XX.

Psalm cxxxix. 7, 8. Whither shall I go from THY SPIRIT? Or whither shall I

go

from

thy presence? If I ascend up into hea

ven, THOU art there.

The psalmist, to acknowledge the omnipresence of the Holy Ghost, says-whither shall I go from thy Spirit? and by what is immediately subjoined, he shews this to be the omnipresence of God himself.So that If I ascend up into heaven, THOU art there. the terms thou, and thy Spirit, are equivalent; i. e. equally conclusive for the immediate presence of the divine nature itself.

XXI.

It was said by the angel-Luke i. 32.-He shall be great, and shall be called the SON of the HIGHEST. But the reason given upon this occasion WHY Christ was called the SON OF GOD, is this, and this only, viz. because he was begotten by the Holy Ghost"The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the HIGHEST shall overshadow thee: THEREFORE also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of GOD." v. 35. When Jesus is called the Son of God, we understand the supreme and true God, besides whom there is no other.

The devils themselves allowed it, and said

"Jesus, thou Son of God MOST HIGH !"a But the person in God, whose son Jesus is said to be in this place, is the Holy Ghost, by whose power (called the power of the highest) he was begotten of the blessed virgin, and thence called the Son of God. Therefore, the Holy Ghost is God, and the highest.

XXII.

The prophet Isaiah, in his 6th chapter, tells us he saw the LORD OF HOSTS. And at ver. 8. that he heard the voice of the LORD, SAYING-Go and tell this people, hear ye indeed, but understand not, &c.

Yet these very words, which the prophet declares to have been spoken by the Lord, even the Lord of Hosts, were spoken by the Holy Ghost-Well SPAKE THE HOLY GHOST, by Esaias the prophet, unto our fathers, saying, Go unto this people and say, hearing ye shall hear, and shall not understand,b &c.

Therefore, the HOLY GHOST is the LORD OF HOSTS.

The article of the Holy Ghost's supreme and absolute divinity being now established in the plainest terms; I shall proceed to answer, from the scripture, the objections usually made against it from thence.

XXIII.

+ Matt. xix. 17. There is none GOOD but one, that is, GOD.

a Luke viii, 28.

b Acts xxviii. 26, 27.

If this be a good objection to the divinity of Christ, it must be equally strong against that of the Holy Ghost, for it is argued from this passage, that the attribute of goodness is confined to the single person of God the Father; who therefore is a being superior to, and different from Christ and the Holy Ghost. The error of this argument has been fully shewn above: for it is not one person, but one God, whom the scripture has asserted to be good; and I now have an opportunity of confirming it, and of proving withal, that in the unity of this one God, besides whom no other is good, the person of the Holy Ghost is, and must be included. For it is written-Thy SPIRIT is GOODa -so that if the same inspired scripture which declares the person of the Spirit to be good, does also as plainly declare that none is good, but God only; then the Spirit is God, even the only true and supreme God; and we are as well assured of it, as if it had been said, "there is none good but one, that is the Spirit, who is one with God." The Hebrew in this place is yet stronger than the English. It is not a good, but goodness itself, that is, divine, essential, uncommunicated goodness, besides which there neither is nor can be any other of the like kind. There is one sort of goodness communicated to men upon earth; as we read, Psalm cxii. 5. the good man shen eth favor, &c.—and Acts ii. 24. that Barnabas was a good man, and full of faith, &c. There is another sort of goodness to be found only in heaven, and that

a Psalm cxliii. 10.

is the goodness of God, which is essential; but this goodness is also an attribute of the Spirit; who therefore is proved to be very God; and by that argument too, for the sake of which, some have denied him to be God.

XXIV.

Matt. iii. 16. The Spirit or God.

The Spirit, say they, is not God, because he is only the Spirit of God. But so likewise the human spirit, whence the apostle has taugnt us to borrow an idea of the divine, is the spirit OF a man; yet, was it ever pretended, that the Spirit, for this reason, is one being, and the man another? No, certainly: and the same must be true of God, and the Spirit of God; as far as the being of the same man, who is one person, can be an image of the same God, who is three

persons.

But there is the plainest testimony of scripture, that the Spirit, though said to be the Spirit OF Jehovah, is also called by the express name of Jehovah himself. For it is written, Judg. xv. 14. that the Spirit OF Jehovah CAME upon Samson. Yet at chap. xvi. 20. it is said, that Jehovah himself DEPARTED from him. Till it can be shewn, then, that the person who came upon him was one, and the person who departed from him was another; it is undeniable, that the Spirit, though said to be OF Jehovah, is strictly and properly Jehovah himself.

XXV.

+ Heb. ii. 4. GOD also bearing them witness with-gifts of the Holy Ghost according to his own will.

Hence it is objected, that the Holy Ghost is subservient and subordinate to the will of another; therefore he cannot be the supreme and true God. But if this own will of God should prove to be no other than the will of the Spirit, this imaginary objection of the Arians, which if it be an error must also be a blasphemy, will turn to a demonstration against them. And that the will of God really is the will of the Spirit, is manifest from 1 Cor. xii. 11. all these worketh that one and the self-same SPIRIT, dividing to every man severally as HE (even he himself) WILLETH.

XXVI.

† Rom. viii. 26. The Spirit itself maketh intercession for us.

The Spirit is not God, because he maketh intercession with God; and God, as it is imagined, cannot intercede with himself. But it is a matter of fact, that he has actually done this: therefore it is wicked and false to say that he cannot. For God reconciled the world TO HIMSELF, and it was done by intercession. The other objections I meet with, are all of this stamp : as that the Spirit is said to be given, to proceed, to be