for ever — yet nevertheless it takes for granted the existence of the human nature : so the form of God is not the Divine nature, nor is the being on an equality with God the Divine nature ; but yet He, who was subsisting in the form of God, and who might have been on an equality with God, is God. Moreover the form of God is used rather than the form of the Lord, as presently after on an equality with God : because God is more an absolute word, Lord involves a relation to inferiors. The Son of God subsisted in that form of God from eternity : and when He came in the flesh He did not cease to be in that form, but rather, so far as the human nature is concerned, He began to subsist in it : and when He was in that form, by His own peculiar pre-eminence itself as Lord, it was entirely in His power, even according to His human nature, so soon as He assumed it, to be on an equality with God, to adopt a mode of life and outward distinc tions, which would correspond to His dignity, that He might be received and treated by all creatures as their Lord ; but He acted differently. — ou^ acxray/Abv j^rfaro, He did not regard it a thing to be eagerly caught at as a prey) as a spoil. Those, to whom any opportunity of sudden advantage is presented, are usually eager in other cases to fly upon it and quickly to lay hold of it, without having any respect to others, and deter- minately to use and enjoy it. Hence apcraXea, with Eustathius, means, ra -TTOCVU -Trspiffvovdaffra, the things which a man may with all eagerness snatch for his own use, and may claim as his own : and the phrases occur, ap^ay/^a^ apvayfAw, ep/Muwy supy/ia., vofAifyiv, KosTffQai, jiytfffdai, ap*dfy/v. E. Schmidius and G. Kaphelius have collected examples from Heliodorus and Polybius. But Christ, though He might have been on an equality vnth God, did not snatch at it, did not regard it as spoil.1 He did not suddenly
1 Many think rightly, from a passage of Plutarch, quoted by Wetstein, that ap-Tret'/pos signifies the act by which anything is greedily seized, and the desire which leads to it ; but that ocj07r«y^«, having a neuter ending, in dicates the object desired, the thing seized, the prey. Drusius, in Grit. S.S., Lond., tries to show that xpTrcfy^og-! as well as up-Truyftcx,, though both strictly signifying an act, may signify the thing which is the object of the act. Wahl renders a^TT-ay^oV, " res cupide arripienda et necessario usurpanda." So Neander, " Conscious of Divinity, He did not eagerly retain equality with God for the mere exhibition of it, but emptied Himself of the outward at tributes and glory of it." The antithesis favours this view. However, there