as vainly imagine themselves to be christians, "when in fact they are not. The bishop asked, at your ordination, this solemn question: "Do you trust you are inwardly moved by the Holy Ghost, to take upon you this office and ministration?" To which you as solemnly answered "I trust so." Bishop Burnet well observes, "If any man says, I trust so, that yet knows nothing of any such motion, he lies to the Holy Ghost, and makes his first approach to the altar with a lie in his mouth; and that not to man but to God." "Now, sir, if all the modern pretenders to inspiration," be enthusiasts, then you are certainly one. If the Holy Ghost had really moved you, could you have denied his inspiration? If he did not, then you imagined yourself to be under his influence, when in fact you were not: And therefore out of your own mouth, you are proved an enthu

siast.

P. I look on the words as mere form; and I used them only as a necessary step to prefer

ment.

D. So in order to get clear of enthusiasm, you are not ashamed to own yourself a hypocrite. Who do you think will ever trust you again, when you can so readily speak one thing and mean another?

P. I regard nothing you are pleased to think of me. The multitude is on my side, not yours. D. The multitude of enthusiasts and dissemblers.

1 See his Pastoral Care.

P. If we dispute till next Sabbath, you will never persuade me to embrace your sentiments.

D. I am grieved at the perverseness and heardness of your heart. Indeed brother, I fear you will add sin to sin till you are past recovery. Truly, you have grievously "erred, and strayed like a lost sheep." You have wofully "followed the devices and desires of your own heart, and are become a most miserable offender." However, I would charitably hope you are not yet out of the reach of divine mercy. I shall, therefore, offer a few things more to your consideration, and then, adieu. The first I shall speak of is holiness.

P. Let me hear you describe what you have so much insisted upon.

3

D. I insist upon it, because without holiness no man shall see the Lord. It is that which Christ purchased with his own blood. He gave himself for us that he might redeem us from all iniquity; and purify to himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works. Without this we have no part in him. If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature. It is the image of God engraven on the soul. Its essence is the partaking of the divine nature: Having the mind which was in Christ: The loving God with all the heart and soul, and strength, and our neighbour as ourselves; Its outward form is justice, mercy, and fidelity; showing itself to be pure,

1 Confession.

2 Hebrews xii. 14. 3 Titus ii. 14. 4 2 Cor. i. 17. 52 Pet. i. 4. 6 Phil. ii. 5. 7 Luke X. 27. 8 Matt. xxiii. 23. See notes on the New Testament by J. W.

peaceable, gentle, and full of good fruits.1 Nothing short of this, is the holiness of the gospel.

P. You astonish me! is it possible for a man to be harmless, free from gross sins, just in his dealings, charitable to the poor, attend the means of grace, and after all destitute of holiness? I cannot believe it.

D. Believe, or not believe, it is certainly true. What harm had the unprofitable servant done? What vice is charged on the foolish virgins? Suppose a man as free from enormous crimes as these; as just, and outwardly strict as the Pharisee, yea, though he bestowed all his goods to feed the poor, and gave his body to be burned, without the charity that suffereth long and is kind, that seeketh not her own, that covereth all things, that endureth all things, it profits him nothing.4

P. You are always for carrying things to extremes. I do not believe that any one ever came up to this. Would you have men live without sin?

D. It is no wonder you believe not me, when you reject the whole testimony of scripture,5 with which my liturgy perfectly agrees,"Vouchsafe to keep us this day without sin:""Grant that this day we fall into no sin, but that all our doings may be ordered by

1 James iii. 17. 2 Matt. xxv. 3 Luke xviii. 11.. 4 1 Cor. xii. 3, 7. See notes on the New Testament, by J. W. 5 See 2 Cor. vii. 1. 1 Thes. iii. 13. v. 22. Titus ii. 14. 1 Pet. i. 15, 15. 1 John iii. 5, 6, 9. 6 Te Deum..

thy governance, to do always what is righteous in thy sight."1 "From all sin, good Lord deliver us. 972 "Make us clean from all sin." Again: "Cleanse the thoughts of our hearts by the inspiration of thy Holy Spirit, that we may perfectly love Thee." But how often have you mocked God, and offered the sacrifice of fools, by using words you neither understood nor believed?

P. I am weary of hearing so much of this.

D. Yet I must still proceed; for " some of you Pulpits deny the eternal and supreme Godhead of Christ and the Holy Ghost. In my Creeds,* Liturgy, and Articles, I ascribe equal

1 Third collect for grace. 2 Litany. 3 Communion for Christmas day. 4 Prayer before the Command

ments.

"The substance of the Athanasian creed, we may presume was never exceeded by any human composition. The truly scriptural confession of the eternity, equality and unity of the triune godhead, the infinite perfections of the three persons of ONE JEHOVAH, cannot be sufficiently esteemed, but we do not contend for the prefatory and concluding clauses which are added. Salvation and damnation should be confined to scripture and not be tacked to any human composition, subscription, or institution whatever. To sentence is the sole prerogative of Christ. He only is our Lawgiver, Matt. xxiii. 8, 10. Rom. xiv. 4. has the keys of hell and death, Rev. i. 18. and is able to save and to destroy, James iv. 12. Let none presume to invade his place, lest it be deemed equal to saying I am He, Luke xxi. 8. "Whosoever will be saved, before all things it is necessary that he" repent and believe the gospel, Mark i. 15. and those who undoubtedly perish,' are they that believe not, Mark xvi. 16. John iii. 36. and

worship, adoration, glory, dominion, life, reign, and eternity to the Son and Spirit in unity with the Father.*

"The Old and New Testament do the same. Before the coming of Christ in the flesh, the prophet calls him the mighty God, Father of eternity. When his birth drew nigh, the angel called Emmanuel, God with us. At his baptism the Father bore witness by a voice from heaven: and the spirit descended like a dove in a bodily shape."§

obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. 2 Thess. i. 8."

* See articles first, second, and fifth, Nicene and Athanasian creeds, catechism, litany, the benedictions, doxologies, prayer of St. Chrysostom-in time of dearth, office of baptism and confirmation, petition after pslam in visitation of the sick, collects for first and third Sundays in Advent, St. Stephen, Thomas, and Matthew, sixth Sunday after Epiphany, first in Lent, Septuagesima, Christmas, Good Friday, Easter, Ascension, and Whitsunday-for the king, preface on feast of Trinity, prayer and doxology in Communion Service, General Thanksgiving.

Isaiah ix. 6. See the marginal reading.

Matt. i. 23. Here, and in John xx. 28. and Acts xx. 28. is the emphatic particle which makes it the God: for the want of which, in some places, the Arians have made much objection against the godhead of Christ.

§ Luke iii. 22. Leslie, in his Socinian Controversy, removes this objection to the divinity of the Holy Ghost, as if he appeared in the form of a bird, by showing that both the original, and the sense of the passage, prove the contrary; and that the resemblance of a dove related only to the manner in which the glory of the Holy Ghost came down, and abode upon the Son of God. John i, 32,33. The bodily shape was the divine