Now

of by word to intelligent beings when they shall be created, and by them he can be apprehended. Now this subsistence of Godhead within the bounds of intelligence is sustained in the person of the Son, and not in the person of the Father, nor in the person of the Holy Ghost. The Son consenteth, for the common purposes of Godhead, to subsist within the limited bounds of the Christ, wherein he shall ever call the Father GOD, "the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ." This is the expression of his subordinate personality, as the generated Son in the co-equal and coessential Godhead. It is proper to him, as Son eternally begotten, to take upon him the submissive, dutiful, and lovely part of condescending out of the infinite Godhead into the finite Christ; and without changing, or separating from, his Godhead, to put forth for ever its energy in the way of self-emptying and humble condescension into a limited form; which limited form, for its properties we speak not of now, but may give to it its name amongst other intelligencies, which is the risen God-man. while thus it is proper to the Son to uphold and sustain the subsistence of the Christ, it is proper to the Holy Ghost to bring that subsistence into realized form. The Father's property it is, to originate the form; the Son's property it is, to give it person; the Holy Ghost's, to give it life and being: and their communion is, to educe out of it the various ages of time, the various forms of life, the various things of creation; which all, as they come forth from the fulness of the Christ, may acknowledge him as the origin and originator, as the creator and upholder of their life. And thus it is that the Godhead, anterior to all creation and before all worlds, took to himself a limited form of subsistence, which in the Proverbs is called Wisdom (chap. viii.); and in the Gospel by John is called the Word; and in the First Epistle of John is called the Life; and in all Scripture is called the Christ. This is the Divine subsistence which is expressible by word and apprehensible by reason. This is that of which all Scripture doth testify; which, also, all creation doth acknowledge and declare. This is he of whom the acts, offices, and dignities are thus expressed in the opening of the Epistle to the Hebrews:-" God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto the fathers

by the Prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds; who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he bad by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high; being made so much better than the angels, as he hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they. For unto which of the angels said he at any time, Thou art my Son, this day have 1 begotten thee? And again, I will be to him a Father, and he shall be to me a Son?" And of this same being, the Christ, it is still more fully written in the opening of the Epistle to the Colossians: "In whom we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins. Who is the image of the invisible God, the first-born of every creature: for by him were all things created that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers all things were created by him, and for him. And he is before all things, and by him all things consist. And he is the head of the body, the church: who is the beginning, the first-born from the dead; that in all things he might have the pre-eminence. For it pleased the Father, that in him should all fulness dwell; (and having made peace through the blood of his cross) by him to reconcile all things unto himself,-by him, I say, whether they be things in earth or things in heaven. And you that were sometime alienated, and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath he reconciled in the body of his flesh through death, to present you holy and unblameable, and unreproveable in his sight: if ye continue in the faith, grounded and settled, and be not moved away from the hope of the Gospel, which ye have heard, and which was preached to every creature which is under heaven; whereof I Paul am made a minister."

Now it further remaineth to the complete unfolding of this most precious truth, that I should shew what most necessary and otherwise unattainable ends are served by this great act of Godhead, before the world was. first, it realizeth the existence of Godhead before all time, and beyond all space of creation. Here is an act of

And

Godhead in himself, exterior to creation, and therefore altogether out of creation. The act is the setting up of the Christ, "from everlasting, from the beginning, or ever the earth was." (Prov. viii. 23.) And not only is the existence of Godhead thereby realized, but its existence in divers personalities, and also the relation of these personalities to one another, is thereby discovered. In the same passage of the Proverbs is thus written of these two, the person of God and the person of Wisdom : "Then I was by him, as one brought up with him; and I was daily his delight, rejoicing always before him; rejoicing in the habitable part of his earth, and my delights were with the sons of men." And in the sublime exordium of the Gospel by John, it is said of the Word that he was with God, and that he was God, and that he came forth from the bosom of God: and in the passage quoted above from the Colossians, it is said that it pleased the Father that in him all fulness should dwell; expressions these which convey in the strongest terms the diversity of persons in the Godhead, the subordination of place in the unity of substance, between these two, the Father and the Son. But this unity of substance between two divers persons can only be maintained, even in idea, by the existence of a third person, who shall be the bond of that union. If the Father in his own personality were to speak or to do any thing to the Son, to the end of his coming into the bounds of the Christ, or if he were to express or shew forth any affection to him, in that subsistence, then doth the Father himself come within the limits thereof, and unlimitable infinite Godhead ceases to be the inalienable property of the Father; - ceases, indeed, from its unchangeableness, incomprehensibility, and all the other attributes which are essential to its being worshipped by the creature. Therefore,most necessary it is to the end of God, which is his own glory and worship, and the creature's blessedness therein, that, in holding communion with his Son, in the limited form of Christ, he should do it by another person, who being God, may, for this very end of communicating between God the Father and Christ the Son, reduce himself in order to pass between, and fill the Christ with the continual supply of the Father's good pleasure; and having received from Christ the expression of his perfect duty, pass

again into the Godhead of the Father; and so without bringing the Father into limitation, and without taking Christ out of limitation, may, by a continual circulation, preserve the oneness of mind, the identity of will, purpose and act, between God and Christ, between Godhead in the infinite and Godhead in the finite, between Godhead in the absolute and Godhead in the non-absolute. And thus, by the setting up of the Christ before the world was, is the existence of God out of creation, and his subsistence within himself in three persons, and his enjoyment within himself, demonstrated in the only way in which I believe it to be capable of demonstration.

Again, this setting up of the Christ by the persons of the Godhead before the world was, doth make a creation possible, and doth give to creation its proper place and use and relation unto God. Creation hath a being only in virtue of the Christ who is already set up; and only through him hath it, or can it have, any relation to or communication with God. For, as hath been said already, God in himself is essentially incommunicable, ineffable, incomprehensible, while creation is essentially derived, determined, and limited; and, therefore, there could exist no communication whatever between the absolute Godhead and a bounded creation, or a bounded intelligence; for there is no way from the infinite into the finite opened up. Creation in such a case, if creation there could be such, would necessarily be a God unto itself, and consequently a rival God, which God, who is very goodness, would never permit. To connect creation, therefore, with the Godhead, in those bonds of knowledge, worship, and obedience, which are the only sources of its well being, the setting up of Christ as THE FIRST was absolutely necessary: and, though I will not say that the setting up of Christ was for the end of creation, but for the higher end of God's enjoyment of himself, and perhaps also for the end of realizing the personalities of the Godhead in unity, most certainly necessary for the apprehension of the same by us; yet I will say, that creation could not have been without the previous constitution of the Christ, who is therefore said to be before all things, and likewise the first-born of every creature. To the consistency of this great idea, it is essential that the Christ be not a creature, be not a creation; for

if a creature or creation he were, as the believers in a pre-existent humanity erroneously hold, then God were not known out of creation, because he is not known out of Christ; and creation, instead of deploring its own instability and sinfulness, would have had to boast of its stability and sinlessness. What then is the Christ, if he be not a creature, and if he be not the absolute God? He is the purpose of the absolute God realized in a person, which person is the Son of God, very God of very God, in whose Christhood the Father beholdeth his purpose all complete, and through the means of the Holy Ghost doth express his delight therein, and receive his homage by the same Holy Ghost therefrom. And the Son of God in his Christhood doth constitute the ages, and create the world, and do all things according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will, in whom we are chosen before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love. Creation, therefore, and redemption, and election, are all seen in the Christ, and communicated with, by the Father through the Spirit, ere ever they had an outward being; and as the Christ is beloved so is every creature beloved of the Father. This is the high birthplace of every creature, this is the noble birthright of every creature, to have been beloved in the Christ by the Father, before the world was. As the Father loved Christ, so was creation loved of him; and as the Father loved Christ, so are we the church still loved of the Father. (John xvii. 23.) And as the Father loved Christ, so shall all the things in heaven and in earth, when recapitulated into Christ, be loved of the Father; and as creation was seen in Christ before it had a being, perfect, and beautiful, and beloved, it shall be gathered into him and stand in him through ages and ages. This is necessary to be known and had in remembrance, in order that every creature may know what a Father it hath in God, in order that every prodigal creature may know the heinousness of its offence in sinning against such a Father, in order that the exceeding sinfulness of sin may be known, in order that the exceeding long-suffering of God to sinners may be known, in order that the eternal love of God which moved redemption may be known to have been always in him; for what is the love of redemption, but a