God;-Because thy heart is lifted up, and thou hast said, I am a God,-behold, thou shalt die the death of the uncircumcised,' &c. How different the Father's language to the Son: Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever'! Why this different language to the prince of Tyrus and to Jesus?" Had the Editor attentively referred to the Scriptures, he would not have taken the trouble of putting this question to me; for he would have easily found the reason for this difference; that is, the king of Tyrus called himself God, as above-stated; but Jesus, so far from robbing the Deity of his honour, never ceased to confess that God was both his God and his Father. (John xx. 17.) Also, that the prince of Tyrus manifested disobedience to God; but Jesus even laid down his life in submission to the purposes of God, and attributed divine favour towards himself to his entire obedience to the Most High. Rom. v. 19: "For as by one man's disobedience, many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous." John x. 17: "Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again." Luke xxii. 42: "Father, if thou be willing, remove this cup from me: nevertheless, not my will, but thine be done." As the conduct of the prince and that of Jesus towards God were quite different, they were differently treated by the Father of the universe. As to the above verse, ("Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever,") God does not peculiarly address Jesus with the epithet

God, but he also uses for the chiefs of Israel and for Moses the same epithet.

The Editor quotes 1 Cor. iv. 5: "Judge nothing before the time, until the Lord come, who both will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and will make manifest the counsels of the heart; and then shall every man have praise of God." The passage simply amounts to this: "Judge not either me or others before the time, until the Lord come, who will bring to light the dark and secret counsels of men's hearts, in preaching the gospel; and then shall every one have that praise, that estimate set upon him by God himself, which he truly deserves." -Locke.

It is not Jesus alone that was empowered by God to know and to judge all secret events; but, on particular occasions, others were intrusted with the same power, as has already been noticed in page 518, and will also be found in Dan. ii. 23: "I thank thee, and praise thee, O thou God of my fathers, who hast given me wisdom and might, and hast made known unto me now what we desired of thee; for thou hast now made known unto us the king's matter." And in 2 Samuel xiv. 19, 20: " And the king (David) said, Is not the hand of Joab with thee in all this? And the woman answered and said, My Lord is wise, according to the wisdom of an angel of God, to know all things that are in the earth." 1 Cor. vi. 2, 3: "Do ye not know that the saints shall judge the world? And if the world shall be judged

by you, are ye unworthy to judge the smallest matters? Know ye not that we shall judge angels?” &c. Here Christian saints are declared to be judges of the deeds of the whole world, and of course to be possessors of a knowledge of all events, both public and private, so as to enable them to perform so delicate a judgment. Besides, a knowledge of future events is by no means less wonderful than that of past things or present secrets of hearts; yet we find all the prophets of God were endued with the former. 1 Kings xx. 22: "And the prophet came to the king of Israel, and said unto him, Go, strengthen thyself, and mark, and see what thou doest; for at the return of the year the king of Syria will come up against thee." So we find the same gift of future knowledge granted to righteous men in numerous instances.

He then cites Daniel i. and vii., and founds upon them the following question: "If, then, by nature he was not God, by nature the creator of heaven and earth, he and his kingdom must perish from under the heavens." To this my reply is, that we find Jesus subjected to the death of the cross while on earth, and, after the general resurrection, to Him that put all things under him. (1 Cor. xv. 28.) The Son, therefore, is not by nature God, the creator of heaven and earth. As to the sophistry that attributes the death and subjugation of Jesus only to his human capacity, it might be applicable to every human individual, alleging that they, being the chil

dren of Adam, the son of God, (Luke iii. 38,) are possessed of a divine nature also, and that their death, consequently, is in their human capacity alone, but that in their divine nature they cannot be subjected to death. (Vide pp. 464-469 of this Essay.)

By applying to Jesus the epithet "most holy," found in Dan. ix. 24, the Editor attempts to prove the eternal deity of the Son, forgetting, perhaps, that the same term "most holy" is applied in the Scriptures even to inanimate things. Numb. xviii. 10: "In the most holy place shalt thou eat it." Exod. xxix. 37: "It shall be an altar most holy."

The Editor, in noticing Hosea, says, that "the evangelist's quoting this passage, (Out of Egypt have I called my son,') plainly shews that it referred to Christ as well as to Israel; but the difference is manifest: Israel was God's adopted son, constantly rebelling against his Father; Jesus was God's proper son, of the same nature with his Father, (as is every proper son,) and did always what pleased him." This assertion of the Editor, that "Israel was God's adopted son," is, I think, without foundation; for they are declared, like Jesus, to be begotten sons of God; but were not, like Christ, entirely devoted to the will of the Father of the universe. Deut. xxxii. 18: "Of the Rock that begat thee thou art unmindful, and hast forgotten God that formed thee." Exod. iv. 22: "And thou shalt say unto Pharaoh, Thus saith the Lord, Israel is my son, even my firstborn." He then quotes Hosea iii. 5: "Afterward

shall the children of Israel return, and seek the Lord their God, and David their king." On which he comments, that David had then been in his grave— he could be sought only in heaven:-as David, in common with other saints, could not search the heart and know the sincerity of prayers, this prophecy must be assigned to the son of David, the Messiah. I really regret to observe, that as the Jews endeavour to misinterpret such passages as are most favourable to the idea of Jesus being the expected Messiah, so Christians, in general, try to refer to Jesus any passages that can possibly be explained bearing the least allusion to their notion of the Messiah, however distant in fact they may be from such a notion. By so doing, they both only weaken their respective opinions. The above citation, on which the Editor now dwells, is an instance. Let us refer to the text of Hosea iii. 4: "For the children of Israel shall abide many days without a king, and without a prince, and without a sacrifice, and without an image, and without an ephod, and without teraphim." Ver. 5: "Afterward shall the children of Israel return, and seek the Lord their God, and David their king, and shall fear the Lord and his goodness in the latter days."Does not the poetical language of the prophet determine to the satisfaction of unbiassed every man, that, after long sufferings, Israel will repent of their disobedience, and seek the protection of their God, and the happiness which their fathers enjoyed during the reign of David? as

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