We believe that thou shalt come to be our judge. We therefore pray thee help thy servants whom thou hast redeemed with thy most precious blood.. Make them to be numbered with thy Saints in glory everlasting.

sin.

O Lord, save thy people, and bless thine heritage.
Govern them and lift them up for ever.

Day by day we magnify thee.

And we worship thy name, ever world without end.
Vouchsafe, O Lord, to keep us this day without

O Lord, have mercy upon us, have mercy upon us. O Lord, let thy mercy lighten upon us; as our trust is in thee.

O Lord, in thee have I trusted, let me never be confounded.

I HAVE remarked this in proofs of fact, and

have observed it in all the histories of Christianity, that those who have believed and taught truly and incorruptly the principal articles of faith concerning Jesus Christ, have afterwards stood in the true Christian faith safely and firmly. And that, although they may have had their certain errors and sins, they have yet been saved in the end. For, he that believes this article, that Jesus Christ is truly God and truly man, that he died for us and rose again, and holds fast that faith, will acquiesce in, and heartily assent to, all the other articles. So true is that which Paul saith, that Christ is the greatest and principal good, the foundation or basis, and the sum total; under whom, and to whom, are drawn and thered all things. And as he saith also in another place, "In him are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge." And Christ himself saith, "He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit." And again, And again, "He that is not with me is against me; and he that gathereth not with me scattereth." For, saith Paul, it is so decreed that in Christ Jesus should dwell all the fulness of the Godhead bodily, or substantially..

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Hence, he that does not find and apprehend God in Christ Jesus, will never find and apprehend God any where out of Christ, even though he should mount up above the heavens, or descend to the lowest hell, or, in a word go out of the world after him. For, saith God, It is here, here, in the human nature of Christ, born of the Virgin Mary, that I will dwell. If thou wilt believe this, thou shalt be blessed: but if not, go where thou wilt and do what thou wilt: yet, thy unbelief shall neither alter nor invalidate my decree. And most certainly, Christ, together with all his believers, will directly withstand thee, as they have hitherto ever withstood all the power of the devil and of the world.

AND AGAIN, I have ever observed this-that all errors, heresies, idolatries, offences, and abuses, and all ungodliness in the church, have principally arisen fromthe contempt, or neglect, or utter loss, of this article or part of the Christian faith concerning Jesus Christ. And if any one will consider the matter closely, he will find, that all errors directly militate against this saving article concerning Christ Jesus. Even as Simeon prophesied of him, 'that he was set for the rise and fall of many in Israel, and as a sign that should be spoken against." And Isaiah, long before, predicted, That he should be a stone of stumbling, and a rock of offence.'-For whatever stumbles or is offended, must stumble and be offended at this one Stone: he it is, that is the stumbling-stone in the way of all such, and that is "rejected" of the "builders ;' as Christ himself shows in that 118th Psalm. And therefore, John also saith in his epistle, that there is no more certain mark whereby to distinguish lying and antichrist spirits, than the denying of Christ. For all heretics have attempted to gain the victory and so triumph over this Christ; but they have gotten nothing but shame and confusion for their pains.

SOME OF THESE have attacked the Divinity of Christ, and that, not in one way only. For some, have stripped him of his Divinity altogether, and have contended that he was nothing more than a man. Others, have contended that he is the same person with the

Father, and have asserted that it was the Father himself that suffered for the human race. Others, again, have inventively made him a creator far more excellent than all the angels, and would have him called such a God as made all the other creatures, and yet, not truly and naturally the eternal God together with the Father.

Acute men have stretched their inventions upon this point in wonderful ways, and have jeoparded all their powers and faculties, that they might not be compelled to believe, that Christ is truly and naturally God; and have tried their utmost to find out and comprehend by their own reason the whole scripture, and more espécially this article, and to bend them down to their own opinions. This article however has, as a rock, stood immovable, while they have fallen headlong to destruction. Though the devil continued to scatter his poison in the hearts of the ungodly and unbelieving even unto the times of Mahomet, who tore away the East, a great part of the world, from Christ.

OTHERS, AGAIN, have attacked his Humanity; and they also have sported with their inventions in a wonderful way. The delirium of the Manichees was this: they considered Christ to be a certain shadow only which passed through the Virgin Mary, like a kind of spectre, which has neither a real body nor a real soul.

Others, denied that he had a soul, and imagined that his Divinity governed his body in the stead of a soul.→ Others, dreamed that he was not truly and naturally the Son of the Virgin Mary. And the Jews think that they display a singular wisdom, in daring to assert that he was begotten of Joseph. And some of them have spoken so profanely, irreverently, and filthily of his conception, that what they have said is too bad to be repeated

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The Jews have, as they imagine, brought the matter to a needle's point, when they argue, that there cannot be Three distinct Persons in the God-head. For (say they) they cannot be brothers or kinsmen: and therefore, they cannot, upon any grounds of reason, be considered to be Three equal Persons. O, how acute and wonder

fully wise are such! who wish to judge of the inscrutable and eternal nature and essence of God by these mortal faculties of men, or rather of beasts.

In a word, the rage of the devil has never ceased at any time, whensoever and wheresoever that article of of the creed concerning Christ, that he was truly God and Man, and died for us and rose again, has sounded forth in the church. For he is that blessed Seed of the woman which bruises the serpent's head, and in whose heel, in turn, the serpent dashes his poisoned teeth. And therefore, this enmity will remain unto the final judgment.

AND AGAIN, what have we new-formed and exalted saints under the Pope thought of Christ Jesus? We have indeed confessed, verbally, that he was truly God and Man, and that he was our Saviour and Deliverer, and died for us and rose again, &c. But we have, actually, not only continually denied those things, but have fought against them with all our power and malice, and have not ceased to do so unto this day.-Some, have taught that he died only for original sin: and that we are to make atonement for our actual sins ourselves. Others again, have affirmed, that if any fall after baptism, Christ no longer profits them any thing. And hence have proceeded prayers to saints, pilgrimages, purgatory, masses, monasteries, and numberless other enormities of the same kind, whereby we have endeavoured to appease Christ and gain him over, as though he were not our Mediator and Intercessor before God, but an inexorable and angry judge.

And, at this day, those very persons who more especially wish themselves to be accounted Christians, who boast of the name and title of the church, and who destroy the godly with fire and sword, and sprinkle and satiate themselves with the blood of the innocent,those very persons, I say, think that alone to be the true and only right doctrine, when they teach, that men obtain grace and eternal salvation by their own works; and that the only honour that is due unto Christ, is, that he begun the work of our salvation; but that we

are those mighty nerves, who finish and perfect our salvation thus begun, by our own works. For they will have it, that Christ did die for us that he might begin our salvation, that is, that by him we might obtain the remission of [original] sins, but that we can merit eternal life and salvation by our own works.

THUS DOES the devil wonderfully make sport of Christ, attacking him by his army thus divided into three parts: the one of which plunders him of his Divinity, the second of his Humanity, and the third of his benefits.

Each of these three tries to destroy Christ and take him out of the way altogether. For what will it profit thee to confess that he is truly God, unless thou believe that he is truly Man also? Because, thou hast not thus a whole and true Christ, but a certain spectre of the devil. And, what will it profit thee to confess that he is truly Man, unless thou believe that he is truly God also? And finally, what will it profit thee to confess that he is truly God and Man, unless thou believe that he has done, and will do, all things for thee? Even as also it profited nothing unto those who believed that he died for the human race, &c. and yet, either did not believe that he was God, as the Arians, or did not believe that he was Man, as the Manichees.

But all these articles must of necessity be believed; namely, that he is God, and Man; and that he was made such a Man for us as is described in the First Creed: namely, that he was conceived of the Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary, suffered, was crucified, died, was buried, and rose again, &c. For the Christian faith must be complete and perfect in all things. And although it may be weak and languishing, and attacked and tried in various ways, yet it must ever be true and whole. A weak faith brings no one any hurt, but a false faith will bring eternal death and damnation !

BUT here, some of those greatest pests and most detestable among men, will rise up, and, with the bitterest hatred against, and mockery of, the