reading through. I profess this most unjust calumny of Mr. Clerke against this holy Martyr, is intolerable. For I have demonstrated Irenæus, from the most convincing testimonies, alleged out of himself, to have constantly owned the most absolute Divinity of the Holy Ghost'.

P. 135. At length Mr. Clerke comes to the conclusion of his work, such as well suits with the rest of his performance. "Now," says he, “let us cast our eyes back to what has been said; what mighty service has Dr. Bull done his cause, by citing about thirty Fathers, scarce half of whom have left us any undoubtedly genuine writings, though out of as many thousand Bishops, to shew the Catholic doctrine, that is the opinion of the generality of Christians, from the Apostles' times and downwards. Let us hear what Eusebius says of the Bishops; Victor (at Rome) succeeded Eleutherius; at Alexandria, Demetrius succeeded Julian; at Antioch, the eighth from the Apostles was Serapion; Theophilus then presided at Cæsarea; Narcissus at Jerusalem, Bachylus at Corinth, and Polycrates at Ephesus, were of great note amongst the Bishops. Besides that, in many other places we hear of famous Priests about that time." I answer, That I have cited no writings of the ancients, for the Catholic faith, which if they were called in question, I have not first proved by solid arguments, to belong of right to those authors whose names they bear. Had Eusebius been silent in the case, who could possibly doubt that there were many famous Doctors in the Church? but what good does this do Mr. Clerke and his party? It seems he would have his reader suspect all those, or at least the greater part of them, to have been constantly of opinion with the Unitarians, in the question concerning the Person of Christ; than which nothing is falser. I have proved in my dispute with Zuicker, that the Catholic opinion concerning Christ prevailed in the Church of Jerusalem, the mother of all other Churches, from the Apostles to the time of Adrian, when that Church was scattered abroad. I have proved by unexceptionable witnesses, Hegesippus and Irenæus, that the same doctrine had descended by uninterrupted tradition, in all other Churches, from the beginning to their times. But Mr. Clerke proceeds, y Defence, sect. 2. c. 5. §. 9.

z Eccl. Hist. 1. v. c. 22.

"And the same Eusebius," says he, "makes mention of many Unitarians, who were near the days of the Apostles, and boasted of the Apostles and their successors, as for the most part on their side, before Victor; and that there were such as were esteemed great philosophers and mathematicians, whose names he recites, Aquila, Symmachus, Theodosion, Artemon, Paulus Samosatenus, Natalis, Beryllus, Theodotus, Asclepiodotus, Hermophilus, Apollonides, &c."

Certainly, were not Mr. Clerke past all shame, he would never have dared to put these infamous names in the balance against those holy Doctors and Martyrs of the Catholic Church, whose writings I have appealed to. Some of them have apostatized from the Christian faith to Judaism; the rest were most desperate heretics, except Natalis and Beryllus, who though they had for some time embraced the heresy of denying our Saviour's Divinity, yet both at length returned to the Communion of the Catholic Church, and died in it. All the rest, I say, were condemned by the universal Church as heretics. Mr. Clerke had said above, he wished his soul might be amongst better Divines than the Trinitarians are. And are these his better Divines? The Lord have mercy upon him!

Thus at last Mr. Clerke finishes his discourse; "Now that I may at length conclude, though I should grant Dr. Bull that all his testimonies were of the greatest force, yet would they not be satisfactory to us who have known the mystery of the great Apostasy; but we should still appeal from the ante-Nicene Fathers to the Apostles." And in what manner Mr. Clerke, and his companions here in England, have appealed to the Apostles and the Scriptures of the New Testament, we all very well know. The places of Holy Scripture brought by us for the Catholic faith, though the clearest that can be, they either wrest intolerably, or question their authority, or perhaps utterly reject it. I could confirm what I say with instances, which would make every good man's ears tingle. But I will shut up these my animadversions, with a serious admonition to my readers, especially to the candidates of Divinity, in the words of the Apostle St. Peter, in his second Epistle, the last chapter and the end of that chapter, "Ye therefore, beloved, seeing ye know these things before, beware lest

ye also, being led away with the error of the wicked, fall from your own stedfastness. But grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. To Him be glory both now and for ever. Amen."

N. B. The preceding Discourse is a translation from the Latin original of the Author, which will be found at the end of the sixth Volume of Dr. Burton's edition. Oxford, 1827.

DISCOURSE V.

CONCERNING THE FIRST COVENANT, AND THE STATE OF MAN BEFORE THE FALL, ACCORDING TO SCRIPTURE, AND THE SENSE OF THE PRIMITIVE DOCTORS OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH.

Written at the request of a Friend.

[IN all the transactions between God and mankind, some promises have ever been condescended to on God's part, and some conditions have ever been required on our side, in order to obtain and preserve His favour. So it was in the state of innocency, as appears from the very original law given to man. in Gen. ii. 16, 17; which was not established only with a threatening, but with a promise also annexed; and consequently was more than a mere law. So it continued after the fall, as is undeniable from those most remarkable words of God to Cain, recorded in Gen. iv. 7, and from the constant manner of God's proceeding with the Patriarchs and others in the Old Testament. But then it ought nevertheless to be observed, that besides the seeds of natural religion sown in man's mind at the creation, he was also endowed with certain supernatural gifts and powers, in which his perfection chiefly consisted, and without which his natural powers were of themselves insufficient to the attainment of an heavenly immortality; and, consequently, that the law of nature as considered now in fallen man, without Divine revelation, and without any supernatural assistance, is much less able to confer the heavenly immortality and bliss upon them that live up to it. Since both from Scripture, and the consentient testimony of the ancient Catholic

a The beginning of this MS. being wanting, that which is included between the two crotchets is added to supply the

introduction, being extracted from the author's own writings.

writers, it is plain, as I have elsewhere shewed", that there was a covenant of life made with man in his state of innocence, and not (as some pretend) only a law imposed upon him; that this covenant was by the transgression of the protoplast made void both to him and his posterity; that all his posterity, as such, were thereby wholly excluded from the promise of eternal life made in that covenant, and consequently subjected to a necessity of death without hope of any resurrection; that, as such, they are only under the obligation of the law of nature, and the dictates of common reason; that this law is not a law of perfect obedience, or a rule of perfection; that it hath not the reward of eternal life annexed; and that there is no covenant of life eternal, which God ever entered into with the posterity of fallen Adam, but that only which is confirmed and ratified in Christ, the "second Adam;" and which is by consequence the very same with the Gospel itself.

But because from what I have already written on this head, it may not be sufficiently evident to all, what the nature of this covenant of life eternal was, which God made with man in his state of integrity, and what were the means proportioned to it in order to the end, I shall readily take the pains to explain the sense of the Catholic Church hereupon, in which I ́ readily concur and acquiesce; and I would have it to be accounted as my own. That there was then such a covenant made with man by God, I cannot doubt in the least. I am not ignorant that the school of Socinus (which taketh too] great a liberty of interpreting Scripture against the consent of the Catholic Church) flatly denies it, affirming the law given to Adam to have been a mere law, established only with a threatening, and no covenant, or law with a promise annexed. But the contrary is most evident. For, 1. The prohibition given to Adam, concerning the not eating of the tree of knowledge, is ushered in (which very few interpreters take any exact notice of) with this express donation or grant of God, that he might

&c.

b Appendix ad Animad. xvii. §. 2,

• Here the Manuscript in the Dishop's own hand begins.

d This was long ago observed by Theophilus Antiochen. 1. ii. ad Autolyc. p. 101. [c. 21. p. 366.] where, speaking

of the law given to the first man, he hath these words, Ἐνετείλατο αὐτῷ ἀπὸ πάντων τῶν καρπῶν ἐσθίειν, δηλονότι καὶ ἀπὸ τοῦ τῆς ζωῆς, μόνου δὲ ἐκ τοῦ ξύλου τοῦ τῆς γνώσεως ἐνετείλατο αὐτῷ μὴ yevoao@ai.