which from the Fall has educed greater blessedness to the creature and greater glory to himself. While man stood-noble and godlike as he was, and truly the image of God, and an instrument fit to shew forth His glory-he did not properly represent the Creator, because not representing him distinct from the creature. A self-sufficient creature, or a deified creature, were such things possible, would not manifest God the Creator distinct from and above the creation. God manifest in the flesh and no part of it-this, this is the great mystery of godliness: a personal God manifested in a person, known to be distinct from the person, to be God-known to be a person, not an influence-known to be the Originator of spirit and will and understanding, as well as of matter-the Creator of body, soul, and spirit; of all things, whether visible or invisible; and for whose pleasure they are and were created.

God's benevolence towards all the creatures he has made, is unwearied and unchanging: he delighteth to bless. And, God's wisdom being infinite as his love, he reveals to his creatures the true way of attaining the blessings which he loves to bestow. To Infinite Wisdom there can be but one way, and the wisdom of finite creatures consists in following implicitly in that way which Infinite Wisdom has pointed out: implicit obedience, therefore, is the first duty of the creature. We might carry our argument up to the angels who kept, and kept not, their first estate, and shew that the difference between them lay in difference of choice in them; some of these "ministering spirits" having chosen to abide dependent upon God for all things, and to know nothing of themselves, but wait for directions continually from him; while others, in the free exercise of will (without which they would not be creatures outstanding from the Creator, but parts of the Creator, which is a perfectly absurd supposition), choosing for themselves, and not binding themselves to implicit obedience, must of necessity choose wrong, as they are of necessity finite in knowledge, and as the one only possible way had been already revealed by Infinite Wisdom and that way to be kept only by implicit obedience. We might from hence shew that every such deviation, in the slightest particular, has all the guilt of the most aggravated sin; and that these aggravations are but the measures of sense, affect not the principle, and neither aggravate nor extenuate sin in the mind of the Infinite We might thus shew that many of the discussions concerning the origin of evil have been wholly beside the truth; evil being in its origin a negation; and a negation of the only good being of necessity evil, wholly evil, irremediably evil, except by a new creative act of Omnipotence. And we might further shew, that this demonstrates from reason a truth which is so clearly revealed in Scripture,-that for the angels who sinned no redemp

tion is possible: their re-creation could not take place without the destruction of their present being, and would annihilate the distinction between right and wrong, between obedience and disobedience, between holiness and sin.

But these topics we pass for the present, leaving them to the meditation of our readers, that we may address ourselves now solely to the manifestation of the personal God in man, and the transcendent glory which shall from thence redound to the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, through all eternity. And we now desire to do it briefly and practically; gathering up the heads of doctrine to be found in many preceding papers, and resting and feeding upon them, in preparation for the speedy coming of the Lord from heaven, to be glorified in his saints, and to be admired in all them that believe; to manifest the sons of God as the tabernacle of the invisible God in the midst of menmen beholding the glory of the Son, which he had with the Father before the foundation of the world; and themselves transformed into the same image, from glory to glory, as by the Lord the Spirit (2 Cor. iii. 18).

the

God, who knoweth the end from the beginning, and who hath ordained all the laws of succession which we observe, and controuls and directs every thing which we call contingency, did, from the time when he said "Let us make man in our image," arrange all things to bring about this manifestation of himself in man, whom he was about to make. The Fall of man was then foreseen, and the remedy provided; and in the contemplation of the glory therein to be displayed, the Eternal Word, Wisdom set up from everlasting, "from the beginning, or ever the earth was, "" rejoiced in the habitable part of his earth, and had his delights with the sons of men." And the Father, having determined to manifest the fulness of the Godhead in a body, sent forth the Son, by whom also he made the worlds, to create man in such sort as that he might be a fit instrument to make known the character of God, to feel the affections of God, to speak the words of God, to do the works of God: and such a body as the Son himself had first created did he in the fulness of time assume, to do therein his Father's will, and make known that will to the universe. "A body hast thou prepared me....lo! I come to do thy will, O my God....I have not concealed thy righteousness and thy truth from the great congregation' (Ps. xl.; Heb. x).

But this will of God, the delight in which brought the Son from heaven to take a body, was complete in the purpose of God before time was, and before the creation of the world, from the dust of which the first body of man was framed and the glorious future and eternal state of man, when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal immortality;

which man in the person of Christ has now attained, and which all the sons of God shall attain at the resurrection; was the end and consummation contemplated in the purpose of God from the beginning. His purpose, like every thing else in God, is erroneously regarded unless considered apart from time and place and circumstance: these are the creature elements and conditions within which alone the creature can apprehend an infinite God; but if we suppose that the whole of God is to be so apprehended, we do greatly err. In thus looking at the purpose of God as complete from the beginning, we have also another error to guard against, lest, holding the purposed recovery, we seem to necessitate the fall, or necessitate sin and death in the provision for resurrection and incorruptibility. The argument is the same with that of the Apostle to the Romans; "Have they? stumbled that they should fall? God forbid, but through their fall salvation is come to the Gentiles:" and the conclusion is also the same; "Oh the depth both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! how unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out!" (Rom. xi. 11, 33.)

While Adam stood in obedience he could know no change; being sustained by his Creator as long as he fulfilled the ends of his creation. But Adam's stability gave no demonstration of the unchangeable nature of God, unless he continually referred it solely to God, and gave demonstration that it was not in himself by some perpetual token; as abstaining from the forbidden tree, and taking God's word for good and evil; doing what HE should command, avoiding what HE should forbid. While Adam thus stood, in conformity with the will of his Creator, he might exhibit holiness, truth, love, peace, joy, and so forth, to the intelligent creation, and exercise righteous dominion over the inferior creatures, and so far become the likeness of God in part. But God has revealed himself to us now in various attributes which could have no manifestation in man while Adam stood in his integrity, though they form the most sublime and touching and rapturous of all the attributes. He could not then have been known in the character by which He revealed himself to Moses, as "The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, forgiving iniquity, transgression, and sin;" nor could He have displayed to us the infinitude of his holiness and love combined in one act, as when he spared not his own Son, but sent him to die for sinful man, to save man from eternal death; displaying to the heavenly hosts the heretofore inconceivable paradox of mercy and truth met together, righte ousness and peace kissing each other: at the revelation of which they rejoiced together, praising God, and saying "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will towards

men;" and which gave a new cause of joy to the angels themselves, over every sinner that repenteth. "Without controversy, great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory" (1 Tim. iii. 16). We, who from our childhood are familiarized with the stupendous fact of the Incarnation of the Son of God, cannot fully enter into, and many of us have not even a conception of, the difficulty, we had almost said the impossibility, of understanding the mysteries of redemption in its details before the coming of Christ. The fact of a redemption was so clearly revealed that the faithful expected it; but the circumstances appeared so irreconcileable, that, though angels desired to look into them, and holy men of old searched diligently, and prophets and righteous men desired to see those things which we see and to hear those things which we hear, they could not discover them. If redemption were so simple a work as many of our brethren idly and thoughtlessly imagine, it were easily discoverable. If redemption were merely an equivalent provided, or a reciprocal transfer of punishment and righteousness; or if it were brought about by creating another man of stronger endurance than Adam; or re-creating such an one as Adam, and taking this new man into union with the Son of God: if any of these suppositions were the work of redemption, it might be easily understood; but it would not meet the case,-it would bring no glory to God, it would afford no hope to man. First, it would be no manifestation of God the Creator of Adam, and our Creator; for it would in no measure come in contact with Adam or his race it would need some connecting link to demonstrate that this God was our God. Secondly, it would afford no hope to man, who needs to know how he may recover the favour of God, and attain to eternal life; and the knowledge that some other kind of being has so succeeded cannot satisfy this need. We need to be assured that one like ourselves has been empowered by our God to explore the paths which we are called to follow; that he, in flesh like ours, triumphed over all those enemies by which we are assailed; that he, our kinsman according to the flesh, died to redeem all mankind, and rose from the dead, and ever liveth to make intercession, and is ever willing to send the Holy Spirit to quicken our mortal bodies with the same life and power which he possesses; that we may not only follow the great Captain of our salvation through the thorny mazes of this earthly pilgrimage, but walk through the valley of the shadow of death and fear no evil, knowing by the word of the Lord that "them which sleep in Jesus will God bring with him, and so shall we ever be with the Lord."

When Christ came in our nature, the kindness and love of God appeared; and he, performing in our flesh all the commands and requirements of God, justified the ways of God, proved that the commandment was holy and just and good; and having glorified his Father upon earth, by finishing the work which he gave him to do, he is now as Son of Man invested with that glory which he had as Son of God with the Father before the world was, and in him man now truly is the image of God; but in him alone for not till his ascension did he become the Second Adam, speaking from heaven; the quickening Spirit. And as he attained his present glory through humiliation and suffering, we, who now bear the image of the earthly, shall, if we follow his footsteps, bear the image of the heavenly Adam, and shall also attain to far higher dominion than man lost by the Fall. The viiith Psalm, as quoted in the Hebrews, demonstrates this, and gives to all his faithful followers, not only the assurance of the sympathy and succour of their great Captain, but promises them the participation of all his prerogatives in the ages to come-all, without any exception. The Man thus visited and subsequently exalted, is in the Psalm Enosh, 'infirm, miserable man;' as in the Prophets he is called "a worm, and no man ;" and in the Hebrews he is said to be touched with a fellow-feeling of our infirmities, "in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin" (Heb. iv. 15), "that he might be a merciful and faithful High Priest: for in that he himself hath suffered, being tempted, he is able to succour them that are tempted" (Heb. ii. 18). Our High Priest, who is now within the veil, hath there received all power in heaven and earth; which he is ready to give in the Holy Spirit to all his followers, for the end of thus ensuring their purification, their perfecting through sufferings, their patient endurance, and their victory over tribulation-not their escape from trial. "For it became him, for whom are all things, and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons unto glory to make the Captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings. For both He that sanctifieth, and they who are sanctified, are all of one; for which cause he is not ashamed to call them brethren" (Heb. ii. 10, 11).

Bringing his sons unto glory, is therefore the end for which Christ came; and sanctification through suffering, is the means both in him and in them: and this shall have its accomplishment in both in the world to come, which shall not be administered by angels, but by risen saints, who shall then, under Christ, exercise the dominion spoken of in the viii th Psalm-the dominion contemplated in the purpose of God at the creation, and prophesied of by all the holy men of old as the new creation; the reign of the Lord our Righteousness, our Melchizedek, Jehovahshammah; the kingdom of heaven; the tabernacle of God with men; the heavenly Jerusalem; the Millennial blessedness "For