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power, was considered an entity or reality in God, its communication to Christ was hence described, as though it were a real being descended from heaven, and united with the man Jesus. This notion accounts for the following language of Philo: "God, the author of divine virtue, was willing, in compassion on our race, to send his image from heaven to the earth, that he might wash away the impurities which fill this life with guilt and misery, and that he might thus secure to us a better inheritance."* Here the author assuredly means the Logos of God, united with the man Jesus, conformably to the following words of John: "And the Logos became flesh, and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth: and we have seen his brightness like that of the only begotten son of the Father." Notwithstanding this strong language, Philo expressly declares, that by the Logos was meant, not a real being, but a power or entity in God. We have, therefore, his instruction for concluding that the Evangelist meant only to say that Christ was a real man, and was invested with that power, wisdom, and goodness, which, under the name of Logos, had hitherto resided in God. It is worthy of observation, that John, in this place, sets aside as false the miraculous birth of Jesus, by saying that the Logos became flesh, and not that he was born flesht; and his meaning in this cannot fair

Eccles. Resear. p. 138, or Philo, vol. ii. p. 669, * Σαρξ εγένετο, and not σαρξ εγεννηθη. This dis tinction between yiyoμar and yavaw is uniformly preserv ed by all writers. The Evangelist has hence clearly shewn

ly be overlooked as he premises, that "such as become sons of God are born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, brit of God." He, moreover, sets aside as false, the notion that Christ was a man only in appearance, by saying that he became flesh, that is, a real human being.

I shall now conclude with a short paraphrase of the whole proem; which being summary and connected, may appear more satisfactory to the reader than the account already given of it. It must however be remembered that, though the language of the evangelist is levelled against the pretended friends, it is so general, yet so seleet and appropriate, as to bear with equal force and pertinence against the open enemies of the Gospel; and this peculiarity gives it a beauty and excellence, of which no other passage of antiquity can boast.

1, 2." The great abyss of waters is not, as some false teachers pretend, the first principle of things; from the beginning there existed a God. His perfections, known under the name of Logos, are divine and eternal; these alone were with

that Jesus was not, by virtue of his birth, the son of God. It is remarkable, that Cerinthus availed himself of this language and seems to have made use of the Gospel of John in support of the very heresy which it was the object of John to refute. By Logos, the Evangelist meant only a power of an abstract quality, while Cerinthus affected to mean by the same term a real being. This distinction was in time overlooked; and there were men, who, under the name of Alogi, rejected the Gospel of John as the production of Cerinthus.

God, to the exclusion of all other gods as aquals or associates. The Gospel comprehended in the same perfections, and called by the same name, though recent in its appearance, may also be said to be in the beginning with God."

3. The same eternal and all-perfect Being, and not an inferior evil being, made all things; nothing comes to pass, no not even the evils of life, without his appointment and agency. And the works which Jesus did in attestation of his divine mission, are the effects of the same Logos, or divine attributes, and of no other cause."

4. "The same perfect Being that made the material world, made also mankind, having inspired them with life, and illumined them with reason, and with the light of the Gospel. And as they owe their present existence to him, to him also they must be indebted for the renovation of their being, the knowledge of which is now brought to light."

5. "And as light when first created, shone on the world, immersed in darkness and in a chaos, so the light of the Gospel shines on mankind benighted in vice and ignorance. And though it reflected a benign lustre, and was offered to shine as the means of rescuing them from the darkness of ignorance here, and from the darkness of death hereafter, the majority of men did not embrace it, but wilfully shut their eyes against it."

6, 7, 8. The Baptist whose name is John, was sent from God: but he came to apprize the Jews of the light, which was soon to rise, and to prepare them for its reception. He was not

the person, as some men, from envy and malice, pretend, in whom the light appeared. The object of his mission was, not himself to reflect it, but to announce its approach, and to direct the attention of his countrymen to the person in whom it would be displayed."

9. John was but a lamp, yielding a faint and transient light, and that to a few. The true light which emanated from the Logos, or the perfections of God, and of which the light of the sun is but a shadow, appeared in Christ. This light was embodied in him; and while it enlightens all who enter into that world, which shall exist after the renovation of heaven and earth, it is the fountain of that wisdom and understanding, which in different portions illumine all men in the present world."

. 10. “ Farther, the light of the divine perfections, which shines in Jesus Christ, does not like the sun, shine at a distance, but in the midst of the world, so that the world by it became all light; yet such was the infatuation of men that though they could not but perceive, they did not recognise this great moral luminary."

11, 12, 13. " But though Christ, as the Logos, came to the people, who had been taught by a long course of religious discipline to expect and to receive him, and who have been separated from other nations as the people of God, yet they did not all embrace him. But such as believed in him received a privilege which is beyond all human titles the privilege of being the sons of God; and they are born of God, by being instructed of God, by walking worthy of God, and thus reassuming his image, in consequence

of the new views they have imbibed, and not by following the instructions of flesh and blood, or receiving the Gospel as corrupted by the bad passions of men. They are also born of God, by confiding in the testimony which God himself bore to Jesus as his beloved Son, and thus sharing the blessings of his mission, and not in that of any self-commissioned impostor, nor even in the declarations of the Baptist."

14, 15. "The divine perfections of which I am speaking under the name of Logos, were united with Jesus after his baptism; so that, while he thus became the only begotten Son of God, he was really a man, and not a man in appearance, as some false teachers maintain; or of a nature as the Son of God distinct from his nature as the son of Joseph, as is taught by Cerinthus and his followers. On two occasions he was announced by his heavenly Father as his Son-at his baptism, and at his transfiguration. John has borne testimony to him in the first: in the second we his disciples were spectators of the glory, by which he was thus signalized; and we do testify that the person held forth as the model of our faith and obedience, was in reality the man Jesus, and not a God dwelling in him."

16, 17. "In the fulness of the divine perfec tions, thus as it were embodied in him, we his Apostles have been partakers, and have hence been led to embrace his Gospel, which is a ra tional and spiritual system of faith and practice, and which is a free gift unmerited on our part, in the room of the Mosaic law, which consists of rites and ceremonies, and which, though a fa

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