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diversified than the ancients respect- | name, are little more than a modifica

ing their theological creed. Spinoza agrees with some of the ancients in maintaining God and the universe to be the same. To this opinion Lucas and Tolland also subscribe; and it is generally thought that Hume's opinions were something similar. Des Cartes imagined his visionary vortices to be God; and Mr. Pope observes, that

"All are but parts of one stupendous whole, Whose body nature is, and God the soul." Some modern infidels have believed, with Confucius, an ancient Chinese philosopher, that this world has existed in its present form from all eternity; and to this opinion Sir William Temple yields his cordial assent. Others, again, allow that it was created in time, but reject the Mosaic account, attributing to it an earlier date, by some thousand years at least; while a third class adopt the atomical hypothesis, with all its accompanying absurdities. But as the far greater number of modern infidels can give no intelligible account of their creed, they will do well, on this interesting subject, to consult Cudworth's Intellectual Systém, where they may obtain some valuable information.

Now, while it appears evident from the foregoing remarks, that infidels are more diversified in their sentiments than those who profess the religion of Jesus; it will also be obvious, that the subjects on which Christians differ in opinion, are of much less importance than those on which infidels disagree; and it may be confidently predicted, that the differences of opinion which at present agitate the Christian world, will be completely reconciled long before infidels are agreed among themselves on the leading features of their natural theology. In the preceding remarks, no distinction has been made between deism and atheism; for the writer considers them so nearly allied to each other, that he must be a profound metaphysician who can draw the line of demarcation between them. The learned Dr. Samuel Clarke, in his Evidences of Natural and Revealed Religion, observes, that "every deistical pretence must, of necessity, terminate in downright atheism." And it is melancholy to reflect, whatever may be said to the contrary, that some systems which assume the Christian

tion of infidelity; for if there be any
truth in the scriptures, it is not less
criminal to reject its distinguishing
doctrines, than to deny the existence
of their divine Author,-the eternal
and triune God.
Elgin.
J. G.

(To be continued.)

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Abraham.

As a spiritual seed is something entirely different from a natural, it is necessary, in the first place, to shew in what the difference consists, and to describe the manner in which men are constituted spiritual. And here it ought to be observed, though indeed it be a truth generally admitted, that all men are naturally on a level before God. The universal depravity of human nature, is a doctrine clearly taught in scripture; and the distinction between the converted and unregenerate is constantly kept in view. The two great heads of these respective bodies are distinguished from each other, 1 Cor. xv. 45, the one being styled the first or earthly, the other the second or heavenly man. And in conformity to the heads, so are the respective members, John iii. 31. Philip. iii. 20.

To constitute men partakers of the first nature, nothing more is necessary than that they be born of men; but to constitute them partakers of the second, it is necessary that they be also born of God, or the Spirit, as our Lord teaches, John iii. 5, &c.

The change which is produced, in thus bringing men out of darkness into God's marvellous light, is always accompanied with a belief of God's revealed truth. As Abraham believed in the Lord, and it was counted to him for righteousness, so they believing, in like manner, are hence counted the children of Abraham; and are blessed, like him, with the blessing of justification. To be believers of the truth of God, therefore, to be born again, to be created anew in Christ Jesus, to be justified, adopted, and sanctified, are terms of nearly the same import, or inseparable the one from the other, and all relate to one and the same character. Such was the character of

Abraham as a spiritual father, and such is the character of his spiritual children.

In regard to the extent of this ap pointment, it is said, that he was to be made the father of many nations. But that the word many was not to be limited, as signifying only a part, the apostle puts the matter beyond a doubt, when he declares, that Abraham had a promise that he should be heir of the whole world, Rom. iv. 13. When God devised the scheme of salvation by the mission of his Son into the world, he said, "It is a light thing" that he should redeem his people Israel, he shall be for "salvation to the ends of all the earth.” He had

accordingly "the heathen given him for an inheritance, and the uttermost ends of the earth for a possession." Psal. ii. And in conformity to this design, Christ himself commissioned his apostles to go into all the world, and preach the glad tidings to every creature.

Thus, though salvation was of the Jews, blessed be God, it was at no period entirely confined to them. Being free as the air we breathe, and bright as a morning without clouds, it was not to be monopolized by them, or any other who should receive it, but diffused abroad as a common interest-a gladdening message sent to the nations to the whole world, in which all are equally concerned, and from the blessings of which none are excluded.

In considering Abraham as the father of all believers from the beginning to the end of the world, it is necessary that we should recur to the original appointment. When his name was changed from Abram, which signifies a father by eminence, to that of Abraham, which denotes the father of a multitude, this was assigned by Jehovah as a reason, "For a father of many nations I have made, or constituted, thee," Gen. xvii. 5. The word father, in this passage, should not only be connected with the change of the name, but with T, which our translators have rendered made, and which properly signifies to be constituted or appointed to a particular thing. The LXX have it rɛɛika σe, I have placed or constituted thee. It thus denotes the sense in which Abraham was the father of many nations, and distinguishes between the relation in which he stands to them, and that in which he stood to his natural posterity, The last was a relation of an ordinary kind, | and denoted no more, even in Abraham, than what it does in any other human character. The first, however, is far otherwise. There is here no relation by natural descent, nor any but such as flow from a similarity of internal principles and dispositions, and which can be produced only by the power of the truth upon the mind. Hence it follows, that the very truth which Abraham believed, is said to beget others to a belief of it likewise; and on this account, all believers being the children of faith, and begotten of the truth, are the spiritual children of Abraham. The connexion between Abraham as a spiritual father, and believers as his spiritual children, is most explicitly stated by Paul, Gal. iii. 6, 7. “Even as Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him for righteousness. Know ye, therefore, that they which are of faith, the same are the children of Abraham." That is to say, his spiritual children; for the apostle cannot once be supposed as denying the relation which sub-ed by several remarkable characters. sisted at the same time between Abraham and his natural descendants. It is, therefore, to an appointment or constitution of a spiritual kind, and not to natural descent, that the word Th evidently refers.

The means of salvation, it is true, were for a long season, in a manner, confined to Israel; but in contem plating the spiritual Israel, we must extend our thoughts beyond the boundaries of the literal Israel, and include all the true worshippers of God throughout the whole world, from the beginning to the end; for it was of all such that Abraham was constituted the spiritual father. In the antedilu vian age, he had many children, many who believed, as he did, in the promis ed Saviour, and who rejoiced to see his day afar off. Jude relates a predic tion of Enoch, (ver. 14,) from which it appears, that they even understood the doctrine of the future judgment. Believers in that age were distinguish

It is said of Abel, that he sacrificed in faith, Heb. xi. 3.; and when Enos was born, that "men began to call upon the name of the Lord," Gen. iv. 26. Of Enoch it is said, that he walked with God, Gen. v. 24. and of Noah, that

"he was a just man, and perfect in his generation," Gen. vi. 9.

There is nothing, in the Mosaic account of that period, said respecting the number of God's spiritual worshippers; but considering that the epoch itself extended nearly to two thousand years, and that the lives of men were so exceedingly prolonged, as to afford them much opportunity for the propagation of the truth, they would perhaps make greater advances in this respect, than we are aware of. But if truth spread, we know, so did corruption; and that to such a degree, that a holy and righteous God, burdened, as it were, by the wickedness of his creatures, determined to cut them off, by destroying them all with a flood. Though Noah and his family were the only persons preserved from this dreadful catastrophe, I bardly think it probable that there were no other spiritual worshippers at that time, besides him, upon the earth. Be this as it may, however, we may be assured, that Noah, who was a preacher of righteousness to the old world, would be careful to lay the foundations of the new, by communicating God's purposes of grace, and of the world to come. And if Noah was not the means of bringing a goodly number to the knowledge of the truth, (considering that he lived six hundred years previous to the flood, and three hundred and fifty after it, and had that extraordinary event to refer to,) he must have been one of the most unsuccessful preachers ever divinely commissioned. In regard to the more immediate descendants of this patriarch, it appears beyond a doubt, that the fear of the Eternal was in the hearts of many of them.

Many, even of the descendants of Canaan, who are generally considered as having been all devoted to perdition, in consequence of the curse pronounced upon their predecessor Ham, appear to have been by no means destitute of this gracious principle. Compare the genealogy of Ham, Genesis x. with what is related respecting Abraham, and Abimelech king of Gerar, chap. xx. And let it not be forgotten, that, at this time, God himself bears them witness, that they were not so absolutely profligate and abandoned as is generally supposed, by saying, "their iniquity is not yet full," chap. xv. 16..

79.-VOL. VII.

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Further, in looking into these genealogies, we find, that Uz was a descendant of Shem, in the second generation. Now this Uz was, no doubt, the founder of that province or country in the East, which went by the same name, and in which the patriarch Job dwelt. But it ought to be observed, that between Uz and Abraham, there were no fewer than eight generations, and for reasons already adduced, Job must have been still further distant. Supposing it, then, to have been ten or twelve generations, that is to say, about the descent of Israel into Canaan,-a space, I suppose, of nearly six hundred years,what a view does it give us of the state of religion in those places during that period? The history of Job and his friends affords a lively view of their deep researches into the things of God.

We may observe, further, that the worship of the true God seems also to have been preserved by that line of Shem's descendants in which Abraham came; for the God of Abraham is likewise styled the God of Nahor. For the same purpose, we may refer to the account given in the xxivth chapter of Genesis, respecting Abraham's choosing a wife to his son. Principle, it would appear, restrained him from seeking one among the daughters of Canaan, where he sojourned. He therefore sent to his father's house and, lo! when his servant came, and related to them his message, we find him among a people who knew and acknowledged the Lord, and who decided accordingly, with his fear before their eyes, ver. 50. The sons of Abraham by Keturah, having also been favoured with similar privileges, would carry the knowledge of the true God, and of his various transactions with Abraham, with them into the east, whither they were sent; and thus preserve the knowledge of them in those remote parts for many ages. We find, accordingly, that one of Job's friends was a Shuhite, evidently a descendant of Shuah, one of the sons of Abraham thus dispersed; and the same may be remarked concerning that excellent youth, Elihu. He was a Buzite, a descendant of Buz, son of Nahor, brother to Abraham.

This investigation, had we time to pursue it, would not only be delightful, but highly useful; as it would

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open to the mind one connected view of the family of God, and shew how erroneously those people judge, who are for confining the whole knowledge of the true God, then existing among men, to the Israelitish nation.

But to place matters in a right point of view, respecting that nation, and the spiritual seed of Abraham, of which we are speaking, a few further observations will be necessary.

Two different principles are therefore to be particularly observed,-the one, that all the natural posterity of Abraham, in the line of Jacob, were actually in the covenant,-the other, that notwithstanding this, they were not all spiritual; consequently, many who were included in the covenant, in the literal sense, had no interest in it whatever in the spiritual. Upon what other principle can we account for these words of our Saviour, Mat. viii. 11, 12. "That many shall come from the east and west, and shall sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, in the kingdom of heaven; but the children of the kingdom shall be cast out!" From which passage two things are evident: first, that the children of the kingdom were the Jews; for it is between them, and the centurion who applied to Christ in behalf of his servant who was sick of the palsy, that the contrast, in respect of their faith, is here made, as we learn from verse 10th. The other circumstance, equally obvious, is, the expulsion even of these children of the kingdom. Now the question comes to be,-On what account were they expelled, or rather, not admitted, into the kingdom of heaven? The reason is obvious. It was manifestly for their want of faith. "When Jesus heard it," (the centurion's account of himself,) "he marvelled, and said to them that followed, Verily I say unto you, I have not found so great faith, no, not in Israel. And I say unto you, that many shall come," &c. If then the Jews were really the children of the kingdom, and were not, for want of faith, admitted to a participation of its blessings in the world of glory; does not this shew that the interest they had in the kingdom here, arose from some other source than that of personal conversion to God, and belief of the truth? Here they are said positively to be "the children of the kingdom;" but hereafter they shall be cast into

outer darkness, where there shall be wailing, and gnashing of teeth."

What, then, was their situation here as the children of the kingdom, when hereafter they shall be found to have no right nor title to a place in the kingdom of glory? Whether were they spiritual or carnal persons? Whether were they the children of the kingdom by faith in Christ Jesus, or merely by natural descent from Abraham? It was by the latter, undoubtedly; and for want of the former it was, that they could not be admitted into the kingdom of glory. Had they been the spiritual seed of Abraham, as they were his natural, they would, most assuredly, have been as readily admitted into the kingdom of heaven and of glory, as, being his natural, they were into the kingdom which God established upon earth with Abraham and his seed, till Christ should come. Hence, all those who were related to Abraham, not merely in the flesh, but in the spirit, had a place assigned them, not in the kingdom of Israel and land of Canaan only; but in that which both typified, and which was, the grand and ultimate object of their faith. So we read of the thousands who were sealed out of every tribe, in the book of the Revelation, chap. vii. These are the spiritual Israel, selected from among the carnal; and with these the apostle John connects "the multitude which no man can number,"the redeemed "of all nations, and kindreds, and people, and languages."

It is the whole family of God, thus created anew in Christ Jesus, the redeemed of all nations, Gentiles as well as Jews, who are the spiritual seed of Abraham. And with what an exalted view of the greatness and grandeur of this family, are we presented in the scriptures of truth. The scriptures represent it as but a light or small thing for the Saviour to redeem such of his people as belonged only to the Israelitish nation; he was to be for salvation to the ends of all the earth. The bulk of the Jewish nation, far from regarding the salvation even of their own souls, yet pluming themselves on account of their external privileges, became proud, self-conceited, censorious, and disposed to say to others, "Stand by, for I am holier than thou." They would have no dealings with Samaritans-counted sinners among the Gentiles as an unclean thing

vehemently opposed their admission | they shall differ in any thing from what into the kingdom of heaven, contra- they respectively were in the converdicting and blaspheming. But God, sion of myriads at the first promulgawho was found of others besides them, tion of the gospel. The doctrines of and that not only before, but after the cross, which were a stumbling, they had been selected to be his pecu- block to the Jews, and foolishness to liar people, shewed his impartiality the Greeks, were, notwithstanding, the and readiness to accept "all, in every power of God and the wisdom of God nation, that fear him and work righte- unto salvation, to every one that beousness," Acts x. 25. He gave, there- lieved, to the Jew first, and also to the fore, the severest check to the bigotry Greek. And it is still by the same of the Jews, first by the reception of means that a people are to be made willCornelius and his companions into the ing in the day of the Saviour's power, church, and afterwards by commis- Truth alone is to be exhibited, and by sioning his servant Paul to go far truth alone is he to subdue the nations hence among the Gentiles, and to and the people under him. preach the glad tidings to them. When the Jews rejected the doctrine of the apostles, counting themselves unworthy of eternal life, as the scripture expresses it, they said, "Lo! we turn to the Gentiles." To the Gen--worship God in the spirit,-rejoice tiles, accordingly, they did turn; travelling far hence among the nations, preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God. And the effect was, though some mocked and persecuted those heralds of the truth, yet others received with meekness the ingrafted word, which was able to save the soul. Disciples were converted,-churches planted, - ordinances instituted, apostolical instructions written, circulated, and to be transmitted to posterity, as the only rule of faith and practice,

But gloriously as the truth triumphed in the early ages, it was only an earnest or sample of what should take place in latter times. The first-fruits of the Gentiles were then admitted into the church; but there was a whole harvest, a fulness of them, spoken of, to be reserved till the time appointed of the Father, and, with them, his ransomed from among the Jews are also to be gathered in.

Hitherto the gospel of the kingdom has been published but partially among the nations. But we live in the triumphant expectation, that it shall yet be diffused and propagated throughout the whole habitable world; and the present times afford the pleasing aspect of the dawn of this glorious period beginning to break forth.

Though the latter day glory, both as it respects the nations and the ingathering of the Jews, be equally the subject of prophecy; yet we shall err most egregiously, if we imagine, that in effecting either the one or the other,

Thus must a spiritual or believing seed, whether Jews or Gentiles, always have regard to the truth which converts them; and by the faith of which they live,-overcome the world,

in Christ Jesus, and make no provision for the flesh,-by which also they are justified, adopted, and matured for eternal glory.

Many, it is true, in every age, profess to be of the truth, who, nevertheless, are not; but these exceptions make no difference in regard to the general position,-that the spiritual children of Abraham are such only as know God, and are known of him. Mere profession, in this point, makes nothing to the purpose; for if any man have not the same spirit of faith which Abraham had, he cannot be reckoned among the number of his spiritual children while, on the contrary, "they who are of faith, the same are the children of Abraham," Gal. iii. 7.

To place this subject in a yet clearer light, I shall conclude this essay by a remark or two from Dr. Owen. "Two privileges," says he, "did God grant to Abraham, upon his separation to a special interest in the old promise or covenant.

"1st. That according to the flesh, he should be the father of the Messiah, the promised seed, who was the very life of the covenant, the fountain and cause of all the blessings contained in it. That this privilege was temporary, the thing itself doth demonstrate.

"2dly. Together with this, he had also another privilege granted to him, namely, that his faith, whereby he was personally interested in the covenant, should be the pattern of the faith of the church, in all generations; and that

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