DEAR SIR,

      Having in a former letter plainly stated, and as I believe fully substantiated the Trinitarian doctrine, as commonly held by those to whom that name is applied; I proceed to examine the arguments and evidences you have brought against our Lord's Divinity. This is the subject of the second section of your book. In your first edition this section bore the title, "Of the Divinity of Jesus Christ." In the second, it bears that, "Of the Son of God." Then in the very outset you complain of being "charged with denying the Son of God; or in other words, his divinity." Now, I understand you, the Son of God, and his divinity, mean just the same thing, and therefore there is evidently more ambiguity in the present title than the former. In this there was probably some special design. In you first work, you made this broad declaration; "I believe in the divinity of Jesus in the fullest sense." This is left out in the work under consideration. Your belief in the divinity of Jesus in the fullest sense, was called in question, and shew to be a declaration without foundation, by comparing your views when explained by yourself, with our public Symbol, Chap. 8, Sec. 2. It was also abundantly shewn, that by the divinity of Jesus, you meant one thing, and we another; that you held a created pre-existent soul of the man Christ Jesus, with nothing more than derived powers, and a communicated divinity; while we on the other hand held his eternal pre-existence, as the second person in the divine nature, and consequently, his unoriginated and eternal divinity. This is the fullest sense in which the divinity of Jesus is held by millions in the Christian world; and any plain man may see at once an essential difference. It was prudent enough therefore in [31] you, to drop that expression of your belief, in a subsequent work; but in the mean time did not candor and charity, forbid you to reiterate the complaint of an "unjust charge" against you for "denying the divinity of Jesus," without stating fairly and honestly the ground on which the charge is set up, by those, who have no doubt in their minds of your complete denial of the proper divinity of the Son of God.

      In a work as limited as this must be, it would be unreasonable to expect a formal reply to every paragraph in your book; or even to every thing presented with confidence under the imposing name of argument. Quotations cannot be lengthy; yet your idea shall be presented fairly if possible. The following, I believe, is your principle argument from reason.

      "The voice of reason is, that the same individual cannot beget itself, not be begotten by itself. Therefore the substance of the Son was never begotten nor born. If it be granted, that the substance of the Son was eternal, and therefore never begotten, but still urged that the Son was eternally begotten; then it must follow that, what was eternally begotten had no substance, and therefore, was not a real being. This is virtually to deny the Son. If language conveys ideas, it is plain that the act of begetting implies a previous agent; and that the agent and the act must precede the thing begotten; therefore the Son could not be eternally begotten. If the Son be very and eternal God, and as there is but one only true God, then it will follow that the Son begat himself and was his own father!--that he was active in begetting, and passive in being begotten. I would humbly ask the advocates for eternal generation, did the Son of God exist before he was begotten?" (p. 14.)

      It is no difficult matter to predict, much less to see, how men can argue against the sublime doctrines of the Bible when they come out upon them with "The Voice of Reason." Not being able to conceive HOW the three divine persons can be one Godhead or essence, nor HOW the Father and the Son can be one in eternal honors and attributes, which is abundantly taught in the Bible; rather than subscribe to this evidence, the pride of human [32] understanding boldly and confidently reasons about it from things human to things divine; and because a human son is inferior to his father, and was begotten by him at a certain point of time, it very gravely concludes, that it cannot be otherwise with the Godhead.

      When you say, (in page 20) "Humbly would I suggest that Jesus is called the only begotten of the Father, because the Father begat him of and by himself, without the means of any other," is it possible that you can after this, be so blinded as to stride over our heads with "the voice of reason," upon the analogy of a human and a divine generation? What likeness, analogy, or parallel, can you institute between the physical or literal generation of a human being, and that which is divine, either as it respects the modus generanti of the Father, or the modus existendi of the Son? I deny that there is any; and I refer to your own humble suggestion, just quoted, to support me in the assertion. I deny that your reasoning has any force, because it has no foundation. But perhaps Noah Worcester, a brother in the same line with yourself, and whose Arian notions are very prominent in your book, will afford you a little aid here. "God," says he; "has endued his creatures with a power of procreation, by which they produce offspring like themselves. Why is it not possible that God should possess the power of producing a Son in his own likeness, and with his own nature." (Bible News. p. 58.) This requires no comment of mine. It shows what the voice of reason, and the reveries of imagination can do when the standard of revelation is deserted.

      That the generation of the Son of God is something figuratively called a generation, cannot be denied. But what is its natural meaning when applied to the Son of God, or what may be its true sense when it is so applied in scripture, I shall not attempt to define. The LOGOS of God is doubtless eternal; for "In the beginning was the Logos, and the Logos was with God, and the Logos WAS GOD." From this passage the eternity of the WORD is as firmly established as the eternity of God, and all the criticism in the world cannot destroy it, without destroying the authority of the text. When therefore the Logos, is called the Son, the Son of God, &c. I understand, that this name [33] is expressive of a certain relation which the second person stands in to the first who is called the Father. Nor do I conceive that the birth or generation of the Son, is to be understood as if he was something that had been ever made,because his actual existence is from eternity, as I have proven from Micah 5. 2. and John 1. 1. And further, this is the necessary consequence of the confessed eternity of the Father. The personal subsistence of a divine Logos is implied in the very idea of a God, and the existence of the Son is necessarily and inseparably attached to the attributes of the Paternal Mind: insomuch that the Father could no more be without the Son, than without his own attributes. How could paternal attributes be ascribed to him, if they were older than the Son's personal existence? Paternity individuates the person who is called father among men; but how can any man sustain a paternal relation, or be called a father, who never had a son? By the generation of the Son of God, therefore, when it is spoken of as taking place at a particular time, is not to be understood as any beginning of his existence, which he ever had, when, to use the words of an excellent writer, "He lay as it were, unissued in the bosom of the Father, as one brought up with him, and where he energized only with himself;" but when the divine faculties were first exerted, or the Divine Nature became active on created things, according to some of the ablest of the primitive fathers, this was the exertion in which the Logos, or Son, came forth. This was not a beginning of his existence, but a display of his powers in the creation of the world, for all things were made by him. And if the belief of antiquity would have any weight here, I am fully authorized to assert that, at the time of the Nicene council, it was the language of the orthodox, that the existence of the Son was prior to his generation, and independent of it; understanding, as I have said, the generation of the Son, to be something figuratively, not physically or literally, called a generation; and not the commencement of his existence, but a display of his powers in creation. This is confirmed by Constantine the Great, who called that council, and who afterwards, writing to the Nichomedians, uses these expressions--"he was begotten, or rather he himself came forth (being ever [34] in the Father) for the setting in order of the things which were made by him." (Horseley's Tracts, p. 236.)

      I am not sure that you and those who act with you make a distinction between begetting and creating as it respects the Father in the production of the Son. Mr. Smith says, "We are not disposed to urge that Jesus Christ in his pre-existent state was created." You said in your first Address, (p. 19.) "I have proved already that he was created or brought forth by God himself, the first of all." You now tell us, that "the Father begat him of and by himself, without the means of any other; but he begat and brought forth all other things by his Son." Then to make him out an instrumental creator, you cite Eph. 3. 9. "God created all things by Jesus Christ." Here the proof is fair as it respects you, the generative act of the Father, is the same with his creative act in bringing forth his Son. Here all the force of your reasoning from analogy is lost forever, for human fathers never create their sons, as it seems God did his. Now for your views: "My own views of the Son of God are, that he did not begin to exist 1820 years ago;" (i. e. when he was born) "nor did he exist from eternity: but was the first begotten (created) of the Father before time, or creation began." p. 19. Now here is a being, "the soul of the man Christ Jesus," (p. 17. 1st Edit.) "the Son of God," created before creation began! before time, and yet not from eternity! "Begotten by the Father of and by himself, without the means of any other;"--without a mother, must be your meaning! If you are not fairly entitled to the name of the Mistress Babylon, then no Trinitarian need ever fear any other rival. But to cap the climax of mystery and absurdity, that being, whatever it was, that was brought into existence somewhere between time and eternity, assumed or was united to a human body only, without a soul! Your words are: "It is also affirmed by our brethren, the Son of God took to him a reasonable soul, as well as a true body.--That he took a reasonable soul is a doctrine without a shadow of Bible proof, the contrary of which is plainly declared. A body hast thou prepared me,--the word was made flesh, &c. If there is one text to shew that the Son of God took to himself a reasonable soul, I should be glad to know it." [35] p. 17. That there is a shadow of Bible proof, and more than a shadow too, there can be no question. The term flesh, by a synecdoche (a part put for the whole, a very common thing in the scripture) is put to signify the whole man, soul and body. "All flesh is grass." (Isa. 40. 6.)--All flesh had corrupted his way. (Gen. 6. 12.) So likewise, by the same rule, the soul is put for the whole human person. Gen. 12. 6. "And Abram took Sarai his wife--and the souls that they had gotten in Haran." But what are we to understand, when in prophetic declaration, the Son of God is made to say "thou wilt not leave my soul in hell;" or, as it is commonly understood, in the state of the dead, or place of separate spirits? When his "soul was made an offering for sin, and was exceeding sorrowful even unto death," what was it, if not a human soul? How was he in all things made like unto his brethren, (Heb. 2. 17.)--how was he that second Adam! or how was the first Adam a figure of him that was to come, if Jesus Christ had no human soul? And if it was not a reasonable soul, then what was it! I will push these inquiries no further; but will agree that you shall settle this point by your own acknowledgment in your first Address, (p. 13) which I consider as good proof here, seeing you are "not conscious that the sentiments in general expressed in your former publications are at variance with any expressed in this." Your words are: "That the humanity of Jesus consisted of a reasonable soul and true body, but few, if any, deny. That his humanity, consisting of soul and body, was created or produced, all agree, who have not the spirit of Antichrist." If I were one of your disciples, I should begin to think it high time to look out for my own safety, when I heard the trumpet of my leader emitting such sounds of uncertainty and self-contradiction. After such a strong and proscriptive declaration seven years ago; who, of all your votaries, could have dreamed of such an approximation to the spirit of Antichrist, as now appears in the denial of the real humanity of Jesus Christ; for a human soul is surely essential to constitute human nature. And if Jesus Christ were not perfectly a man, possessing human nature really and truly in its pure and sinless state; I cannot conceive it possible, that any point in theology or moral can be proved [36] from the language of the New Testament. And will any one refuse his assent to the proposition, that Christ possessed a divine nature, because he cannot see how a union of the divine and human natures could take place; and yet believe that a human body was united to a soul not human? According to your account of the Son of God, it is impossible to ascertain what kind of a being he is. In attempting a rhetorical description of his death on the cross, you say, "It is not a mere man that suffers and dies." To what order or class of beings, then, does this new compound, and strangely mixed person belong? His existence did not commence with time, nor was it from eternity. He is a being distinct from the Father, and inferior to him; he is not God; he is not man; he is not divine; he is not human; nor is he angelic, for angels have no corporeal forms. If there be mystery in any theory, which has ever been proposed, respecting the person of Christ, it appears to me, it may surely be found here.

      The Docetae, or Gnostics, the followers of Simon Magus, averred that Christ was a man in appearance merely, and not in reality. They likewise maintained, "that from the Supreme Divinity proceeded certain Enos, who were a kind of lesser Gods, (dii minores;) and one of which (Christ) created the world. This descended upon Jesus at his baptism, and forsook him at his crucifixion." Now, in what important respect that opinion differs from this, which holds that Christ had a superangelic soul, or created something answering in the place of a human soul, united to a human body, I confess I cannot see. We are no more likely, I apprehended, to be freed from mystery by your theory, than we would by that of the followers of the Samaritan sorcerer in the first century. To say as you do, that Christ was begotten by and of the Father himself, and yet "that the Father and the Son are not one substance." (p. 9.) And again, that "the substance of the Son was never begotten nor born;" (p. 14) then to say, "The old Father's expression is, the Son is of the substance of the Father, against which you have no objection," (Letter to Moreland, p. 10) are sayings and declarations which, if not contradictory, are certainly very problematical.

      I will here introduce one argument which, though [37] familiar to Trinitarians, because it is as old as St. Austin, who is the father of it, yet I believe we might safely challenge the whole tribe of opponents to solve it, and indeed, if it were necessary, might venture to rest the issue of the controversy upon it. His words are the following purport: "Christ, by whom all things were made, cannot be made himself. And if Christ be not made, then he is not a creature. But if he be not a creature, he must be of the same substance with the Father (the Creator:) For all substance or being, which is not God, is necessarily a creature; and what a creature is not, that God is. Now, if the Son is not of the same substance of which the Father is, he must inevitably be a created substance: and if he be a created substance, then all things could not be made by him. But all things were made by him. Therefore, he is of the same substance with the Father: and consequently is not only God, but the true God." (Hor. Sol. vol. 1. p. 421.)

      Your reasoning powers appear to have had much to do with that passage of our Confession which says, "that the Son of God, the second person in the Trinity, being very and eternal God," &c.--did take upon him man's nature.--So that two whole, perfect and distinct natures, the Godhead and the manhood, were inseparably joined together in one power--which person is very God and very man, &c. The words "very and eternal God," sometimes converting them into the "one only true God," without any regard to the connection and explanation of the whole section, have employed your logic for three or four pages, which is really a tax upon patience to read, and by no means deserves a serious refutation. You have made us to say that, the very and eternal God was born of Mary--the very God suffered--the very and only God was crucified--yea, was dead--buried too--and continued three days and nights under the power of death--the Godhead and manhood in Joseph's tomb--two distinct Gods--one changeable, the other unchangeable--the one a living God, the other a dead, buried one,--all this say our brethren."--Pray, hold, Sir; don't call us brethren, if these things are true, lest you be counted insincere. Such a pretended friendship,--such a reiterated appellation of the term "brethren" above a hundred times in [38] your book, under such circumstances of horrid misrepresentation, is entirely gratuitous; it cannot be reciprocated; and really too much resembles the conduct of Joab to Amasa, when he called him, "my brother,--took him by the beard with his right hand to kiss him," while a sword in his left pierced him in the fifth rib. (2 Sam. 20. 9, 10.)

      "Who suffered on the cross?" you triumphantly ask three times in one page. You answer not the question yourself, but make your brethren (as you are pleased to call them) do it, in the language of your sophistries and false inferences. But to the question, who died on the cross? Let Mr. Stone answer himself in another place, (p. 24) when probably he was not thinking of it: "It is not a mere man that suffers and dies; it is the Son of God." This is too indefinite, and we are still left in the dark: Let Mr. Smith answer. "Our view of the subject is, that the sufferer on the cross--was the greatest being whom the one God ever produced; that he was the greatest being in heaven or earth, his Father excepted." (p. 22.) Alas! We are worse off than ever! We must now travel back to where? The beginning of time? That were to stop before we had scarcely commenced. We must travel beyond the confines of time up through the vast vista of unmeasured eternity, until we arrive at a point, a period, or what shall we call it; when some great being of distinct nature and separate existence from God was begotten, produced, or created, and afterwards inhabiting a little human frame at Bethlehem without a soul, itself answering in the place of a soul; a being not God, not man, but a new compound of a mere body and a non-descript something, with a borrowed name, and called the Son of God! I hope the honest Trinitarian will never hang his head any more when taunted and jeered by the great rationalists and simplifying theorists of the day, on account of the acknowledged mysteries of his holy doctrines.

      As time is the measure of finite being, and as it is not possible to conceive of a medium between time and eternity; therefore, whatever was before time, which only measures creation, must be from eternity. Absurd then truly, and little less than a contradiction, to say that there was a finite being produced before time; for that is, in effect, to [39] assert that a limited duration is antecedent to that measure whereby it is determined or limited. The Socinian theory seems to me incomparably more rational, and more tenable, than any shade of the Arian hypothesis. If the evidence be not complete, that Christ was a real man, as to his human nature, from his birth, actions, sufferings, death, and affirmations respecting himself; then how is it to be proved, that he ever existed at all? The sufferer on the cross, if Peter may be allowed to speak, was "Jesus of Nazareth, a MAN approved of God." Acts 2. 22. But we are told that "Trinitarians and Socinians, though always contending, are in your view, the same on this doctrine;" and you tell Mr. Moreland that your views (meaning that the soul of Christ was the Son of God himself, the only begotten of the Father; and when united with flesh, was the very soul of that body,) are "as high above those of Arius, as Arius's is above Socinus and modal Trinitarians, yea as high as the heavens are above the earth." To what shall we attribute such assertions? I will not name it lest it might be offensive. They ought not to have been made. No honest, intelligent writer has ever before set Trinitarians and Socinians down together, and the very extracts that you have made from our public symbols might have taught you a different lesson. Prudence and modesty forbad you to vilify the very company amongst whom you associate a few pages ahead, when with Socinians as well as Arians, you deny the vicarious obedience and substitution of Jesus Christ. Besides, do you know the difference between the High and Low Arians? Perhaps you may yet have to learn that you belong to the former class, as you seem to be in a state of progression, and may have arrived to that stage without knowing it.

      The High Arians "believe the Father to be the one Supreme God over all, absolutely eternal, underived, unchangeable, and independent; they conceive the Son to be the first derived being from the Father, and under him employed in creating, and also in preserving and upholding the world." They concur with the Low Arians in "maintaining the pre-existence of Christ as a super-angelic Spirit, which supplied the place of a soul to him upon his conception and birth, and also his derivation from, and [40] subordination to, the Father; but ascribed to him a higher degree, rank, and dignity, than the others, which created the distinction of High and Low Arians." (Religious World Displayed, vol. 2nd. p. 173. See also, Art. Arians, in Rees's Cyclop.)

      Arianism in England, compared with what it has been, is but a faint echo, and daily growing fainter and fainter; the most of its abettors having, with the great Mr. Chillingworth, slidden down the precipice into Socinianism below. This name, however, being unpopular and odious, they assume in the place of it the title of Unitarians. Whiston, the translator of Josephus, and Thomas Emlyn, a dissenting minister in Dublin, appear to have been the first of the Arians who claimed this title. This is the great Thomas Emlyn, as your Unitarian brother, Mr. Smith, calls him, who makes such a figure in the 19th page of his sermon, and in other parts of the same performance, where the Arian heterodoxy plentifully abounds. I mention these circumstances, which at first may be deemed unimportant; but my object is to show which way the current is flowing, and little doubt have I, but that the Arianism of this country in seven years more, will be extinct altogether, or swallowed up in the vortex of Unitarianism, which is only the modern name adopted in the place of Socinianism. On the atonement, you are already full up to the eyes in that heresy; and you have only to lose sight of that phantom of a created, pre-existent being, before which you fall down and worship, to plunge fully into the more consistent inconsistencies of the Academy of Hackney in England, or the new Divinity School of Germany.

      I acknowledge this is digression: I will return to my purpose. A few words more on the pre-existence of Christ. That he had an existence before he took flesh upon him, and before he came into the world, is true of his divine nature; for he was a divine person, the second in the Godhead. before he became the God-man. But that notion which attributes to the pre-existence of Christ some intelligent nature inferior to Godhead, is without foundation, or shadow of proof, as we have already proven, and believe shall be able further to confirm.

      Your notion of the existence of the Son of God before [41] time, and yet not from eternity, flatly contradicts the Apostle: "Wherefore in all things it behoved him to be made like unto his brethren." Heb. 2. 17. Now if Christ was made, as it behoved him to be made, and none can doubt it, he was made in all things, in all respects, like his brethren. According to your theory, it should have been, he was made in some respects like his brethren. Suppose you assert the pre-existence of all human souls, as some have done, to make things fit together; you can adduce no proof, that any human soul did ever exist before its body. Can you find the man; were you yourself ever conscious of any such pre-existence? Who ever has remembered any mental act performed by himself before he was born? If Jehovah has revealed the fact of any such pre-existence, where is it? If all the souls of men, therefore, were produced as early as Adam's was, no man knows it.

      But if you still press your argument, we ask, how old was the Son of God? This you cannot tell upon your principle of pre-existence. But if you refer back the question to me, I reply, "he was twelve years old" when his parents went up with him to Jerusalem. Luke 2. 42. "He began to be about thirty years of age" when he was baptized and entered on his public ministry. Luke 3. 23. Now, according to you, this will apply to his body only, for what you call his soul, or whatever it might be, was at that time older than the hills. It will not do to read the above passages, when his body had been born twelve years, or was twelve years old, &c. Besides, he is frequently styled by the Holy Ghost, the child, and the young child. Did his body alone constitute the child? Or how could he be a young child, if that soul which animated his body was older than Adam?

      But the child Jesus grew and waxed strong in spirit,--increasing in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and man. Luke 2. 40, 52. How could this be, if "he was the greatest being in heaven or earth, that God ever produced?" How could he who possessed wisdom to plan, and power to create and uphold all things, be reduced down and circumscribed in the little human frame of the babe of Bethlehem, by a limited wisdom which must increase with the growth of time and stature? And did all the fulness [42] of Godhead dwell in him bodily before he had a body? And if a distinct, separate being from the Father, created, or produced by him, and being of course a finite being, how can a finite capacity on such a plan contain infinite perfections? How can a vessel, finite and limited, measure the infinite fulness of the Godhead? If he were not equal with the Father "in essence, being or eternity," as you aver; and "the divinity in him was eternal, because all the fulness of Godhead was in him," as you acknowledge; how did he possess this divinity but by communication, or transfer? And if he possess ALL the fulness of Godhead in this way, how much remained with the Father? If an earthly father transfer the whole of his wealth to his son, is the father still rich?

      Having fully shewn the absurdity of your notion of Christ's pre-existence, I proceed a step further, to examine one still more absurd, if possible, which makes him out an instrumental creator. "The Lord Jesus Christ, who is the Son of God, is the instrumental cause of all things," p. 20. "The Son," says Mr. Smith, "was the instrumental cause of the creation." This you have attempted to prove by a number of texts, whereas, there are but two in all the New Testament, in which the Father is said to have created all things by the Son, namely, Eph. 3. 9.--"God, who created all things by Jesus Christ," and Heb. 1.2--"By whom also he made the worlds." In the former, the words, by Jesus Christ, are not in Griesbach's Testament, which seems to be such high authority with you; and it has been ascertained long ago, that they are wanting in some ancient copies of the Scriptures. Of this, however, I take no advantage. The other passages you and your friend have cited, can no more ascribe an instrumental agency in creation to the Son, than to the Father, e. g. in Heb. 2. 10, it is said of the Father, that "it became him, for whom are all things, and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons unto glory, to make the Captain of their salvation perfect through suffering." But in Col. 1. 16, of the Son it is said, "all things were created by him, and for him." I aver likewise that the word dia in this connection designates the principal, as well as the instrumental cause. In Rom. 11. 36, "All things are said to be of God (ex autou;) [43] and by God (di' autou;) the very form of expression applied to Christ, in Col. 1. 16-20. So Heb. 2. 10, quoted above, and 1 Cor. 1. 9. But still the difficulty remains, how we are to explain or understand the phrase, "by whom he (the Father) made the worlds," Heb. 1. 2. The apostle's own words, it might seem, are entirely sufficient to prevent mistake here, verses 10-12: "And thou, Lord, in the beginning hast laid the foundations of the earth; and the heavens are the works of thy hands," &c. This is an address of the Father to the Son, and can't be misunderstood. If, however, the difficulty seems still to press, let us see if it may not be removed by Hos. 1. 7, "I (Jehovah is the speaker) will have mercy upon the house of Judah, and will save them by Jehovah." Can any suppose that the second Jehovah in this place is the instrumental cause of Judah's salvation? Of a similar import is the phraseology in Gen. 19. 24: "And Jehovah rained down upon Sodom and Gomorrha fire and brimstone FROM JEHOVAH, out of heaven." Is either the first or second Jehovah in this verse an inferior being? How then can the phrase that God made the worlds by his Son, imply, of course, that the Son is of an inferior nature? That it does imply a distinction, between the Father and the Son, we have all along averred to be a scripture doctrine. "It seems to declare, also, that the Godhead, in respect to the distinction of Son, was in a special manner concerned with the creation of the worlds. What is there impossible or improbable in this?"

      But there arises another objection to your theory; from the consideration of its being incompatible with the idea of creation, which is a production of something out of nothing, for God to make use of an instrument. If an instrument be made use of, it must be finite or infinite. The latter it cannot be, unless we maintain two infinites, the one superior and the other subordinate, which is absurd. The former it cannot be; for creation being a supernatural effect, which infinite power only can produce, and as infinite power cannot be exerted by a finite medium, therefore no such instrument can be used. Besides, creative power, which must be infinite, would be limited in its method of acting, by the instrument it makes use of; for whatever [44] power the principal has in himself, the effect produced by the instrument will be in proportion to its weakness. For instance; suppose a giant were about to turn over an house, and should make use of a straw or a reed to do it with, would not the weakness of the instrument render his power insignificant and ridiculous? So for God to make us of an inferior or finite being in the creation of all things, the power exerted by that being can be no more than finite, and therefore inadequate for the production of things supernatural, which require infinite power.

      It will be inquired here, are not miracles supernatural productions; and were they not wrought by men as instruments? It is granted that miracles are supernatural productions. But they are a species of creation, or equivalent to it. The power that wrought them was as directly from God, as if no instrument had been present. It was the same power that opened one man's eyes, and raised the withered arm of another, though clay was used in the former case, nothing but a word in the latter. Men were not properly instruments in the hand of God, to produce supernatural effects. They who are said to have wrought them, sometimes used no action whatever therein,--they addressed themselves to God, that he would put forth his immediate power in the miracle to be wrought; they called the attention of the people; raised their expectation, and taught them to look for the divine interference. (See Num. 16. 23-33, and 2 Kings 1. 12.) Sometimes a visible sign was used, as in the cases of Moses's rod and Elijah's mantle dividing the waters of Jordan. But who supposes that the action of stretching the rod over the waters in the one case, or smiting them with the mantle in the other, had any tendency to produce those miracles? The power was the same without them; but they were employed to excite expectation, that God would put forth his immediate power to work.

      One word more: What assignable reason can be given why God should make use of an instrument in creation at all, when he could have created all things, without difficulty, and without absurdity, by that very power which produced the instrument? I say there is none. But last of all, I oppose your theory, because, if ever there was one [45] directly opposed to, and contradicted by the word of God, yours certainly is. It is written; "GOD HIMSELF formed the earth and made it." (Isa. 45. 18.) "He ALONE spread out the heavens." (Job. 9. 8.) "Jehovah that maketh all things, stretcheth forth the heavens ALONE." (Isa. 44. 24.) "I even MY hands, have stretched out the heavens." (45. 12.) "He that BUILT all things is GOD." (Heb. 3. 4.) If the absurd theory of a proxy creator, an instrumental God, can be maintained in opposition to such express testimony as this, then we need no more wonder at the hardihood of men who can even deny the Lord that bought them.

[LBWS 31-46]