tongue; forsake all sins; live like an angel, shine like a sun, walk up and down the earth like a distressed pilgrim bound to another country; die ten thousand deaths; and lie in the focus of hell, so many millions of years as there are sands on the sea shore, or stars in heaven for these are not the blood of Christ. Cry out, therefore, as a blessed martyr did, None but Christ, none but Christ!

Here, finally, is matter for warning-take heed of neglecting or rejecting so great salvation by Jesus Christ.

It will be objected by some one, "This redemption is not intended for all, and therefore not for me: how can I then reject Christ ?"

It is true, that Christ did not pray for all. I pray for them, I pray not for the world; but for them which thou hast given me. Much less did Christ spend his blood for all: but how dost thou know that he is not intended as a deliverer for thee? Though Christ is not intended as a Redeemer for all, yet he is offered unto all, to whom the gospel is sent; and therefore he is offered to thee. As a King he commands them to cast away their weapons, stoop to his sceptre, and depend upon his free mercy, acknowledging that if he saves them, it is of grace, but if he damns them, he is righteous in their. destruction.

What canst thou plead against the doctrine, that Christ is offered unto thee? Perhaps thou wilt say, "Oh, I am so ignorant of myself, God, Christ, or his will, that surely the Lord offers no Saviour to me." Yes, but he does, even though thou liest in utter darkness; for the Saviour thanks the Father for revealing the mystery of the gospel to simple men, to babes, to fools, None are so base and mean, as to be beneath the gracious regards of Christ.

You will object, "I am an enemy of God; and have a stubborn heart, loth to yield. I have vexed him

by my transgressions." Yet, he beseeches you to be reconciled.

"But I have despised the means of reconciliation, and rejected mercy." True. Yet God calls you to return. Thou hast played the harlot with many lovers, yet turn again to me, saith the Lord. Jere. iii. 1. Cast thyself into the arms of Christ, and if thou perish, perish there. If thou dost not this, thou wilt surely perish. If mercy is to be had anywhere, it is by seeking to Christ, not by turning from him. Herein appears Christ's love to thee, that he hath actually given thee a heart in some degree sensible; whereas he might have given thee up to hardness, security, and profaneness. He who died for his enemies, will not refuse mercy to those whose desire is towards him. When the prodigal set himself to return, his father tarried not for him, but met him in the way. If our sins displease us, they shall never hurt us; but we shall be esteemed of God to be that which we desire to be. Ps. cxlv. 19.

"But can the Lord offer Christ to me, so poor, that have no strength, no faith, no grace, nor sense of my poverty y?" Yes, even to thee. Why should we except ourselves from the general offer of the gospel, when Christ does not except us? Come unto me, all ye that are weary and heavy laden. We are poor, because we know not our riches. He that sits in darkness and seeth no light of comfort, no light of God's countenance, yet let him trust in the name of the Lord. Weaknesses do not debar us from mercy; nay, they incline God the more. The husband is bound to bear with the wife, as being the weaker vessel; and shall we think God will exempt himself from his own rule, and not bear with his weak spouse? A Christian's conduct towards Christ may in many things be very offensive, and cause much strangeness, yet, so long as he resolves not on any known evil, Christ will own him, and he Christ.

hear persons of this description complain never of the want of faith, but only of its weakness.

Fourthly, the tottering, doubtful unbeliever, who halts between two opinions, and doubts whether he had best have Christ or not. He sees some good in Christ, which he would gladly have, for the sake of securing pardon, peace, and heaven; and yet he sees many things which he dislikes in Christ, especially his requiring us to renounce merry meetings, pastimes, cards, dice, and sinful amusements. These all reject Christ; and for this dishonouring, ungrateful, inexcusable sin, they shall be rejected of Christ. No sin will so gripe them in hell as this. (To be continued.)

DR. WATTS HIS OWN ADVOCATE.

Dr. Watts has been assailed from two very opposite quarters. Both parties aim at the same point: they wish to prove this celebrated divine to have been a Unitarian; but they are influenced by very different motives. The one reject the glorious doctrine of the TRINITY, so clearly taught in the revelation which Jehovah has been pleased to make of himself; and are therefore anxious to shield themselves from the charge of HERESY by a name so famous in the church of God, as that of this learned and pious Christian. The other believe the doctrine of three persons in one Godhead; but, being hostile to the use of Watts' Psalms and Hymns in divine worship, they imagine that, if they can only impress the public mind with a conviction of the Unitarianism of this sweet singer in Israel, the expulsion of his aid in conducting so important and delightful a part of worship, as singing the praises of God, will, in many congregations, speedily follow as a matter of course.

But the expectations of both parties must be disappointed. In the subsequent publication the Trini

tarian sentiments of Dr. Watts will appear with incontrovertible evidence. It will consist of the Preface and Introduction to his dissertation on the TRINITY, together with the propositions he establishes in that work. Burder, in his edition of Watts' works, speaks of it as an admirable performance on that mysterious truth. From these extracts it will be seen, that the author was a firm and decided believer in the doctrine of the Trinity, both before and after the publication of his Psalms and Hymns. His Hymns were published in 1707; his Psalms in 1719; and his work on the Trinity in 1722.

In the preface to this last mentioned performance the reader will observe in what strong language he expresses his feelings of surprise, at the conduct of those who profess to receive the Bible as the word of God, and yet believe JESUS CHRIST to be a mere man: and that although, in his riper years, when the Arian controversy was agitated, he was led to view his own sentiments in regard to the Trinity, and to read the writings of those who opposed it in the most candid manner; so far was he from being shaken in his belief of that glorious doctrine of divine revelation, that he became still more firmly settled in a conviction of its being plainly taught in the sacred scriptures.

We tender our thanks to a correspondent, for bringing this work of Watts to our notice, and for his kindness in submitting to the trouble of transcribing the copy from which we print.

J. J. J.

PREFACE.-The late controversies about the important doctrine of the TRINITY, have engaged multitudes of Christians in a fresh study of that subject; and amongst the rest I thought it my duty to review my opinions and my faith.

In my younger years, when I endeavoured to form my judgment on that article, the SOCINIANS were the

chief or only popular opponents. || Upon an honest search of the scripture, and a comparison of their notions with it, I wondered how it was possible for any person to believe the BIBLE TO BE THE WORD of God; and yet to believe that Jesus Christ was a mere man. So perverse and preposterous did their sense of the scripture appear, that I was amazed how men, who pretended to reason above their neighbours, could wrench and strain their understandings, and subdue their assent to such interpretations. And I am of the same mind still.

But while I was then establishing my sentiments of the Deity of the Son of God and Spirit, by the plain expressions of scripture, and the assistance of learned writers, I was led easily into the scholastic forms of explication; this being the current language of several centuries. And thus unawares, I mingled those opinions of the schools, with the more plain and scripture doctrine; and thought them all necessary to my faith, as thousands had done before me.

When I lately resumed this study, I found that the refiners of the Arian heresy had introduced a much more plausible scheme than that of Socinus. While I read some of these writers, I was so much divested of prejudice, and so sincerely willing to find any new light, which might render this sublime doctrine more intelligible, that some persons would have charged me with luke-warmness and indifference. But I think my heart was right in these inquiries. And as the result of my search, I must say, that I am a steadfast and sincere believer of the Godhead of Christ still. For though those authors give a rational and successful turn to some places of scripture, which I once thought did contain a substantial argument for that truth; yet there never was any thing that I could find in these new writings, that gave me a satisfying answer to that old, that general and extensive

*

argument for the DEITY of the Sox and SPIRIT, which I have proposed in its clearest light in the eighth Proposition. The expressions of scripture, on this head, were so numerous, so evident, so firm and strong, that I could not with any justice, and reason, enter into the sentiments of this NEW SCHEME. But after a due survey of it, I was fully convinced that the professors of it, who denied the Son and Spirit to have true and ETERNAL GODHEAD belonging to them, were so far departed from the CHRISTIAN

FAITH.

I render hearty thanks to God, who hath so guarded the freedom of my thoughts, as to keep them religiously submissive to plain revelation; and has made these later inquiries a means to establish my faith in this blessed article; that the FATHER, SON and SPIRIT, are three PERSONS in one God; and to confirm it by juster and brighter evidences, than I was possessed of before.

But while I was engaged in this study, I found that the scholastic explication of this sacred doctrine, was not, in all the parts of it, so evidently revealed, and so firmly grounded upon scripture, as the plain doctrine itself. Thus while my faith grew bolder in this sacred article, my assurance as to the modes of explication sensibly abated. Though none of the Arian arguments could prevail against my belief of the true and ETERNAL GODHEAD subsisting in three persons; yet my thoughts were often embarrassed about the co-eternal and co-equal Sonship of Christ, and procession of the Holy Spirit; about the communication of the same infinite individual essence, or the conveyance of the same unoriginated and self-existent nature to two other distinct persons in the Godhead. I began to think that we had been too

* See Proposition VIIIth, in the Introduction.

bold in our determinations of the modus of this mystery; we had entered too far, and been too positive in describing the eternal and consubstantial generation of the Son, and spiration of the Holy Ghost, in the same numerical essence; and that we had made a particular detail of these incomprehensibles, too necessary a part of our creed.

And, especially, when I came to reflect, that there had been some other modes of explaining this sacred article, proposed to the world, and some of them patronised by men of distinguished learning and unblemished piety, I found that these learned, scholastic FORMS and TERMS of explication, were by no means necessary to support the scriptural doctrine. I also took notice how much occasion the unskilful management of these artificial hypotheses had given to the cavils. of heretical wit, to blaspheme the doctrine itself.

I then considered with myself how useful it might be to private Christains, to have the plain, naked doctrine of scripture, concerning the TRINITY, fairly drawn out, and set before their eyes with all its divine vouchers :-how much more easily they would embrace this article, when they see the whole of it expressly revealed. And though they might confess they knew not the way to explain it; yet, perhaps, they might be more firmly established in the truth, and better guarded against temptations to heresy, than if it were surrounded with hard words and learned explications, which could not be proved with such express evidence from the word of God; and which explications are confessed to be as unconceivable as the doctrine itself; and which also had ministered to strife and controversy.

I imagined, also, that it might be an acceptable service to the church of Christ, if this sublime and important doctrine were distinctly declared and vindicated out of the

holy scriptures; which is of far greater moment to our piety and salvation, than any nice adjustment of all the mysterious circumstances that relate to this article in the theory of it.

I knew of no treatise written in this manner, and therefore I attempted it. Now the reader will find these four things following, designed and kept in view throughout the discourse: viz..

1. To declare and confirm this blessed doctrine of the Trinity, by plain and express testimonies of scripture. As far as I was able, I would make this truth appear to the world with as much evidence as it has appeared to me :-that the same true Godhead belongs to Father, Son, and Spirit; and yet that they are three such distinct agents, or principles of action, as may, reasonably, be called Persons.

2. To describe, according to the revelation of scripture, what are the same divine honours and duties that may be paid to the sacred Three, considered as one in GODHEAD; and what are the distinct personal duties and honours that we are required to pay to each divine PERSON, considered in their distinct characters and offices.

3. To show that all the necessary truths that relate to this doctrine may be believed; and all the necessary duties that flow from it may be performed, without inquiring into any particular schemes to explain this great mystery of godliness; or determine the manner how one God subsists in three persons. To this end I have taken care to avoid every argument, and every expression, that could confine our thoughts to any one scheme of explication; or necessarily lead us into any one hypothesis. For since the doctrine of the Trinity is so important in itself, and so necessary to true Christianity, I would not willingly bring in any thing as a necessary part of this doctrine, but what might be acknowledged and professed by all