ent passage concerning those against whom he was writing"Ecce enim dico alium esse patrem et alium filium et alium spiritum, male accipit idiotes quisque aut perversus hoc dictum, quasi diversitatem sonet, et ex diversitate separationem protendat, patris et filii et spiritus." Adv. Prax. lib. i. § 9.

of

Such then are the attempts to set aside this passage Tertullian. Dr. Horsley affirms that the majority of believ ers' means only 66 some persons ignorant and stupid in the extreme." The Monthly Reviewer says Tertullian called his opponents, the bulk of believers, in a fit of passionate disdain, and that even if the majority of Christians did not believe the doctrine of the trinity, they might have believed something else equally adverse to the opinions of Dr. Priestley. Mr. Barnard after entering his caveat against the credibility of an heretic, and insinuating that no truth could have been expected from Tertullian after he became a Montanist, if he had not still remained a trinitarian, finally concludes to give up the majority of believers to Dr. Priestley, only maintaining that they were heretics and out of the church; and poor Jamieson in his attempts to manage this difficult passage blunders against the vulgar rules of syntax and construction. It will be seen however that these explanations are so inconsistent, that if any one of them be true the rest must be essentially false, and that they mutually destroy each other.

We come next to different passages from Origen. Origen, who, it may be recollected, is one of the principal authorities, and the most decisive in proof of the unitarianism of the Jewish church, is, according to Dr. Priestley, equally clear in affirming the fact, that the majority of Gentile Christians were unitari-ans. Dr. Priestley introduces his quotations from him with the following remarks:-"That the common people among Christians were actually unitarians in the early ages, and believed nothing of the preexistence or divinity of Christ before the council of Nice, we have as express a testimony as can be desired in the case. These sublime doctrines were thought to be above their comprehension, and to be capable of being under

stood and received by the learned only. This we see most. clearly in the general strain of Origen's writings, who was himself a firm believer, and a zealous defender, of the preexistence and divinity of Christ."*

The first passage which Dr. Priestley quotes from him is as follows:-"This,' says Origen, 'we ought to understand, that, as the law was a shadow of good things to come, so is the gospel as it is understood by the generality. But that which John calls the everlasting gospel, and which may be more properly called the spiritual, instructs the intelligent very clearly concerning the Son of God.-Wherefore the gospel must be taught both corporeally and spiritually, and when it is necessary, we must preach the corporeal gospel, saying to the carnal, we know nothing but Jesus Christ and him crucified. But when persons are found confirmed in the spirit, bringing forth fruit in it, and in love with heavenly wisdom, we must impart to them the logos returning from his bodily state, to that in which he was in the beginning with God.'"+

This passage, with some others which I am about quote, was produced by Dr. Priestley in his Second Letters to Dr. Horsley; but Dr. Horsley not having made any reply concerning them, I have only to offer the remarks of Jamieson. He first proposes a new translation of the beginning of the passage. It is as follows"As the law contains a shadow of good things to come, which are declared by the law truly explained, Hist. Earl. Opp. B. iii. c. 13. sect. 2.

+ « Και τετο δε ειδεναι εχρην, ότι ώσπερ εστι νόμος σκιαν περιοχών των μελλόντων αγαθών ύπο τε κατ' αλήθειαν καταγγελλομένου νόμου δηλουμένων; έτω και ευαγγελιον σκιαν μυστηριων χριστου διδασκε, το 10μιζόμενον ὑπο παντων των εντυγχανοντων νοείσθαι. Ὁ δε φησιν Ιωαννης ἐναγγέλιον αιώνιον, οικείως αν λεχθησομενον πνευματικον, σαφως παρίστησι τοις νο8σι τα παντα ενωπιον περί τε ὑια το 968.-Διοπερ αναγκαιον πνευμα τικως και σωματικως χριστιανίξειν και όπε μεν χρη το σωματικόν κηρυσ στον ευαγγελιον, φασκοντα μηδεν ειδεναι τοις σαρκικοίς η Ιησεν Χρισον και τα τον εσαυρωμενον, τ8τον ποιητέον. Επαν δε ευρεθώσι κατηρτισμένοι τῷ πνευματι, και καρποφορείες εν αυτώ, ερώντες τε τε ερανια σοφίας, μεταδόλιον αυτοίς τε λογέ, επανελθοντος απο τε σεσαρκωσθαι, εφ ο ην εν αρχή προς τον θεον.” Comment. in Johan. Tom. i, sec. 9. vol. iv. p. 9. 10. Ed. Delaru. --Second Letters to Dr. Horsley, Let. 8. Hist. Earl. Opp. B. iii, c. 13.

even so the gospel as it is received to be understood by all who are coming to be instructed teaches a shadow of the Christian mysteries." With regard to Dr. Priestley's translation of a part of this passage" so is the gospel as understood by the generality." Jamieson affirms-"Origen hath said nothing that can bear this sense. He does not so much as mention the generality. This is entirely our author's own gloss."" Origen has no idea of contrasting the learned with the common people, but church members with the catechumens, who were yet to be initiated in the first principles of the oracles of God."" Nothing can be plainer," he adds, "than that the only persons here contrasted are those coming vouabat, 'to be instructed,' and τοις το σι 'those already instructed.'" Jamieson then proceeds to state that great secresy was by the time of Origen introduced into the church, with regard to mysteries; and that however long persons might have been in the state of catechumens, the mysteries of the Trinity and incarnation were not taught them till about forty days before baptism. Origen therefore, according to him, is merely saying that the corporeal gospel, as he calls it, was to be preached to catechumens, and the spiritual gospel to the initiated. To this answer of Jamieson, it is only necessary to say, what will be perfectly obvious to every one who has a com, mon knowledge of the Greek language, that the words of the original will bear no such meaning as he has put upon them. To yoμZouevo cannot mean-" as is received to be understood," and still less can vouoda, mean “to be instructed." Nouiqua, as far as its significations have any reference to the present passage, means, to be considered,'' to be thought,' to be esteemed?and you, not " to be instructed," but to be understood.' The literal rendering of the passage, of which Dr. Priestley has given the proper sense, is as follows: "As the law exhibits a shadow of good things to come, to be made manifest by that law, which is preached according to truth, so also the gospel, as it is thought to be understood by the generality, teaches a shadow of the mysteries of Christ." The translation of Ferrarius, which is published in the Benedictine edi

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tion of Origen, and which may be seen below,* agrees esseutially with the above, and with that of Dr. Priestley.

It is unnecessary to point out some other errors, by which Jamieson has supported what he has advanced.

I proceed to another passage, which Dr. Priestley has produced from Origen.

"Some are adorned with the logos itself, but others with a logos which is akin to it, and seeming to them to be the true logos; who know nothing but Jesus Christ and him crucified, who look at the word made flesh."+

"It is not surprising," says Jamieson, "that a writer, who was so absolutely devoted to mystical senses, as to speak contemptuously even of the letter of the gospel, should frequently take occasion to expose the ignorance of others, while he thus virtually extolled his own inventive powers. This is the obvious tendency of the other passages quoted by Dr. Priestley." He then quotes the passage last given, and only remarks upon it, that "in these words, there is nothing that shews whether he immediately referred to catechumens, or to church members."

The next passage quoted by Dr. Priestley is as follows:

"There are,” says Origen, "who partake of the logos which was from the beginning, the logos that was with God, and the logos that was God, as Hosea, Isaiah, and Jeremiah, and any others that speak of him as the logos of God, and the

• —“ Ut lex umbram continet futororum bonorum, quæ declarantur ab ea lege quæ annuntiatur secundum veritatem; sic etiam Evangelium, quod vel a quibuscunque vulgaribus [υπω πάντων των εντυγχάνοντων] intelligi existimatur, umbram docet mysteriorum Christi." Oi TyxαMONTES, Qui in nos incidunt, seu, In quos nos fortefortuna incidimus. STEPHANUS. It may be thought however (as Ferrarius seems to have understood it) that ὁ εντυγχανων here passes into the meaning of ὁ επιτυ χων.ὁ επιτυχων de quolibet dicitur in quem primum incidimus.Et quoniam ea, quæ passim obvia sunt, vilia plerumque sunt et vulgaria, ideo pro Vilis, Vulgaris et Trivialis accipitur-Item homo Tx dicitur qui eorum numero est qui passim nobis occurrunt. Id est, qui Plebeius est et e vulgo, Vilis et humilis conditionis. STEPHANUS.

† Comment in Johan. tom. ii. sec. 3. Op. tom. iv. p. 53. Edit. Delaru. Hist. of Earl. Opp. ubi sup.

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logos that was with him; but there are others who know nothing but Jesus Christ and him crucified, the logos that was made flesh, thinking that they have every thing of the logos, when they acknowledge Christ according to the flesh. Such is the multitude of those who are called Christians.”* "Here," says Jamieson, "I grant, Origen seems to speak of church-members. But the whole context is such a mass of mystic absurdity, that it is impossible to know his determinate meaning, almost in any one assertion. A few lines before explaining a passage in Deut. iv. he says, That God gave the heavenly bodies to the nations, that those who cannot recur to intelligible nature, might suspect that there was divinity in bodily and sensible things, and not descend to the worship of idols (the work of the hands of men) and dæmons.' I presume, that it would puzzle our author himself to make. any thing that has the shadow of sense, not to speak of the substance, in the greatest part of the exposition of that passage which is the pretended text.

"Are we then," he asks, "to form our judgment of the real state of the Christian church from such an unintelligible rhapsody?"

I can readily believe that Jamieson did not understand the context of Origen, though from a different cause than any intrinsic obscurity. The sentence that he has quoted as a specimen of mystic absurdity is in itself about as intelligible as can easily be produced. Origen is instituting a comparison between those who are in different states of knowledge in respect to what is to be worshipped as supreme, and those who have different degrees of knowledge in regard to the logos, or rather are in different states with regard to the wisdom, of which he is the source. He divides each, viz. the worshippers of the true God and of other gods, and the partakers of the logos into four classes. The third class of those first mentioned are such as worship the heavenly bodies, whom he considers as superior to the fourth and last class, the worship

Comment in Johan. ubi sup. Second Letters to Dr. Horsley, let. 8. Hist. of Earl. Opp. ubi sup.