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tumult, and took offence; but if he faid

any thing low, and becoming a man, they

ran to him, and received his doctrine. "And where do we fee this? In John chiefly. For when he said, Abraham, our father rejoiced to fee my day, and he faw it, "and was glad, they fay, Thou art not yet

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forty years old, and hast thou feen Abra"ham. You fee how they were affected to"wards him as to a common man. What "then did he reply? Before Abraham was "I am; and they took up ftones to stone "him. He spake more distinctly, saying, "The bread which I fhall give for the life of "the world is my flesh. They faid, this is a "hard faying, who can hear it; and many of "his difciples went backward, and walked no "more with him.

"Tell me, then, what must he do? Muft "he always dwell upon thefe lofty topics, "fo as to drive away his prey, and deter all "from his doctrine? But this did not be"come his divine philanthropy. Again, "when he said, He that heareth my words fhall never taste of death, they said, Do we "not fay well, that thou hast a demon.Abraham,

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abfolutely neglect, fo as to fatisfy himself with having no hypothefis on the fubject. We certainly find the apostles, as well as the reft of the Jews, without any knowledge of the divinity of Chrift, with whom they lived and converfed as a man; and if they ever became acquainted with it, there must have been a time when it was either difcovered by them, or made known to them; and the effects of the acquifition, or the communication of extraordinary knowledge, are, in general, proportionably confpicuous.

Had we no written hiftory of our Saviour's life, or of the preaching of the apof tles, or only fome very concife one; ftill fo very extraordinary an article as this would hardly have been unknown, much less when the history is fo full and circumftantial as it is.

Had there been any pretence for imagining, that the Jews, in our Saviour's time, had any knowledge of the doctrine of the trinity, and that they expected the fecond perfon in it in the character of their Meifiah, the question I propofe would have been needlefs. But nothing can be more

evident

evident than that, whatever fome may fancy with respect to more ancient times, every notion of a trinity was obliterated from the minds of the Jews in our Saviour's time: It is therefore not only a curious, but a ferious and important question, When was it introduced, and by what fteps? I have anfwered it on my hypothefis, of its being an innovation and a corruption of the christian doctrine; let others do the fame, on the idea of its being an effential part of it. Let us then fee, what it is that the chriftian Fathers, who themselves believed the preexistence and divinity of Chrift, and who were much nearer than we are to the time when the gospel was promulgated, have faid on this fubject.

CHAPTER III.

Of the Conduct of our Saviour himself, with reSpect to his own fuppofed Pre-exiflence and Divinity.

IF

F we look into the gofpel hiftory, we fhall find, that all that our Saviour himfelf taught, or infinuated, were his divine miffion in general, or his being the Meffiah in particular; with the doctrine of the refurrection, and that of himself coming again to raise the dead and judge the world. Thefe doctrines, accompanied with moral instructions, and reproofs of the Pharifees, for corrupting the law of God, made up the whole of his preaching. He never told his difciples that he had pre-exifted, or that he had had any thing to do before he came into the world; much lefs that he had made the world, and governed it; and there is abun

dant evidence that this was admitted by the chriftian Fathers.

Athanafius expreffes his fenfe of the difliculty with which the Jews admitted that Chrift was any thing more than a man very strongly in the following paffage: "He calls his humanity the fon of "man; for the Jews, always oppofing God, "held a twofold blafphemy with respect to "Chrift; for fome of them being offended "at his flesh, viz. the fon of man, thought "him to be a prophet, but not God, and "called him a glutton and a wine-bibber; "who were forgiven, for it was then the "beginning of the preaching, and the world "could not yet believe him to be God, "who was made man; wherefore Chrift

fays, Whofoever shall speak a word against "the son of man, viz. his body, it shall be

"

forgiven him. For I will venture to say, "that not even the bleffed difciples them"felves were fully perfuaded concerning his divinity, till the holy fpirit came upon them "at the day of Pentecoft. For when they faw him after his refurrection, fome worhipped

VOL. III.

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