one text taken from the 2d. Psalm, being so very peremp tory and decisive, we should even have abstained from transscribing the irrefragable testimonies of the primitive Fathers, had we not to deal with men, who in direct contradiction to all historical truth, would fain make the public believe that the ante-nicine fathers were all Unitarians. The primitive fathers of the church are all on the side of the christian dogma.

CCVIII. St. Ignatius Martyr, in his Epistle to the Magnesians, speaks thus: "There is one God, who has made himself known by Jesus Christ his Son: Who is his eternal Word, that went out from him not after a silence," that is to say, not as if there had been a time, in which the Word did not exist.*

St. Justin, in his Dialogue with Trypho," I shall produce to you, my friends! from the sacred writers another testimony to prove that God, first of all, has before all creatures begotten out of himself a certain rational power or virtue, who, by the Holy Ghost is called the glory of the Lord, at times, his Son, at times, Wisdom, at other times, Angel, sometimes God, and again Lord and Word."†

Athenagoras in his Apology for the Christians, writes thus, "The Son of God is the Word of the Father in thought and ef ficacy; for by him and through him all things were made, as the Father and the Son are one, so that the Son is in the Father, and the Father in the Son, by the union and the power of the Spirit; for the mind, or the Word of God, is the Son of God. Now, if you who excel in acuteness of understanding, wish that I should show from a higher source, what this Son of God means, I shall tell you in a few words. This Son is the firstborn offspring of the Father, who, not as if made (for from the beginning God, who is the eternal mind, has with himself the hoyo, that is, the word or the reason, being eternally ra

"Unus est Deus, qui seipsum manifestum reddidit per Jesum Christum filium suum: qui est ipsius verbum sempiternum, non post silentium progressum." † Μαρτυριον δε και αλλο υμιν, ω φιλοι εφην, απο των γραφων δωσο, ότι αρχην προ παντων των κτισμάτων ο θεος γεγεννηκε δυναμιν τινα εξ εαυτό λογικην, ητις και δοξα κύριε υπο το πνευματοσ τε αγια καλείται, ποτε δε υιοσ, ποτε δε σοφία, ποτε δε αγγελοσ, ποτε δε Θεοσ, ποτε δε κυριος καὶ λο yoo. Dialog. cum Tryph.

tional himself,) but in order to be the idea and perfection of all things, he went forth."*

St. Theophilus of Antioch has these words in his 2d Book to Autolycus, "The prophets were not, when the world was created, but the Wisdom of God, which is in him, and his Holy Word, were always with him." And "God therefore having his own Word in-born in his own bowels, brought it forth with his wisdom, (by wisdom, understand according to the usual phrase of the fathers of that age, the Holy Ghost,) bringing it forth before all things."+

St. Irenæus, 3d. Book against Heresies, chap. xviii. "All kind of contradiction of those who say: if, therefore, Christ was then born, he was not before, is excluded. For we have shown that the Son of God did not then begin, since he always exists with the Father."* And 2d. Book, chap. xxxi. "The Son is always co-existing with the Father."t The same holy father asserts the co-eternity of the Son with the Father, lib. ii. 43; and lib. iii. 6, 12, 16, 18, 21, 23, he expressly teaches that the Son is Oμovorov, or consubstantial with the Father, and truly and by nature God.

Indeed the whole book of Tertullian against Praxeas is nothing less than a professed vindication of the Mystery of the

*

Αλλ' εστιν ο υιος το Θεό, λογοσ τε πατρος εν ιδέα και εν εργεια προς αυτέ γας καὶ δι αυτε παντα ήγενετο, ενοσ οντοσ τε πατροσ και το υίδ. Ουλοσ δε το υιδ εν πατρι, καὶ πατροσ εν υιῳ, ενοτητι καὶ δυναμει πνευματοσ, νεσ και λογοσ το στρεσ, Ο υιοσ το Θεό. x. T. λ.

† σε Ου γαρ ήσαν οι προφηται, ο τε ο κόσμος εγινετο αλλά η σοφία η εν αυτό εσα η του θεε, και ο λογοσ ο αγιοσ αυτε ο α εισυμπαρων αυτω.

Η “ Εκων ουν ο Θεοσ τον εαυτον λόγον ενδιάθετον εν τοισ ιδιοισ σπλαγχ νοια, εγέννησεν αυτόν μετα τησ εαυτου σοφιασ εξερει ξαμενοσ προ των ολων. Ibidem.

"Exclusa est omnis contradictio dicentium: si ergo tum natus est, non erat ante Christus. Ostendimus enim quia non tum cæpit Filius Dei, existens semper apud Patrem."

"Semper est co-existens Filius Patri."

"Sermo ergo et in Patre semper, sicut dixit: Ego in Patre, et apud Deum semper, sicut scriptum est: et Sermo erat apud Deum; et nunquam separatus a Patre, quia Ego et Pater unum sumus."

Trinity, and of the distinction of the three Divine Persons, as it must be evident to any one that will give himself the trouble to peruse the book. Tertullian against Praxeas, c. viii "The Word, therefore, is always in the Father, as he himself says: I, in the Father: and with God always; according to what is written: and the Word was with God; and at no time separated from the Father, for I and the Father are one."

St.Clement of Alexandria explicitly teaches, that the eternal Word has made this universe; and, citing the sublime exordium of St. John," In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God," adds, "Which word, inasmuch as it existed before the laying of the foundations of the world, was the divine principle or beginning of all things; and is still so. This Word, therefore, Christ, was not only the cause of our coming into existence, (for he was then in God) but the same also gave us the means to be happy, and of late appeared to men, in order that he, who only is both God and man, might afford us a complete and perfect felicity. And he who, as the creator of the world, has imparted to us life in our first creation, took the garb of an instructor, with a view of teaching us how to live righteously, in order that hereafter the same as God may bestow upon us life everlasting."*

St. Dionysius of Alexandria, in his Epistle against Paul of Samosata," There is but one Christ, who is in the Father, the co-eternal Word." And, in his answer to 10th. question of Paul of Samosata-" I have written, and I still write, and I confess, and believe, and preach, that the only-begotten Christ and the Word of the Father, is co-eternal with the Father."

Such are the testimonies of the ante-nicine fathers, and from them it is incontrovertibly demonstrated, that it was the steady and uniform belief of the first ages of the church, that Jesus Christ, as the Word, is begotten by the Father by an ineffable and eternal generation, and that, of course, he is true God.

Exhortat. ad Gentes circa initium. Item Pædagog. lib. 2. "Unus est Christus, qui est in Patre co-eternum Verbum."

"Scripsi et scribo, et confiteor, ac credo et prædico ce-eternum Patri Christum unigenitum. et Verbum Patris."

CCIX. I sincerely regret to find the learned and acute Professor Stuart to be at variance with the christian world on the When I entered into the list important subject before us. against a common foe, I little expected to have to contend with those nobler champions, that have taken the field long before me, and that have earned such well-deserved laurels by their able performances. Such however being the case, Professor Stuart's known candour, and love of truth, will not, I am confident, disapprove of my adverting to such parts of his excellent writings as appear to me incorrect.

"This council, (the venerable council of Nice,) says Dr. Stuart, like the great body of the ancient Fathers, believed in the doctrine of the eternal generation of the Son. This generation from all eternity, appears to have been the distinctive point of difference between the Son and the Father, (whom the Ecclesiastical writers often describe as ayemtos, unbegoten,) on which they fixed their attention, and which they have plainly laboured, in their creed, to describe or illustrate. As co-eternal with the Father, they regarded the Son of the same substance they asserted him to be. How then could he be begotten or derived, if he were of the same substance and of the same eternity? To hold fast both these ideas, they said the Son was "God of God; light of light; very God of very God; begotten, not made; of the same substance with the Father." They endeavoured to justify such expressions, by saying that the light of the sun is coeval with it, and of the same substance; and by a multitude of similes of the same nature, drawn from created and material objects. How utterly incompetent all this must be, to effect the object intended, is easy of apprehension when we once reflect, that the divine nature is self-existent, independent, and immutable."*

"After all, I am unable to conceive of any definite meaning in the phrase, eternal generation. Generation or production, like

See "Letters to the Rev. Wm. E. Channing, containing Remarks on his Sermon," &c. by Moses Stuart, Associate Professor of Sac. Lit. in Theological Seminary, Andover. 3d. edition.

creation, necessarily implies in itself beginning; and of course contradicts the idea of absolute eternity."

On this passage I take the liberty of making the following remarks: First, Dr. Stuart confesses that the venerable council of Nice held as early as the year 325, that is to say, the whole Church of God upon earth, together with the great bo dy of the ancient Fathers believed in the doctrine of the eter nal generation of the Son. I ask you, gentle reader, is not this granting much? and however determined Dr. Stuart on his very outset seems to be, not to be moved or governed by any human authority, or to disregard any thing like creeds or formulas of faith, I ask the learned Professor, whether the authority of the whole Christian world, for the space of upwards of eighteen centuries, be not entitled to some attention and regard on his part, and moreover whether his own excellent logic would not pronounce us to be downright antipodes to good sense, were we simple enough to prefer his own individual reason glimmering on the Christian horizon at the late period of the eigteenth century to the collective reason of all Christian ages and nations during the long period of eighteen hundred years?

Dr. Stuart may possibly reply that indeed the council of Nice, and the great body of the ancient Fathers, believed in the eternal generation of the Son of God, but that, in his opinion, they went too far, and were actually mistaken.

According to Dr. Stuart, the eternal generation of the Son of God was the belief of the council of Nice and of the generality of the ancient Fathers, that is to say, of the preceeding ages. This fact therefore is incontestable; but this fact being once admitted to be out of all controversy, I ask, where did this universal faith of the eternal generation of the Son of God, set forth by the decrees of the venerable council of Nice and the concurrent testimony of the great body of the ancient Fathers, originate? Did any one invent it between the period that elapsed from the time of the Apostles down to the council of Nice ? If so, let the innovater be pointed out who first broached it; let his name be mentioned, his country, the age in which