" Quae scntcntia ejus est ? — Deum Jesu tale corpus aptasse, postquam in coelum c^t ingressus, quod ad obcundum munus poutificis summi aptura ct accommodatum forct.'
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of tlie "world to come," and so taken off all that here they relate unto, so in that demonstration which, God assisting, I shall give of Christ's being a priest and offering sacrifice in this world before he entered into heaven, I shall remove what farther here they pretend unto. In the meantime, such expositions as this, that have no light nor colour given them from the texts they pretend to unfold, had need of good strength of analogy given them from elsewhere; which here is not pretended. " ' When he cometh into the world,' that is, when he enters heaven, he says, ' A body hast thou prepared me,' that is, an immortal body thou hast given me." And that by this immortal body they intend indeed no body I shall afterward declare.
Grotius turns these words quite another way, not agreeing with our catechists, yet doing still the same work with them; which, be- cause he gives no proof of his exposition, it shall suffice so to have intimated. In sum, verse 4, he tells us how the blood of Christ takes away sin, namely, " Because it begets faith in us, and gives right to Christ for the obtaining of all necessary helps for us," in pursuit of his former interpretation of chapter ix., where he wholly excludes the satisfaction of Christ. His coming into the world is, he says, " His showmg himself to the world, after he had led a private life therein for a while," contrary to the perpetual use of that expres- sion of the New Testament. And so the whole design of the place is eluded, the exposition whereof I shall defer to the place of the satis- faction of Christ.
And these are the texts of Scripture our catechists thought good to endeavour a delivery of themselves from, as to that head or argu- ment of our plea for his subsistence in a divine nature antecedently to his being born of the Virgin, — namely, because he is said to be incarnate or " made flesh."
CHAPTER XIV.
Sundry other testimonies given to the deity of Christ vindicated.
In the next place they heap up a great many testimonies con- fusedly, containing scriptural attributions unto Christ of such things as manifest him to be God ; which we shall consider in that order, or rather disorder, wherein they are placed of them.
Their first question here is : —
Ques. In what scriptures is Christ called God ?
Ans. John i. 1, "The Word was God;" John xx. 28, "Thomas saith unto Christ, My Lord and my God;" Itom. ix. 6, the apostle saith that "Christ is God over all, blessed for ever."
Q. What can be proved by these testimonies ?
A. That a divine nature cannot be demonstrated from them, besides the things
TESTIMONIES TO THE DEITY OF ©HEIST VINDICATED. S05
that are before produced, is hence manifest, that in the first testimony the Word is spoken of, and John saith that he was " with God;" in the second, Thomas calleth him " God" in whose feet and hands he found the print of the nails, and of the spear in his side; and Paul calleth .him who according to the flesh was of the fathers, '■ God over all, blessed for ever;" — all which cannot be spoken of him who by nature is God, for thence it would follow that there are two Gods, of whom one was with tlie other ; and these things, to have the prints of wounds and to be of the fathers, belong wholly to a man, which were absurd to ascribe to him who is God by na- ture. And if any one shall pretend that veil of the distinction of natures, we have above removed that, and have showed that this distinction cannot be maintained. '
That in all this answer our catechists do nothing: but besf the ih'mgr in question, and flee to their own hypothesis, not against assertions but arguments, themselves so far know as to be forced to apologize for it in the close. 1. That Christ is not God because he is not the person of the Father, that he is not God because he is man, is the sum of their answer; and yet these men knew that we in- sisted on these testimonies to prove him God though he be man, and though he be not the same person Avith the Father. 2. They do all along impose upon us their own most false hypothesis, that Christ is God although he be not God by nature. Those who are not God by nature, and yet pretend to be gods, are idols, and shall be destroyed. And they only are the men who affirm there are two Gods, — one who is so hi/ nature, and another made so ; one indeed God, and no man ; the other a man, and no God. The Lord our God is one God. S. In particular, John i. 1, the Word is Christ, as hath been above abundantly demonstrated, — Christ, in respect of another nature than he had before he took flesh and dwelt with men, verse 14. Herein is he said to be with the Father, in respect of his distinct personal subsistence, who was one with the Father as to his nature and essence. And this is that which we prove from his testi- mony, which will not be warded with a bare denial : " The Word was with God, and the Word was God;" — God by nature, and with God in his personal distinction. 4. Thomas confesses him to be his Lord and God in whose hands and feet he saw the print of the nails, as God is said to redeem the church with his own blood. He was the Lord and God of Thomas, who in his human nature shed his