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wound your character; but I feel that obligation exceedingly increased when I am fpeaking to a Minifter, an ambassador of God, on whofe reputation for probity and veracity fo much depends yet how to deliver my fentiments on this paffage, how to expofe it as it ought to be expofed, and yet to fay nothing which may give you offence, I own I find very difficult. In most cafes we may diftinguish between the man and the fentiment, and combat the latter, while we love and admire the former; but how to separate them here I know not: let, however, your affertions fpeak for themfelves.

"You differ not with refpect to what Chrift taught." Pray, Sir, do not the Methodils agree with almoft all the Proteftant churches in believing that Chrift taught original fin, † the new birth, and juftification by faith? Whether thefe doctrines be true or not is nothing to our prefent purpose: the question is, do not they believe that Chrift taught thefe doctrines? And did not you know that they were of this opinion? Yes, Sir; but are you of this opinion? Do you believe that Chrift taught these doctrines in the fenfe in which they do? No:-Tell me then, Sir, what conftruction can charity itfelf put upon this affertion, which fhall acquit you of deliberate falfehood?

Again. "You differ not with refpect to what Chrift did." Do not the Methodists believe, not merely that Chrift suffered, but that in fuffering he made a true and proper atonement for fin? Yea, are not their hopes founded upon this doctrine? But, Sir, do you believe that Chrift did this? Do you believe that he actually made an atonement for our fins? How fhall we then account for your profeffing to agree with them in every thing Chrift did, when you utterly difagree with them in the most important thing he ever did?

Again. "You do not differ with respect to what he will do. Let me once more appeal to yourfelf: do not the Me. VOL. XIV. 4 M

John iii. 6

+ John iii. 3. John iii. 15, 18, 36.

thodists

thodists believe that Chrift will come unto them and make his abode with them; that he will teach them as truly as ever he taught his difciples in the days of his flesh; that he will comfort and ftrengthen them; that he will manifeft himself to them as he does not unto the world; and that upon the footing of his own meritorious death he will make interceffion for them at the right-hand of God? I do not afk you what interpretation you put on the paffages of fcripture to which I allude; but whether you understand them in the fenfe in which the Methodils do? Do you believe the doctrines which they believe to be contained in them? You know, Sir, you do not. Let me afk you then, Sir, did you write this paragraph through inadvertency, or did you write it deliberately? If you wrote it inadvertently, it will furely become you to retract it: let the world know, Sir, that it was an overfight; and do your utmost to prevent the circulation of fo grofs a mistake. Confider, that if the Methodifts credit your affertions, they will read your books under the expectation of finding all the doctrines, on which they build their hopes, inculcated and enforced: and thus they will fall into a fnare, through their unwillingness to entertain an uncharitable thought of you. Let me entreat you therefore to pay a greater regard to your own character, than to fuffer fuch notoriously false affertions to pass uncontradicted by yourself. Any man may err, and inadvertently affirm what on mature confideration he would condemn: but no one can continue to circulate a falfehood, especially if it be of fuch a pernicious tendency as thofe above referred to, without forfeiting all right and title to the character of an honest man: for your OU'R fake therefore as well as theirs let your acknowledgement be Ipeedy, full, and unequivocal. But, if you refufe to acknowledge the paragraph was written inadvertently, what muft the world think? Surely they muft conclude that you wrote it deliberately, for the purpose of impofing on the Methodists, and of drawing them over to your own party. Will they not then juflly alk, "where is your probity? Where is your regard to confcience?"

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Oh! Sir, cut off all occafion for fuch reflections. After profeffing to agree with the Methodifts in thefe things, you challenge them to produce one paffage in fupport of the only point wherein you differ; "Shew me if you can. fay you, a fingle admonition against not worshipping Chrift as God." This, Sir, is a striking example of the artful way which you take to promote and propagate your own fentiments: you have been repeatedly confuted by fair argument, and therefore you have recourfe to methods, which are calculated only to perplex an honeft mind. Let us fuppofe for a moment, that there were no exprefs admonition against not worshipping Chrift as God; would that omiffion invalidate all which the fcriptures have affirmed refpecting the deity of Chrift? Is it not very fufficient for us that Chrift is exprefsly called God; that the attributes and works peculiar to Jehovah are ascribed to him; that the apoftles prayed to him as God, and that Stephen in his dying moments worshipped him in the very fame words in which Chrift in his dying moments had worshipped the Father? Thefe, Sir, are the grounds upon which we think ourselves bound to worship Chrift: and are they not fufficient, without any admonition against not worshipping him? Are we, Sir, to defpife God's directions, because he has not feen fit to give us admonitions? Are we at liberty to dictate to God, and to tell him in what manner he fhall fpeak? You fee then, Sir, there would be no force in your objection, even if it were true: but I think that an unprejudiced reader may find admonitions as well as directions and examples. What does God fay by the Prophet Ifaiah? (xlv. 22, 23.) "Look unto me and be ye faved all the ends of the earth, for I am God and there is none elfe; I have fworn by myself that unto me every knee fhall bow, every tongue fhall fwear ?" Thefe, Sir, you yourfelf will acknowledge to be the words of Jehovah. And does not St. Paul expressly apply them to Chrift? Does he not lay, (Rom. xiv. 10, 11) "We fhall all and at the judgment-feat of Chrift; for it is written, as I live faith the Lord, every knee 4 M a

fhall

fhall bow to me, and every tongue fhall confefs to God?" You will fay, "the Apofle is only fpeaking of our ftanding at the judgment-feat of Chrift, and not of our worshipping him" true; but in order to confirm that folemn truth, he quotes the words of the Prophet, wherein Jehovah himself requires the higheft acts of worship to be paid to him: now we cannot fuppofe he would do this, if Chrift were not that very perfon before whom every knee muft bow, and to whom every tongue must confefs? And how can Chrift be that perfon without being at the fame time Lord and God? Yet if this be the cafe, then it must be Chrift himfelf who is fpeaking by the Prophet; and if Chrift fwears thus by himself that every knee fhall bow to him, is not this equivalent to the strongest admonition against our not bowing to him? Let us bring another inftance from the words of our Lord himself: he tells us, (John v. 23.) that all judgment is committed to him, "that all men fhould honour the Son:" but how are they to honour him? as a mere creature? No. They must honour him, “even as they honour the Father."

I am aware that the word which we tranflate even as often means nothing more than a resemblance: but in this place I apprehend it muft denote equality; becaufe the Jews themselves understood him as making himfelf equal with God, and were feeking to kill him on that very account, ver. 18; and because, in the verses that precede and follow this paffage, he claims an equality with the Father, both in refpect of his felf-exiftence and of his power to raise the dead; vid: ver. 21-26. If we add to this, that the Jews on other occafions alfo confidered him as "making himlelf God," (John x. 33.) and that he is faid by St. Paul to have "thought it no robbery to be equal with God," (Phil. ii. 6.) it will appear that we are fully jus tified in interpreting this pallage as requiring men to honour Chrift equally with the Father. But ftill the question will recur; what admonition is here against our not honouring him, in this exalted manner? Read the next words; "He that, honoureth

honoureth not the Son, honoureth not the Father who hath fent him." Now, Sir, you yourfelf will allow that not to honour the Father muft bring inevitable deftruction on our fouls: and yet Chrift declares that the not honouring of him even as they honour the Father will be conftrued as a neglect of honouring the Father. Can there poflibly be a fronger admonition than this?

Observe, Sir, I offer not these as the principal grounds of our worshipping Chrift; we have plainer and ftronger reasons than these, even such as I have before mentioned; we fee fo many proofs of his Godhead in the Scriptures, fuch plain commands to worship him, and fo many inftances wherein prayer was addreffed to him by his own Apofties, that we dare not do otherwife than worship him as God. Nevertheless from these paffages the Methodifts may fee how groundlefs your objections are, and may learn to guard against the artifice with which they are propofed.

With refpect to what you tell them, "that you once thought as they now do," that will have but little weight with them: while they behold you publishing thofe letters against Mr. W-'s will; while they confider how you have mifrepresented Mr. W's words; and above all, what unparalleled affertions you make refpe&ting the agreement of your fentiments with theirs; at the fame time that light and darkness do not differ more from each other than they do from you in all the fundamental doctrines of Chriftianity: I fay, when they confider these things, your conduct will not imprefs them with any favourable opinion of your change; nor will they feel themfelves much inclined to follow your example. They will rather be ftirred up to watchfulness and circumfpection; and will fee more forcibly the neceffity of attending to that advice of the Apoftle; "be not children toffed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the fleight of men and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive; but speaking the truth in love, grow up into him in all things, who is

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