Some eminent writers, however, have been of opinion, that, when the holy spirit is spoken of as a person distinct from God and Christ, such language implies at once personality and inferiority; and this opinion is, of course, held in perfect consistency with the Unitarian belief, that there is but “one God, the Father." The passages on which this opinion is founded, can, as we have shown, be easily interpreted concerning the gifts and powers which were imparted to the apostles; but, if it be granted that the holy spirit is therein represented as a real person distinct from the Father, it will follow that he is a subordinate being, who derives all his qualifications from Jesus Christ, and from the God and Father of all. Thus is he said to have "proceeded from the Father;" language implying distinct agency, if not dependent and derived existence. He was "given by God to them that obey him;" but a gift cannot, without the utmost absurdity, be supposed to be the very being who bestows it. He was "sent" by Christ "from the Father;" but the Messenger of Christ cannot with truth be considered either as God, or as equal to him. He spoke "not of himself," for he was altogether guided by the instructions which he had "heard and received." He is said to "make intercession for the saints with groanings which cannot be uttered;" and, as a prayerful being is dependent on him whom he addresses, it is clear that he cannot be in possession of omnipotent power. Such, we think, would be the legitimate results of interpreting personally and literally some of those passages which are adduced to prove the existence of a third divine person, in the essence of the Godhead.

Rev. J. H. THOM, entitled "The Comforter;" the ninth of a series by three dissenting ministers of Liverpool, in answer to a course of lectures by thirteen clergymen of the Church of England. The discourse referred to is beautiful in its spirit, eloquent in its tone, argumentative and practical in its matter. We have some difficulty in conceiving how, after perusing it, any unprejudiced mind could defend the loctrine of the Deity of the Holy Spirit, as a personal agent, distinct from the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Had Moses or the prophets, Christ or the apostles, believed that the holy spirit was a person distinct from the almighty Creator and Father of all, and equal to him in every perfection, some direct testimonies in favour of such a momentous doctrine would surely be discovered in the Bible; but on no occasion is it recorded, that either the Redeemer of the world, or any of the prophets, evangelists, or apostles, distinctly and clearly taught that the holy spirit is the third person of a Trinity in Unity. No: nor in the whole compass of the Sacred Volume is there any mention of even a single prayer or petition having been presented to this God the Holy Ghost. Moses, the Hebrew legislator, sang his song of praise to that Being whom he and the Saviour styled the "one Jehovah ;"-David, the sweet singer of Israel, was wont to pay his thanksgivings to Him who said to the Messiah, "Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee;"Isaiah, the sublime poet and prophet of Christianity, denounced the idolatry of such as would set up rivals to the High and Lofty One, who "anointed" his Servant Jesus to preach "good tidings," by" putting his spirit upon him ;"Christ himself prayed to Him who was at once the God of the Jews and the universal Father;—and the primitive disciples ventured not to act in opposition to the practice of the prophets, and the example of their Master, by paying supreme adoration to any spirit, but that ONE whom Jesus termed his Father and his God, and whom he requested his followers to "worship in spirit and in truth."

So far from recognizing any other divine person called God the Holy Ghost, the Saviour expressly restricted true Deity to the Father: "This is life eternal, that they might know THEE THE ONLY TRUE GOD, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent." So far from believing such a person to have been in possession of unbounded knowledge, he unhesitatingly declared that "NO ONE knew the day and hour of

the coming of the Son, BUT THE FATHER." And during the whole course of his ministry,-whether we refer to his conversations, his discourses, his prayers, his miracles, or his sufferings,—he attributed all his powers and qualifications, not to God the Holy Ghost, a third divine hypostasis, but to God, even the Father. The apostle Paul also, whose epistles abound with phraseology relating to the spirit, more than any other writer of the New Testament, distinctly and emphatically asserted, that there is "NONE OTHER God but ONE-that to us (Christians) there is but ONE GOD, THE FATHER."

SUMMARY

O.F

SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE FOR UNITARIANISM.

IF the doctrines of the Trinity, and of the Supreme Deity of Christ, and another person different from the Father, called God the Holy Ghost, were leading and essential principles in religion, it would surely be reasonable to expect, that in a revelation from the Almighty Parent,-the professed object of which is to show the human race the path to everlasting felicity, these doctrines would be expressed in perspicuous and intelligible language. Trinitarians have framed Catechisms, and Creeds, and Confessions of Faith, which explicitly and boldly assert the peculiar tenets of reputed orthodoxy. But these tenets, far from being thus laid down in Scripture, are, in point of fact, at total variance with the doctrines of all the inspired teachers; while, on the other hand, the principles of Unitarianism are not only necessarily implied almost in every page of the Sacred Volume, but are in many places expressed with the utmost simplicity, force, and clearness. To corroborate these brief remarks, and at the same time to serve as a kind of Index to this work, the following summary and comparative table is drawn up.

I.-OF GOD.

SUMMARY OF EVIDENCE FOR UNITA-
RIANISM.

1. The strict, undivided unity of God is clearly expressed in various portions of the Bible. About twenty-four times he is styled ONE, or the ONLY GOD; exclusively of the epithets HOLY ONE, MIGHTY ONE, &c., which occur nearly fifty times. (See pp. 11-25.)

DEFICIENCY OF EVIDENCE FOR TRINI-
TAPIANISM.

1. In no one passage of the Old or the New Testament is the doctrine of Three Persons in one God explicitly revealed; nowhere is it said that Deity consists of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost. (See pp. 14-17; 68; 60; 91-95.)