capable of a more elevated range in intellectual and moral attainments than human beings, they must of course be proportionably more culpable in the neglect and abandonment of them than human beings can be. For these superhuman beings, and such beings as are included under the term goats, to be consigned to the same degree or kind of punishment would, therefore, be manifest injustice. And God, we know, cannot be unjust. The punishment, too, is said to consist of fire; can spirits be acted upon by fire? Does fire appear to be a punishment equally congenial to such heaven-born spirits and to mortals ? "There is another consideration which strongly militates against the opinion of our Lord's referring in this passage to the day of general judgment or retribution. It is not the general conduct of the whole lives of the sheep, which is the object of reward in the parable. The reward is confined to the exercise of those virtues only, which led them to succour, to relieve, and to protect, such disciples of Christ as they knew to be in sickness or distress, or persecuted. It was, the exercise of particular virtues towards a particular class of men, and in a particular situation. It was not the general tenor of their conduct, in all the relations and duties of life, which was then to be the subject of investigation; it cannot, therefore, include the future general day of judgment or retribution, but refers to a reward for the discharge of certain specified and peculiar virtues, arising out of peculiar circumstances. The punishment awarded is considered only as that of certain specified parts of their conduct who were to be punished. They had neglected to practise certain virtues, which they ought to have practised towards those of their own nation; they had wilfully omitted certain duties which, as men and as fellow-worshipers of the same God, they ought to have exercised towards their country-men; and for this part of their couduct and no other was their punishment assigned to them. This punishment was to be the same as had been prepared for Diabolos and his angels: this Diabolos and his messengers, therefore, must have been guilty of similar crimes, or else their punishment would not have been similar. Diabolos, the common adversary of the Jews and Christians, had greatly persecuted and oppressed the latter, through the instrumentality of his angels, who were continually seeking them as objects of their fury and hatred. The conduct of the goats towards the Christians, for this is the specified point of offence, is so similar to that of Diabolos and his angels, that their punishment is the same indeed, many of the goats were themselves the angels of Diabolos, or the Roman civil power. But, it being the punishment of human beings and for a part of their conduct only, both the reward and the punishment must be of a temporary nature. The sheep would be protected and preserved amidst the dreadful havoc, devastation and unparalleled barbarities of these times, while the other two parties, Diabolos and his angels, would miserably suffer during these horrible conflicts."-Pp. 125-129. The Lecturer seems to be fully aware that his explanation of the appellation Devil, in John viii. 44, (the text of the VIIth Lect.,) as referring to the Sanhedrim, will appear harsh to his hearers, and therefore he takes great pains in its vindication. How far he has been successful, we will not undertake to say; but we acknowledge that there is great weight in some of his critical remarks: e. g. "When Jesus, therefore, tells the Pharisees in the text, that Diabolos was their father, who had been a murderer from the beginning, he repeats what he had said before, that they were seeking some plausible pretext for taking his life. In doing this, they were the active and faithful spies of their employers, the Jewish rulers: Ye are the willing perpetrators of their machinations, whose intention has been murder from the beginning of my ministry among you.' Considering all the malicious lies which these Pharisees propagated concerning him, as originating with the Jewish rulers, as a body, he here calls them liars, and hesitates not to declare his belief that they were the father of them, agreeably to the sense in which the term father is frequently used in the Hebrew Scriptures. Thus Jabal, who projected the plan of having moveable dwellings, for the greater convenience of attending their Blocks, is called the father of such as live in tents. (Gen. iv. 20.) His brother Jubal, who was the inventor of string and wind masical instruments, is called the father of the harp and the organ (ver. 21). Joseph, (chap. xlv. 8,) who by his judicious administration of the government of Egypt, had raised it to great prosperity, tells his brothers that God had made him a father to Pharaoh. Job, who knew the value and blessing of rain and dew, speaks of God as the father of them. (Chap. xxxviii. 28.) And Huram is called the father of Hiram, king of Tyre, (2 Chron. ii. 13,) because he was the best workman, in bis dominions, in brass and copper. This same person is also called the father of Solomon, (chap. iv. 16,) because the king of Tyre sent him to Solomon, to fabricate for him, in those branches, the vessels and ornamental parts of the Temple. Thus, the Sanhedrim was the father --the fabricator of all the malicious falsehoods circulated concerning Jesus; the father-the source of all the opposition which had been made to the truth. When any of the Pharisees uttered these lies, Jesus tells them, they only spoke in character, as closely connected with the rulers, the father and origin of all: When any one speaketh a lie, he speaketh according to his own kindred'; for his father also is a liar.' The Pharisees in conjunction with their rulers, were the determined opposers, from the beginning, of Christ and his doctrine; and they would not believe him, although he so repeatedly declared that he told them the truth, and the truth from God, appealing to the testimony which God bore to him by the miracles which he enabled him to perform.”—Pp. 145-147. The VIIIth Lect. is upon the use of the word Devil in the Epistles; the following is the scheme of interpretation here adopted: 1 Peter v. 8, accuser. evil speakers. accuser. false accusers. pride and revenge. 1 John iii. 8, 10, where it is used synonymously with sin. We think our author peculiarly unhappy in his exposition of Heb. ii. 14. "Heathenism" might by a personification be styled the Devil, the Accuser or Tempter; but in what sense could Heathenism be said to have "the power of death"? A writer to the Hebrews was not likely to expatiate upon the deliverance of the Gentiles from their bondage and fear, and verse 16th of the chapter expressly confines his reasoning to "the seed of Abraham." There is evidence in the passage itself that the Devil, as he is commonly conceived, is not and cannot be intended; this Mr. Scott satisfactorily shews: but the whole and true sense does not appear to us to have been yet discovered. Can the writer mean by the Accuser, who had the power of death, the Law, agreeably to John v. 45, and Rom. vi. 13 and 20? or does he refer to some Jewish hypothesis or fable which is not preserved? Lect. IX. embraces the explanation of other expressions in the New Testament besides the Devil and Satan which are supposed to refer to a mighty evil Spirit. "The Prince of this world," in John xii. 31, (the text of this Lecture,) is explained of the Jewish Sanhedrim acting under "The eleventh verse of the ninth chapter of the book of the Revelations," (Revelation) is said to be prolific in its supply of names for the Devil, having no less than three; the Angel of the bottomless pit,' Abaddon,' and 'Apollyon.' John does not say the pit is bottomless; he calls it 'the pit of deepness,' as Wickliff translates the word aburre. The pit is on the earth, since the star, or messenger of heaven, came to the earth, and had the key given him to open this pit. It could not be hell, as its inhabitants are said to be confined there in ada mantine chains, whereas these were let out for five months. The inhabitants of this visionary pit were the enemies of the gospel, and are represented under the Wakefield's translation, emblem of locusts; a very appropriate emblem of the enemies and persecutors of the primitive Christians, for it is a most destructive insect; hence, the leader has the name of Abaddon, or Apollyon, given him, for they both mean a destroyer; indeed, the one is merely a translation of the other. In Judges, chap. vi. 3, we read, that'the Midianites, the Amalekites, and other eastern nations,' i. e. the various Arab tribes, came against the Israelites, encamping on their territory, ravaging the whole produce of the ground, as far as Gaza, leaving them neither provisions, flocks nor herds. They came with their cattle and their tents, like a multitude of locusts without num ber, laying waste the land.' The prophet Joel (ii. 3-5) speaks of the locusts, and describes the devastation they make in the following expressive language: Before them the land is as the garden of Eden, and behind them a desolate wil derness.' He compares them to the appearance of horses, and like horsemen they run; their leap is like the sound of chariots on the tops of the mountains, and like the sound of a flame of fire, which devoureth stubble.' After giving a further account of them, which, in many respects, resembles those mentioned by John, and of their rapid, irregular, destructive and overwhelming march, he says, Before them the sun and the moon are darkened, and the stars withdraw their shining. These locusts are used figuratively to denote the misery, distress and ruin, occasioned by an irresistible attack of a numerous host of enemies. This king of the locusts and his subjects were not, however, utterly to destroy Christianity, nor to consign those who embraced it to the eternity of hell torments, which, as the king of hell, he would have done had he been the Devil; but to harass and persecute the Christians for a limited time-five months; upon the earth, and not in hell. This period answers to the time that locusts generally make their appearance and commit their depredations from the beginning of April to the end of August. To whatever, therefore, John referred by this deep pit, this abyss, he could not intend to designate by it the future abode of the wicked, nor the residence of the Devil, as must appear from the nature of the inhabitants of this pit; who were, probably, from the description of the locusts, military men, employed in the work of persecution and death. "Smoke, in the language of Scripture, does not necessarily imply the presence of fire, as its cause, (see Deut. xxix. 30; Psalm xviii. 7, 8, lxxiv. 1, civ. 32, cxliv. 5): nor does John intimate that the smoke arose from a fur nace; but that it resembled a smoke from a great furnace. The vision contained in the twelve first verses of this chapter appears to me to refer only to some severe, though not a long persecution of the Christians, since John concludes it by saying, the first woe was over, and it had continued only five months; Behold! two more are yet to come.' No such superhuman, malevolent spirit, as the advocates of the Devil believe him to be, is described in this, or in any other of the visions of John." -Pp. 193–196. Scott examines five passages of this In concluding this Lecture, Mr. book in which the term Diabolos or Devil occurs, and contends that in all of them none but a human adversary upon earth is meant; a position which will scarcely be disputed by any who have inquired into the sense of the Apocalypse and endeavoured to find a clue to guide the mind through this labyrinth of oriental vision and Jewish allegory. [To be continued.] ART. II.-The Mutual Relation of the Unity of God and the Humanity of Christ, as Doctrines of the Gospel: a Sermon, preached July 9, 1823, at Bristol, before the Society of Unitarian Christians, established in the West of England, for promoting Christian Knowledge and the Practice of Virtue, by the Distribution of Books. By John Kentish. 12mo. PP. 68. Birmingham, printed and sold by J. Belcher and Son; sold also by R. Hunter, London. R. KENTISH has been long M distinguished as a learned, able, judicious and candid advocate of Unitarian Christianity, and the present discourse lays the denomination in which he occupies an important station under new obligations to him. The Unity of God and the Humanity of Christ have been often well asserted and satisfactorily proved from the Scriptures; but we know of no sermon or treatise in which" the mutual relation" of these principles as "doctrines of the gospel" is so concisely stated and argued, and so clearly established as in the present discourse. It adds to the merit of the Sermon that the whole argument is deduced from and supported by prac the text. On this account, as well The text, already referred to, is Under the first head are the following judicious and instructive remarks: "Heathen idolatry begun in assigning to the one God' subordinate agents, who first shared in the worship presented to him, and afterwards engrossed it. Such were the deified men of antiquity, or its dæmons: I employ the term by which Paul characterizes them, in his speech at Athens, and with which the title lords' is synonymous. For these, astonishing to relate! altars blazed and temples were erected. To the notions, whether right or wrong, entertained of dæmons by the later Gentiles the statement there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus' very pointedly applies. The dæmons of our Saviour's age, were human beings, exalted, on some account, after their decease, to a sort of middle rank between earth and heaven, between mankind and the primary divinities, of whom they were regarded as the mediators, or instruments, in transacting mortal affairs. It was a sentiment fruitful in error, and even in crime; being often productive of the most vicious and debasing homage-as in much later times it has been of many a superstitious practice and fancy. Since it could only be checked by means of sensible miracles, it demanded the coutroul of revealed religion. Much had been done under the Jewish dispensation to weaken its power: far more was effected by the progress of the spiritual worship and holy doctrine inculcated in the gospel, which subverted and destroyed the reigning polytheism, by disclosing not only one' eternal "God,' the sole Lord of nature and Object of prayer, but one mediator, the man Christ Jesus;' his rank being strictly human, while his mission was divine and his endowments were supernatural. Here you discover a key to the apostolic statement, upon which I am discoursing. Timothy, you will recollect, was now at Ephesus, the metropolis of idolatry for a large tract of Asia in writing to him, his venerable friend virtually addressed the inhabitants of that city. To the Ephesians he represents the unity of the Creator. Yet, seasonable and important as was the lesson, there is one God,' and antidote of dæmon worship, and, something more was requisite as a remedy therefore, it is added, and one mediator between God and men.' But who was this mediator? Not a deified human being, a demigod, or a hero; not, to borrow the language of the same import, yet proceeding from a much later school, au incarnate divinity, or a god-man, but simply the man Christ Jesus.' Had Paul contented himself with asserting the unity of the Supreme Being, the case of dæmons, and of the religious services paid to them, would have been left untouched. If, again, he had only affirmed, there is one mediator,' this assertion, however pertinent and momentous, had, in like manner, been insufficient; since he would have passed in silence the doctrine of one God, nor even intimated an opinion with regard to the superior deities of the Pagan world. As it is, he aims a deadly blow at the Gentile superstition, by stating what was directly and completely to his purpose. He combines tenets, which, in reason, cannot be disjoined, and the mutual union of which is everlasting. To the enlightened Christian it must always be a subject of the most gratifying reflection, that, delivered from the darkness of Heathen idolatry, he adores a single and a spiritual Being; and this in the name of the one mediator,' the Great Revealer of his will, to whom the Universal Father has entrusted commissions and powers unspeakably surpassing in dignity those bestowed on any other individual of our race, and, as far as we are informed, of any creature, of any order."-Pp. 11-15. The preacher makes a happy use of his text, in reference to his argument, under the second head: "A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump. The accumulation and the establishment of gigantic errors, are the work *Acts xix. 26, 31. of Time. If a capital article of Revelation be in any degree corrupted, we may justly fear, that the corruption will extend, in the same measure, to some other revealed tenets; especially should the two propositions relate severally to God and Christ. I entreat you to read again Paul's memorable statement. How devoid is it of obscurity; how entire a contrast with merely human creeds, terms and phrases! We, my brethren, I speak without hesitation, we, and they whose adoration is directed as ours is, are the only persons in the Christian world, who can employ this language, as the apostle employed it, literally and verbally, with out the smallest mental addition or reserve. The distinction made between the Beings whose deeply interesting names are introduced, is the clearest which can be conceived. They are distinguished, in respect of the nature of each, as God and man they are distinguished, with regard to their characters under the gospel, as the fountain and the channel of all spiritual blessings in heavenly places. Add to these clauses, or take any thing from them, and you are instantly lost in a labyrinth of error: you exchange apostolic simplicity for the dialect of the schools. Receive the words without a gloss: adhere to them strictly, in your speculations and your practice, and you will neither exhibit nor countenance any approach to idolatrous devotion. If there be one God,' and the Messiah be discriminated from him as the man Christ Jesus,' it is evident that Deity belongs not to the Lord of Christians in any of the modifications or qualifications with which some hold that he is of divine rank it is equally certain that he cannot be the just object of religious homage. From the declaration that he is a human being, it, again, follows undeniably, that he is not a pre-existent spirit; and thus the unity of the Great Supreme is still further guarded. Were Jesus a superhuman or angelic spirit; were he, under God, the Creator of the world; were he, though inferior to the Father, yet, in some way, undefined and inexplicable, of identical glory with him, how easily and insensibly would men hence be led to ascribe to our Saviour essential Deity, the very nature that he disclaimed, the very honours that he prohibited! The mind that duly reflects on the instructions of Scripture, and on the analogy and course of Providence, finds no restingplace, in its meditations upon the Author of the blessings of the Gospel, and the instrument of communicating them, from the one God' to the man Christ Jesus' and Paul writes, as though he beheld with a prophetic eye the sad effect of mutually separating those doctrines, or of keeping either out of sight.”—Pp. 21-24. He sums up in the following observations, the argument from the language of Paul, under the third head: "Let us pause, my brethren, and look back, for a moment, on the train of his thoughts and reasoning. Christianity is designed to be the religion of men of every tongue and kindred. Our common Maker and Father will have all of them to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth. To illustrate and establish this proposition, Paul alleges the Unity of God and the Humanity of our Lord. The force then of the writer's argument, depends on the literal, unreserved acceptation of his words, on God's being strictly ONE, on the mediator's being absolutely MAN. His lauguage, again, must be interpreted by facts, not by an arbitrary bypothesis; by its coutext, not by the creeds of later agesand it is conclusive no less against every theological system, which destroys or impairs the paternal character of the Deity, than against the doctrines of a conjunction of natures in Jesus Christ and a plurality of persons in the Godhead. If the Gospel be glad tidings of great joy for all people, it is because there is,' without any qualification, 'one God, and one Mediator-the man Christ Jesus.' Thus, the argument for the Divine Unity, from the Scriptures, and, I humbly think, that from creation, goes further than to an unity of counsel' it establishes an unity of PERSON." Pp. 35, 36. The mutual relation of the tenets here asserted is shewn, in the last head, to be proved by the instruction, comfort and hope, which they jointly impart to the sons of men. They represent God as a Father, and the Mediator as a brother. Christ's sameness of nature to man in general is the ground of his compassion for mankind; it makes him a fit pattern of duty and reward; it constitutes his resurrection a pledge of the general resurrection; and it qualifies him to be the Judge of quick and dead. In applying his discourse to the occasion of the meeting, Mr. Kentish takes a brief review of the history of the Western Unitarian Society, and presents an animated picture of the triumphs of Christian truth, at home and abroad. He then proceeds and concludes, "Why, my brethren, do I remind you |
