doctrine there. Accordingly, we assert Christ's divinity, and you deny it; that is, you deny the thing, and retain nothing but the name. The difference then is, not concerning the manner of explaining our doctrine, (which with you is no doctrine,) but concerning the manner of explaining the texts which relate to it. You speak of Christ's divinity however; you have some awe and reverence for the language of the Church, though you have left her faith. Some concern you have also for your own characters, and for the interest of the cause you are engaged in ; which can never prevail, no not with the populace, but under the benefit of a mask. If it be asked why we have no such doctrine as that of the divinity of angels and of magistrates, (called Gods in Scripture,) or why the divinity of Christ should be asserted, while the other is absolutely denied, I am persuaded you will be much at a loss for any satisfactory answer, upon your principles. It will be a vain thing for you to plead, that you assert as much of Christ's divinity as Scripture hath asserted. For, were the fact really so, (as it certainly is not,) then indeed Scripture might justify you in your denial of Christ's divinity; but it can never justify you in calling that divinity which, according to the language of the Church, and. just propriety of speech, you yourselves, as well as we, know to be none.

You tell me, that the "whole and only design of the "authors I oppose, has been, soberly, and in the fear of "God, to collect and consider what it is that our Saviour "himself and his Apostles have in Scripture taught us, "concerning that doctrine, separate from the metaphysical "hypotheses of fallible and contentious men." Now, to pass by the extraordinary civility of these reflections upon others, and the modesty of assuming so much to yourselves; as if you had no hypotheses, no metaphysical fancies, were never contentious, scarce fallible, like other men: waving this, yet give me leave to say, that be your designs ever so good, your intentions ever so sober, and your searches directed in the fear of God; if the result of all be,

that you cannot find Christ's divinity (properly so called) in Scripture, you ought not to pretend, either that you are advocates for Christ's divinity, or that any man is to blame for charging you as impugners of it.

You say farther, that by the divinity of Christ, I mean my own particular metaphysical explication of it. A suggestion as false as it is mean. For neither is my sense any particular sense, but the common sense of all men, learned or unlearned, that know the difference between God and creature: neither is there any thing of metaphysics in it, more than there is in the declaration of the God of Israel, as often as he proclaimed himself to be God, (in opposition to such as were no Gods,) on the score of his almighty power, wisdom, greatness, and other divine perfections. However, supposing my account of the Son's divinity to be metaphysical, is not your account of the Father's divinity as metaphysical as the other? And if you, through your false metaphysics, exclude the Son from the one Godhead, I shall not be ashamed of making use of true metaphysics to correct your errors, and to establish the Son's divinity, upon the same foot whereon Scripture has fixed it. You might be ashamed to mention metaphysics, when every body knows that you have little else to rely upon, for the support of your novel doctrine b. Who sees not what a stress has been laid upon a false notion of the self-existence of the Father, to degrade and separate his beloved Son from the one true Godhead? What batteries have you not raised against a proper sonship, from metaphysical reasonings, should I say, or reveries? That generation implies division, and necessary generation outward coaction; that generation must be an act, and every act must mean choice; that necessary agents are no agents, and necessary causes no causes; that nothing individual can be communicated; that three persons must be three intelligent agents, and three intelligent agents, reciprocally, three persons; that three agents cannot be

b See my Defence, vol. i. p. 212, 213, 228,

one being, one substance, one Lord, or one God; that there can be no medium between being and not being; that inseparable union, without identical life, will not suffice to make two Persons one God; and that if there be identical life, then they are no longer two Persons; nor can there be any equality or subordination; that the same living God necessarily signifies the same individual intelligent agent, or Person; that God the Son must be either the same identical whole substance, or an homogeneous undivided part of the infinite substance, upon my principles; and that he can be neither; and therefore not one and the same God with the Father. Here are metaphysics in great plenty, sufficient, one may think, to furnish out an ordinary schoolman. Nevertheless, we should not, on this account, be so unreasonable, as to censure either Dr. Clarke or his friends, for procuring all the real assistance they can from metaphysics; true metaphysics being nothing else but true divinity: let but your reasonings be clear, solid, and pertinent, and we shall never find fault with them for being metaphysical. The truth is, you have pretended to metaphysics; but have betrayed very great mistakes in that part, as you have also done in your other pretences, relating to Scripture and antiquity. To return to the business of the title.

You observe, very shrewdly, that you could with "much greater justice" (and yet you did not think it reasonable so to do) " have entitled your Reply, A Vindica"tion of the Divinity of God the Father Almighty." Truly, if you had done it, you would not have found me complaining of the injustice of it: for, what hurt could you have done to me or my cause, by making yourself ridiculous? I hope, therefore, you do not expect any thanks from me upon this head. You go on, however, seriously to show, how you could have defended so conceited a title. You could have pleaded, that the "deny❝ing the Father to be alone supreme in authority and ❝ dominion over all," (in which consists the true notion of his divinity,)" is denying his divinity." That is to say,

you could have begged the main question, and have thereupon founded a charge against me, with the same, nay, greater justice, than I charge you with a plain matter of fact, no part of the main question between us. The question is, Whether the one true Godhead be common to Father and Son, or proper to the Father only? You have determined for the latter; therefore you have struck the Son out of the one true Godhead, previously to our dispute; therefore you have denied his proper divinity: and the question now is, not whether you have denied it, (which is out of question,) but, whether you have justly denied it? If you see no difference between the two cases, I can only pity your confusion. Whether divinity, strictly so called, can be common to more Persons than one, remains to be considered. In the mean while, it is evident that you, by making it proper to the Father only, have denied the divinity of all besides.

2. A second complaint is of a motto in my title page: "I am Jesus whom thou persecutest: it is hard for thee "to kick against the pricks." Now, I thought a writer might be at liberty to follow his judgment or fancy in such a trifle as a motto, without being so solemnly called to account for it. But, it seems, this must be now brought to the bar, and deliberately scanned. "As if," say you, "the not receiving Dr. W's notions in metaphysics was "persecuting Christ." As if, say I, the abusing of metaphysics, to the destruction of a plain Scripture doctrine, and the undermining the Christian faith, were not, by a very easy figure, justly called the "persecuting of Christ," "crucifying the Son of God afresh," and "putting him ❝ to an open shame."

Since I am called upon in this case, I will tell you, so far as I remember, what I principally intended by the

motto.

1. One thing was, to intimate the great awe and dread which every man ought to have upon his mind, when he takes pen in hand to write in opposition to his Saviour's Godhead, and with a formed design to deprive him of that

worship, and those divine honours, which have been constantly paid him by innumerable martyrs and confessors, by the whole Church of Christ for fourteen centuries at Whatever may be

least, I doubt not to say seventeen, Whatever pleaded for disputing points of an inferior nature, and less set by; this particularly is a cause not to be entered into without "fear and trembling," by any pious man; lest haply he be found to "fight against God." You may think, perhaps, you have no need of such caution: but for that very reason, I should be apt to conclude you have.

2. Another thing intended by the motto was, to insinuate, how impracticable and vain (in all probability) any attempt must be to defeat the doctrine of our Lord's divinity; which has now stood the test for a long tract of centuries, though all imaginable endeavours and artifices have been from the beginning employed to overthrow it. A late writer very well observes, that "this foundation "has been so upheld, that where the first institution were, 66 as it were, sunk out of memory, by the weight of im66 pure mixtures, as in the Greek Church; and where "every other article of faith had received wounds by the "innovations of error, as in the Roman Church; yet all "of them have adhered to and preserved this main and "fundamental point to this day." The same is likewise true of all the Churches of the Reformation: and God has visibly blasted and defeated all attempts against the eternal Godhead of our blessed Saviour." It is hard for thee "to kick against the pricks." So said a pious Father of the Church, applying it to this very cased, (one would think with a prophetic spirit,) thirteen hundred years ago. Such were then the sentiments of the wisest and best men of those times. They were fallible, they were men: but

• Two Letters to the Earl of Nottingham and Mr. Whiston. Pref. p. 19. 4 Τὶ γὰρ κενόδοξε, πολεμεῖς τὸν ἀκαταπολέμητον, τί μάχῃ τῷ ἀκαταμαχήτῳ; σκληρόν σοι πρὸς κέντρα λακτίζειν σεαυτὸν σκανδαλίζεις, καὶ οὐ τὸν λόγον· σαυτὸν ἀλίσκεις, καὶ ἐ τὸ πνεῦμα. σαυτὸν ἀπαλλοτριοῖς ἀπὸ τῆς τῦ θεοῦ χάριτος, καὶ ὁ τὸν υἱὸν ἀπὸ πατρὸς, οὐδὲ τὸ πνεῦμα τὸ ἅγιον ἀπὸ πατρὸς καὶ υἱοῦ. Epiphan. Ancor. cap. xiv. p. 20.