirit, a Spirit without a Mind; but Rational, Reflecting, Intelligent, and in all things, (its own diftinguishing Perfections excepted) like thofe of other Men. Handle me, and fee me, says he to his affright Luk, 24; ted Disciples, for a Spirit hath not flesh 39. and bones, as ye fee me have. Here, you see, our Lord appeals to the Senses of his Apoftles for the Reality of his Body. That his Resurrection-Body, though alter❜d in its Qualities, did still retain its Nature: That 'twas the very felf fame Body, which in the Days of his Humiliation hungred and thirfted, was weary and faint, bruis'd and wounded, buffeted, fpit upon, and fcourg'd, and at last underwent the most painful and ignominious Death of the Crofs; which therefore (as his Enemies could fufficiently witness) could not be a Phantaftical Body, a Body only of Air, fuch as Spirits are fuppos'd to take fometimes upon them, but a Body of Flesh and Bones, a Real Human Body.

Now then how muft our Senses be confounded, our Understandings fcat

ter'd,

ter'd, our wonder heightned, to fee him retir'd into the narrow Receffes of the Womb who fitteth upon the Circle of the Earth, and the Inhabitants thereof are as Grashoppers, who stretcheth out the Heavens like a Curtain, and spreadeth them out as a Tent to dwell sin:? ...To fee him have a Beginning in the Circumfcriptions of Time, whofe proper Commensuration is the Days of Eternity To fee him cloathed with the Infirmities of an Infant, whose is the Greatnefs, and the Power, and the Glory, and the Victory, and the Majefty for ever? To fee him bound in Swadling-cloaths by the Hands of his Mother, who himself binds the sweet Influences of Pleiades, and looseth the Bands of Orion? To fee him carried in the Arms of his Nurse, who maketh the Clouds his Chariot, and comes flying upon the Wings of the Wind? Here, I fay) is a Scene of Grace and Love open'd, which the Intelligences may contemplate, but never can come prehend. Here is a Condefcenfion fo infinitely endearing, that one would think it fhould for ever bind our Souls faft to him in the foft and charming Fetters of Love: For did He chufe the

Angels