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us no less than the two natures really distinct in Christ incarnate.

For if both natures were not preserved complete and distinct in Christ, it must be either by the conversion and transubstantiation of one into the other, or by commixtion and confusion of both into one. But neither of these ways can consist with the person of our Saviour, or the office of our Mediator. For if we should conceive such a mixtion and confusion of substances as to make a union of natures, we should be so far from acknowledging him to be both God and man, that thereby we should profess him to be neither God nor man, but a person of a nature as different from both, as all mixed bodies are distinct from each element which concurs unto their composition. Besides, we know there were in Christ the affections proper to the nature of man, and all those infirmities which belong to us, and cannot be conceived to belong to that nature of which the Divine was but a part. Nor could our humanity be so commixed or confounded with the divinity of our Saviour, but that the Father had been made man as much as the Son, because the Divine nature is the same both of the Father and the Son. Nor ought we to have so low an esteem of that infinite and independent Being, as to think it so commixed with, or immer sed in, the creature.

Again; as the confusion, so the conversion of natures is impossible. For, first, we cannot with the least show of probability conceive the divine nature of Christ to be transubstantiated into the human nature; as those whom they call "Flandrian anabaptists" in the LowCountries at this day maintain. There is a plain repugnancy even in the supposition: for the nature of man must be made, the nature of God cannot be made, and consequently cannot become the nature of man. The immaterial, indivisible, and immortal Godhead cannot be divided into a spiritual and incorruptible soul, and a carnal and corruptible body; of which two humanity consisteth. There is no other Deity of the Father than of the Son; and therefore if this was converted into that humanity, then was the Father also that man, and grew in knowledge, suffered, and died. We must not there

fore so far stand upon the propriety of speech, when it is written, "The Word was made flesh," as to destroy the propriety both of the Word and of the flesh.

Secondly; we must not, on the contrary, invent a conversion of the human nature into the divine, as the Eutychians of old did fancy. For surely the incarnation could not at first consist in such a conversion, it being unima ginable how that which had no being should be made by being turned into something else. Therefore the huma nity of Christ could not at the first be made by being the divinity of the Word. Nor is the incarnation so preposterously expressed, as if the flesh were made the Word, but that the Word was made flesh. And if the manhood were not in the first act of incarnation converted into the divine nature, as we see it could not be; then is there no pretence of any time or manner in or by which it was afterward so transubstantiated. Vain therefore was that old conceit of Eutyches, who thought the union to be made so in the natures, that the humanity was absorbed and wholly turned into the divinity, so that by that transubstantiation the human nature had no longer being. And well did the ancient Fathers, who opposed this heresy, make use of the sacramental union between the bread and wine and the body and blood of Christ, and thereby showed, that the human nature of Christ is no more really converted into the divinity, and so ceaseth to be the human nature, than the substance of the bread and wine is really converted into the substance of the body and blood, and thereby ceaseth to be both bread and wine. From whence it is by the way observable, that the church in those days understood no such doctrine as that of transubstantiation.

Seeing then he which is conceived was the only Son of God, and that only Son begotten of the substance of the Father, and so always subsisted in the divine nature; seeing by the same conception he was made truly man, and consequently assumed an human nature; seeing these two natures cannot be made one either by commixtion or conversion, and yet there can be but one Christ subsisting in them both, because that only Son was he which is conceived and born; it followeth, that the union Div. No. XIV.

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which was not made in the nature, was made in the person of the Word; that is, it was not so made, that out of both natures one only should result, but only so, that to one person no other should be added.

Nor is this union only a scholastic speculation, but a certain and necessary truth, without which we cannot have one Christ, but two Christs, one Mediator, but two Mediators; without which we cannot join the second article of our Creed with the third, making them equally belong to the same person; without which we cannot interpret the sacred Scriptures, or understand the history of our Saviour. For certainly he who was before Abraham was in the days of Herod born of a woman; he who preached in the days of Noah began to preach in the reign of Tiberius, being at that time about thirty years of age; he was demonstrated the Son of God with power, who was the seed of David according to the flesh; he who died on the cross raised him from the dead who died so, being "put to death through the flesh, and quickened by the Spirit;" he was "of the fathers according to the flesh," who was "God over all blessed for ever." Seeing these and the like actions and affections cannot come from the same nature, and yet must be attributed to the same person; as we must acknowledge a diversity of natures united, so must we confess the identity of the person in whom they are conjoined, against the ancient heresy of the Nestorians, condemned in the council of Ephesus.

By the Holy Ghost.

HAVING thus dispatched the consideration of the first person concerned in this article, and the actions contained in it so far as distinctly from the rest they belong to him, we descend unto the other two concerned in the same; and first to him whose operation did precede in the conception, the Holy Ghost. Which second part some may think to require a threefold consideration; first of the conception; secondly, of the person; thirdly, of the operation. But for the person or existence of the Holy Ghost, that is here only mentioned obliquely, and there

fore to be reserved for another article, where it is propounded directly. And for the conception itself, that belongeth not so properly to the Holy Ghost, of whom the act cannot be predicated. For though Christ was conceived by the Holy Ghost, yet the Holy Ghost did not conceive him, but said unto the virgin, "Thou shalt conceive," Luke i. 31. There remaineth therefore nothing proper and peculiar to this second part, but that operation of the Holy Ghost in Christ's conception, whereby the virgin was enabled to conceive, and by virtue whereof Christ is said to be conceived by him.

Now when we say the conception of our Saviour was wrought by the operation of the Spirit, it will be necessary to observe, first, what is excluded by that attribution to the Spirit; secondly, what is included in that operation of the Spirit.

For the first of these, we may take notice in the salutation of the angel, when he told the blessed virgin she should conceive and bring forth a Son, she said "How shall this be, seeing I know not a man?" By which words she excludeth first all men, and then herself: all men, by that assertion, "I know not a man ;" herself by the question, "How shall this be, seeing it is so?" First, our Melchizedec had no father on earth; in general, not any man; in particular, not Joseph. It is true, "his mother Mary was espoused to Joseph;" but it is as true, "before they came together, she was found with child of the Holy Ghost." We read in St. Luke, that "the parents brought up the child Jesus into the temple :" but these parents were not the father and the mother, but as it followeth, “Joseph and his mother marvelled at those things which were spoken of him." It is true, Philip calleth him "Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph;" and what is more, his mother said unto him, "Behold, thy father and I have sought thee sorrowing;" but this must be only the reputed father of Christ, he being only, "as was supposed, the son of Joseph, which was the son of Heli." Whence they must needs appear without all excuse, who therefore affirm our Saviour to have been the proper son of Joseph, because the genealogy belongs to him; whereas in that very place where the genealogy begins, Joseph is called the

supposed father. How can it then therefore be necessary Christ should be the true son of Joseph, that he may be known to be the son of David, when in the same place where it is proved that Joseph came from David, it is denied that Christ came from Joseph? And that not only in St. Luke, where Joseph begins, but also in St. Matthew, where he ends the genealogy. "Jacob begat Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ." Howsoever then the genealogies are described, whether one belong to Joseph, the other to Mary or both to Joseph, it is from other parts of the scriptures infallibly certain, not only that Christ descended lineally from David according to the flesh, but also that the same Christ was begotten of the virgin Mary, and not by Joseph.

Secondly; as the blessed virgin excluded all mankind, and particularly Joseph, to whom she was then espoused, by her assertion; so did she exclude herself by the manner of the question, showing that of herself she could not cause any such conception. Although she may be thought the root of Jesse, yet could she not germinate of herself; though Eve were the mother of all living, yet generation was founded on the divine benediction which was given to both together: for "God blessed them, and said unto them, Be fruitful and multiply, and replenish the earth.” Though Christ was promised as the Seed of the woman, yet we must not imagine that it was in the power of woman to conceive him. When the virgin thinks it impossible she could conceive because she knew not a man, at the same time she confesseth it otherwise as impossible, and the angel acknowledgeth as much in the satisfaction of his answer, "for with God nothing shall be impossible." God then it was who immediately and miraculously enabled the blessed virgin to conceive our Saviour; and while Mary, Joseph, and all men are denied, no person who is that God can be excluded from that operation.

But what is included in the conception by the Holy Ghost, or how his operation is to be distinguished from the conception of the virgin, is not so easily determined. The words by which it is expressed in scripture are very general; first, as they are delivered by way of promise, prediction, or satisfaction to Mary; "The Holy Ghost

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