question were left to a body of slave merchants, some apprehension might reasonably be formed about the issue. But the cause of slavery and the slave trade is no longer a subject of mere private speculation. This cause of human nature is brought before the tribunal of that nation, which has always been celebrated for its mercy; the cause of liberty is submitted to the arbitration of that country, whose freedom and happiness are founded on the general rights of mankind. And we cannot doubt that the great principles of political justice, which form the basis of our constitution, and which ought to come home to the breast of every British subject, will have their full weight in the deliberations of those august assemblies, which are to decide on a cause that involves the purity of our holy religion, and the credit and consistency of our national character."

Coming from an individual of such learning and character as Mr. Burgess, this publication proved both seasonable and influential; and a vote of thanks for it, as such, was soon after passed by the London Abolition Committee, and transmitted to him by the late Bennet Langton, Esq.

CHAP. XI.

SERMON BEFORE THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD IN 1790. CORRESPONDENCE RESPECTING IT.

FROM the moment that Mr. Burgess took orders, his attention was directed in a serious and comprehensive manner to theological pursuits. That he might be able to consult the Old Testament in the original, he was assiduous in the study of Hebrew, while his intimate acquaintance with the Greek language gave him every advantage that learning can impart for the critical investigation of the New. He also commenced, about this time, a perusal of some of the principal Greek and Latin fathers; and he soon after applied his studies in this line to a useful purpose, by addressing an able letter to the Monthly Review, in refutation of a charge which they had made against the orthodoxy of the Antinicene Fathers with respect to the doctrine of the Trinity. In the year 1790, the first sermon which he published, issued from the Clarendon Press. It was preached before the University, and, as the subject was highly interesting, and the mode of treating it original, we shall be excused for dwelling upon it a little in detail. It was entitled "The Divinity of Christ; proved from his own

Declarations attested and interpreted by his living Witnesses the Jews." Respecting the great doctrine of which it treated, it may truly be said, in the language of his preface, "that there is the best evidence for asserting that it has always been believed in all ages of the church, and the best grounds for maintaining that it will so continue to be believed, by infinitely the greater part of those who study the Scriptures seriously and without prejudice." The evidence of its truth is cumulative ; that is, it consists of a series of direct, and of many collateral proofs. The sermon of Mr. Burgess was confined to a particular class of those proofs, which, though occasionally glanced at by preceding writers, had not, it is believed, been hitherto placed in a light so striking, or in a form so original. The following statement will illustrate his ground of argument: On various occasions our Saviour uses language respecting his own nature and attributes, which, interpreted according to the acknowledged and established rules of criticism, amounts to nothing less than the assertion of his Divinity, and of his equality with the Father. If any doubt could be entertained whether his words are to be interpreted in this their plain and obvious sense, that doubt is removed by the testimony of his Jewish hearers, who, being familiar with the same customs as himself, intimately conversant with their own native phraseology and idiom, in which he addressed them, and fully alive to all the circumstances of time,

place, and occasion, were much better judges of the sense which his words conveyed, than even the most learned and critical scholars of modern times. Now their words and their conduct furnish, on the occasions alluded to, convincing proof that they understood him in this high and peculiar sense; for they are not only represented as stirred up the greatest pitch of indignation, at the supposed blasphemy of the claim, but as attempting to inflict upon him, in consequence, the summary punishment directed by the law of Moses against offenders guilty of this crime. (Vid. Lev. xxiv. 14. 16.)

to

On one of the occasions referred to (John viii. 57-59., compared with Exodus iii. 14.), He declares his pre-existence in language which implied an assumption of the name and prerogative of Jehovah, which so incensed his hearers, that they instantly took up stones to cast at him.

On another occasion, it is declared that the Jews sought to kill him, because he claimed to be the Son of God in a sense*, which, to use the words of the Evangelist, was "making himself equal with God." John v. 18. 23.

On a third, when He remonstrates with them for being about to stone him, they justify their rage by replying, "For a good work we stone thee

The force of the original is lost in our English version, by the omission of the word do, that is, own or peculiar (his own Father).

not, but for blasphemy: and because that thou, being a man, makest thyself God." (John x. 33.) And in this latter instance, although in the exordium of his reply, He parried for a moment their anger by a certain degree of ambiguity in the comment he gave upon his own previous words (John x. 36.), yet that anger revives in all its force when he closes by re-asserting his claim to be the Son of God in such a sense, as that the Father was "in Him, and He in the Father." (ver. 38.)

On none of these occasions does Jesus contradict their inferences, which, in his zeal for the honour due only to God, he certainly would have done, had they mistaken his meaning.

But the most remarkable of these examples, is connected with the closing scenes of our Saviour's life; for it appears, on a calm consideration of the facts as recorded by the Evangelists, that the immediate cause of his condemnation was a solemn attestation of his own Divinity. His enemies, it is true, were bent upon his destruction; but, until he himself furnished them with a pretext for compassing it, by a clear and express claim to that effect, they were baffled in their attempts to adduce any plausible reason for such a sentence.

"And the chief priests and all the council (says St. Mark) sought for witness against Jesus to put him to death; and found none. For many bare false witness against him, but their witness agreed not together." (Mark xiv. 55, 56.)