A little to sive lisfht to our armament from hence, and that the strength of it may appear, some few observations concerning the con- text and the words themselves will be necessary: —
1. Verse 5, the apostle, speaking of the heathens and their opinion of the Deity, says, " There be," that is, to them, in their appre- hension, " gods many, and lords many ;" that is, many supreme powers, who are gods and lords. The terms of "gods many, and lords many," ai'e not expressive of several kinds of deities, but of the same. Whom they esteemed lords they esteemed gods, and so on the contrary. In opposition to this polytheism of theirs, he declares that Christians have but one God, one Lord ; wherein if the apostle did not intend to assert one only God unto Christians, in the different persons of the Father and Son, he had not spoken in such an Dispo- sition as the adversative aXXd at the beginning of the words and the comparison instituted do require.
2. That this "one Lord" of Christians is the only true God is ma- nifest from Deut. vi. 4, " The Lord our God is one Lord." So the apostle here, " To us there is one Lord :" not many gods, as the heathens fancied ; in opposition also to whose idolatry is that asser- tion of Moses. And so Thomas, in his confession, joins these two to- gether, intending one and the same person, " My Lord and my God."
3. Kupiog, being put to signify God, is the word which the LXX. render Jehovah by, and so sJg Kupiog is that " only Jehovah."
4. The attribution of the same works in this vei-se to Father and Son manifests them to be the same one God : " Of whom are all
things, and we in him ; by whom are all things, and we by
him." These things being premised, what our catechists except to this testimony may be considered. Thus, then, they: —
TESTIMONIES TO THE DEITY OF CHRIST VINDICATED. 825
Hence a divine nature cannot be proved; for, — 1. He doth manifestly difference Iiini from the Father, whom we have taught above to be the only God by natvu'e. 2. This that it says of him, that " by him are all things," shows him not to be God by nature, seeing, as hath been above declared, this particle " by" doth not signify the first, but the second cause ; which can by no means be spoken of him who is God by nature. And though the Scriptures do sometimes say of the Father, " By him are all things," yet those words are to be taken otherwise of the Father than of the Son. It is manifest that this is said of the Fathei', because all mediate causes by which any thing is done are not from any other, but from him- self, nor are they such as that he cannot work without them ; but it is spoken of Christ, because by him another, namely, God, worketh all things, as it is expressly said, Eph. iii. 9. That I need not to remember, that the word " all things,'' as was showed above, is to be referred to the subject-matter; which that it so appeareth hence, that the apostle dealeth of all those things which belong to the Christian people, as these two words " to us" and " Father" do declare. Whence it is proved that Christ is not simply and absolutely, but in some certain respect, called the " one Lord, by whom are all things." Wherefoi'e his divine nature is not proved from hence.^
It is very evident that they are mucli entangled with this testi- mony, which necessitates thena to turn themselves into all manner of shapes, to try whether they can shift their bonds, and escape or no. Their several attempts to evade shall be considered in their order.
1. It is true, Christ is differenced clearly from the Father as to his person, here spoken of; but that they have proved the Father to be the only God by nature, exclusively to the Son and Holy Ghost, is but a boasting before they put off their harness. It is true, the Father is said here to be the " one God ;" which no more hinders the Son from being so too than the assertion that the Son is the " one Lord" denies the Father's being so also.
2. That cavil at the word "by" hath been already considered and removed. It is enough for us to manifest that this assignation of the creation of all things to Christ by the expression of, " By him are all things," doth by no means depose him from the honour of principal efficient cause in that work, the same attribution being made to the Father in the same words. And to say, as our catechists do, that this expression is ascribed to the Father in such a sense,
' " Ex 80 quod Christum apostolus Dominum suum vocet, natui-a divina efEci ne- quit ; nam eum primo maniteste ah illo Patre, quera ibidem Deum ununi fatetur, secernit, quum solum natura Deum esse superius docuimus. Delude, hoc ipsum quod de eo dicit, omnia per ipsum, eura natura Deum esse non ostendit, cum, ut superius dcmonsti'atum est, liac particula per non primam veiiim secundam causam designari constet, quod de co qui natura Deus est dici nuUo modo potest. Et licet de Patre Scriptura intei'dum loquatur, Per eum omnia, aliter tamen hiec de Patre quam de Christo accipiuntur. De Pati-c enim hcec ideo dici constat, quod omncs causus niedite per quas fit aliquid, non aliunde sint, nisi ab ipso, ncc sint ejusmodi, ut sine iis ille agere non possit ; de Christo vero dicuntur, cjuod per eum alius quis, ncnipc Deus omnia operetur, ut Eph. iii. 9 cxpresse habctur. Nc commcmorandum mihi sit ver- bum omnia (uti superius ostcnsum est) ad subjcctam materiain rcferri ; quod ita habere inde apparet, quod apostolus agit de iis omnibus rebus qua; ad populum Christianum pertinent, ut duo ha'C verba dcmonstrant. 7iobis, et I'aler. Undo eiiicitur Christum nou simpliciter et absolute, verum ccrta de causa vocatum Dominum uuum, per qiiem omnia. Quare hinc natura divina non probatur."