say, that nearly all the learned critics and scholars who hold them as genuine, are mistaken.

Priestley. Again, my Lord, the witness attempts to make St. John speak of an incarnation, when he says, "Every spirit which confesses that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God." 1

Court. Well, are not these the very words of our common version?

Priestley. They are, my Lord; but the term "in the flesh" would be better if it were "of the flesh;" for the clear meaning of the passage is, "Every spirit is of God that confesses Jesus Christ is come of the flesh, or is truly man;" and if he considers the original, he must admit this.2

Witness. I can never admit this; for how you can venture to change the translation of a word for that which is not the translation of the original, I know not.

Court. Hand me the Greek Testament. ἐν σαρκὶ ἐληλυθότα. — Well..

Witness. The words v σaprì can only be truly rendered in the flesh;" and the difference be"in tween the coming of Jesus Christ in the flesh, and his coming of the flesh, is wonderfully great: the one declares an incarnation, the other a mortal extraction.

1 1 John, iv. 2.

2 History of Corrup. vol. i. p. 10.

Court. The alteration is inadmissible.

Priestley. Again, the witness denies that the Nazarenes and Ebionites were the same sect under different names, while Origen and Epiphanius both acknowledge that they were one, and maintained the same tenets. Now it is admitted that the Ebionites denied the divinity of Christ, and therefore the Nazarenes denied the same; and they were the Hebrew Christians, or the primitive church of Jerusalem.

Witness. What Epiphanius says is a mere doubt (for he confesses that he knows nothing of the matter), whether the Nazarenes believed in the divinity of Christ'; which doubt you have improved into a positive assertion that they rejected it and with respect to the singular assertion of Origen, that the name of Ebionites was given, without exception, to all the Jewish Christians who united with the acknowledgement of Jesus as the Christ, the strict observance of the Mosaic law, it is worthy of observation that he says, at the same time and in the same passage, that these Ebionites were so named on account of "the poverty of the law2;" whereas, when he is speaking of the Ebionites, properly so called, who professed the opinions of Ebion, and denied our Lord's

1 Adv. Hæres. lib.i. p. 123. in Nazaræos.

2 Contra Cels. lib. xi.

divinity, he tells us that they were so named on account of" their poverty in their faith of Jesus." 1

Priestley. The learned tutor of the great Lardner proves from his writings, that the Nazarenes and the Ebionites were the same sect.

Witness. That Jones, to whom you allude, wrote to this effect I acknowledge; but his single opinion is opposed to that of the greatest critics, to Grotius, Vossius, Spencer, Huetius, and a host of others, together with the illustrious Mosheim himself, who says, "This little body of Christians, which coupled Moses with Christ, split again into two sects, distinguished from each other by their doctrines concerning Christ, and the permanent obligation of the law, and perhaps by some other circumstances ;" and he adds, "The Nazarenes had a better and a truer notion of Christ than the Ebionites."

"2

1 Πτωχεύοντες περὶ τὴν εἰς Ἰησοῦν πίστιν. In Comment. in Matt, p. 428. See British Critic, vol. ii. p. 273.

2 Both Nazarenes and Ebionites were Christians of Jewish origin, who lived, for the most part, to the east of Jordan and the Orontes. The Nazarenes retained the name which was originally borne, not by a single sect, but by the followers of Christ in general: the Ebionites derived their name either from the Hebrew word Ebion, which signifies poor, or, as some have thought, from a founder of the name of Ebion. Both sects were nearly allied to each other, but on some points they differed. They both agreed in retaining the Levitical Law, at the same time that they professed themselves

Priestley. Still I affirm that there is no trace in history, that the Nazarenes believed Christ to be more than man.

Witness. The silence of history would be no proof on this point, that such was their faith, if indeed history were silent, which I think with Grotius and others it is not. But if it could be proved (which I deny to be possible) that these Nazarenes were the first converts of the Circumcision; we, who maintain the full divinity of Christ, should find in their confession the verdict of those first Christians in our favour.

Priestley. Leaving this point upon which we cannot agree, and going to the dying prayer of Stephen, which you say is addressed to Jesus, I have to observe that the proper object of prayer is God the Father; for "him only" are we called upon to serve how then can you justify supplication to any other, even though he were a Divine Being?

Witness. God forbid that I should ever refuse to acknowledge that the Father is a proper object of prayer, and may he equally forbid that I should consider him as the proper object of adoration to

followers of Christ; but they differed from each other in this respect, that the Ebionites considered Christ as a mere man ; whereas, the Nazarenes, if not all, at least some of them, are said to have ascribed to him a divine origin. — Marsh's Michaelis, vol.iv. p. 162.

the exclusion of the other persons in the Godhead, in the sense in which you seem to charge me. I do not deny that there is an honour personally due to him as the Father; but there is also an honour personally due to the Son, as the Son; and to the Spirit, as the Spirit. Our knowledge of these personal distinctions is so obscure, in comparison with our apprehension of the general attributes of the Godhead, that it should seem that the Divinity is rather to be generally worshipped in the three persons jointly and indifferently, than that any distinct honours are to be offered to each separately. Prayer, however, for succour against external persecution, seems addressed with peculiar propriety to the Son.1

Priestley. Next, I would ask, did not the Christians of the second century, who embraced the notion of Plato's Triad of Divinity, conceive Christ (or the Divine Logos as you call him) only to have been an attribute of the Father: and did not this attribute or property of the Divine mind, in process of time, come to be regarded as a separate, personal character? And was not this the change of a mere attribute into a thinking substance? In plain words, is not the wisdom of God personified and called the Son of God?

Witness. No such thing; for neither did the early Christians, or any other Christians, mistake, nor

Dr. Horsley's Letters to Priestley, XII. p. 234.