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thus preached by the apostle, under a Divine call and qualification, was the powerful appointed instrument for the conversion of those to whom he was sent. It was by this instrumentality, as I conceive, that he baptised them "into the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost." Matt. xxviii. 19-compared with Eph. v. 26. Christ loved the church, "that he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word." Hence to those who believed his message, and accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as their only Saviour, these glad tidings were found to be "the power of God unto salvation." Comp. 1 Cor. i. 18. "For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness, but unto us that are saved it is the power of God." See also Eph. v. 26.

It is surely much to be regretted, that by some persons under our name the passage on which these remarks are offered has been misunderstood, and (without the smallest intention, as I believe, to deviate from accurate truth) wrested from its obvious meaning. The declaration that "the Gospel of Christ is the power of God unto salvation," has been regarded, not as a description of the efficacy of this Gospel for the salvation of sinners, but as a definition of the Gospel itself, as if the Gospel of Christ and the power of God were convertible terms. Hence it is concluded, that "the Gospel" is not the good news of salvation through a crucified Saviour, but the power of God, or, in other words, the Holy Spirit in the heart. That the tendency of this mistake is to dismiss from our view a most important and fundamental part of Christian truth-that very part on which all the rest is built, is too obvious to require notice.

In the Epistle to the Colossians we find another passage, in which the Gospel has been by some persons supposed to signify the power of God manifested in the heart: see chap. i. 21-23, " And you that were sometime alienated," &c. "If ye continue in the faith, grounded and settled, and be not moved away from the hope of the Gospel which ye have heard, and which was preached to every creature which is under heaven; whereof I Paul am made a minister." The circumstance which has induced some persons * to suppose that “ the Gospel" here signifies an internal principle is, that in the original text, for "to every creature," we read ev, which must, as they presume, mean in or

* Our author here uses the term "some persons," which would lead those unacquainted with the principles of Friends, to suppose it might be confined to a few unsound individuals; it may surprise them, therefore, to learn that it is a doctrine held by the Society, and contended for by their celebrated apologist R. Barclay.—See Prop. v. and vi., par. 23, to which we wish our readers particularly to refer.

within every creature. This circumstance is, however, of no importance; for it is certain that the Greek particle ev may be rightly rendered to or among, as well as within; as is evinced by numerous passages in the New Testament itself: thus, we read in Luke i. 17, εν φρονήσει δικαίων, to the wisdom of the just; 1 Cor. vii. 15, εν δε ειρηνη, God hath called us to peace; 1 Tim. iv. 15," that thy profiting may appear unto all;" Acts ii. 29, " And his sepulchre is with [or among] us," (ev nuiv,) &c. ; Acts xxv. 6, " When he had tarried among them," (ev auTois.) That the apostle here uses the word "Gospel" in its usual sense of the glad tidings of salvation through Jesus Christ, may be concluded from his speaking of it as "that which had been preached," -"that whereof he was made a minister;" that which the Colossians themselves had heard, and so heard as to believe in Christ crucified. I would suggest that xTiσ here denotes not the individual creature, but the creation, or world, and that εν παση τη κτίσει τη υπο τον ουρανον ought to be rendered "to the whole creation under heaven," that is, to the whole world. The apostle's meaning seems to be, that whereas, under the legal dispensation, the knowledge of revealed truth was confined to a single nation, the glad tidings of salvation had now been proclaimed to every country, or to the world at large. That the Gospel, when the apostle wrote these words, had actually reached every province of the known inhabited world, or Roman empire, is, indeed, by no means improbable.

A fourth example of mistake is furnished by the view sometimes taken of John i. 9, where another apostle, in obvious allusion to Christ, says, "That was the true light which lighteth every man that cometh into the world." When I call to mind that the apostle is here speaking of Christ in the character of the Divine Word, which belongs to him independently of his incarnation; that this Word was regarded by the Jews as the source to all men of such moral or spiritual light as they possess; and the phrase, "every man that cometh into the world," was precisely that by which they were accustomed to describe the whole family of man.

I cannot but accede to the view of this passage which has been generally accepted in the Society of Friends: I believe it to declare the doctrine that our Lord Jesus Christ, the eternal Word, bestows a measure of the enlightening influence of his Spirit on all mankind. If this be the true meaning of the passage, it follows that Christ is here called "the light," because it is from him that men derive the light of an outward revelation: see John xii. 35, 36. 46. The misinterpretation which I wish to notice is, that of several writers who appear to

suppose that because Christ is called the light, (i. e. the enlightener,) he is therefore to be identified with the influence which he bestows; in short, that the light of the Spirit of God in the heart of man is itself actually Christ. The obvious tendency of this mistake is, to deprive the Saviour of his personal attributes, and to reduce him to the rank of a principle.

For the same reason, we cannot but object to the doctrine that Christ is the Anointing. Truly he is the anointed of the Father, and the anointer of his own people; but who, on this account, would think of identifying him with the anointing, that is, with the enlightening, qualifying influence of the Holy Spirit?

This peculiar notion is, also, occasionally applied amongst us to a highly important passage in the Epistle of Paul to the Colossians, where he speaks of the mystery which hath been hid from ages and generations, but now is made manifest to the saints; to whom, he adds, "God would make known the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles, which is Christ in you the hope of glory," Col. i. 26, 27. The words "Christ in you" are often recited, by mistake, as "Christ within," &c. These expressions are sometimes used amongst us as a synonyme for "the light of the Spirit of Christ in the heart,”a view which some have imagined to be supported by the apostle's treating the whole as a "mystery." Hence it necessarily follows, that the light of the Spirit of Christ in the heart is the same as Christ himself, and represented as the "hope of glory." The plain fact, however, appears to be, that the mystery of which the apostle is speaking is that of the incarnation of the Son of God,-a subject which had, indeed, been typically shadowed forth to the Jews, but had been totally concealed from the Gentiles-kept secret since the world began, but was now made known to the saints. Comp. 1 Tim. iii. 16; " And, without controversy, great is the mystery of godliness; God was manifested in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory."

No sooner did the Gentiles, by a living faith, accept the Saviour who was thus preached unto them,-no sooner did they receive him into their hearts that he might rule there by his Spirit, than Christ was "in" them the hope of glory. Comp. Eph. iii. 17, " that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith," and 2 Cor. xiii. 5, " Know ye not your own selves, how that Christ Jesus is in you, except ye be reprobates?” So also John vi. 56, "He that eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, dwelleth in me and I in him ;" and John xvii. 26, "that the love wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them, and I in them.”

The true view of this subject, and in particular of the passage now cited from Colossians, is briefly but happily stated, in the general Epistle from our last Yearly Meeting: "As the Holy Spirit influences and enlightens our understandings, we are brought to a lively apprehension of the character and offices of the Messiah; and Christ, received by faith into the soul, and resting there by his Spirit, becomes our sure and only hope of glory." Here there is a full testimony to vital, practical, inward religion, but no mysticism.

These mistakes, especially John i. 9, and Col. i. 26—28, have often been made by persons who cordially accept the Lord Jesus Christ in all his gracious offices, both as God and man.* Thus the errors themselves have, naturally enough, been suffered to pass with little notice. But in some, who have seceded from us in America, they have evidently been the means of aiding that tremendous process in heresy by which the eternal Word, or Son of God, is gradually converted into a mere influence, and, finally, becomes nothing at all but a seed sown in the hearts of all men.

Abundant is the evidence that when George Fox, and his fellowhelpers in the work of the ministry, spoke of the Saviour of men under the title "seed," they had no such heresy in their minds. When that faithful labourer in the cause of vital Christianity was drawing near to the moment of death, he exclaimed, "The seed reigneth." Unquestionably he then felt that the Saviour whom he loved and served was completely predominant in his soul by the influence of the Holy Spirit; that he was ruling over all weakness, sickness, fear, and mortality, for the benefit of his unworthy servant-a blessed experience indeed. Nevertheless, it is obviously an undesirable practice to call Christ the "seed," without the additions which Scripture never fails to affix to the expression, wherever it is intended to be applied to him. Thus, he is represented by the sacred writers as the "seed" (or descendant) of the woman, in whom all the nations of the world were to be blessed; there being, in both instances, a direct allusion to his incarnation and human nature.

It may be in consequence of not remarking these additions to the word "seed," when meaning Christ, that some persons appear to have strangely confounded these passages with some of the parables of our Lord, particularly that of the "mustard-seed." "The kingdom of

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* This appears to be treating, in rather too mild a way, an erroneous view, which, in the very same sentence, is allowed to have aided in producing a tremendous process in heresy." Surely it is high time for those who see these things to endeavour to root out such seeds, and not merely to cover them gently over.

heaven is like unto a grain of mustard-seed, which a man took and sowed in his field, which indeed is the least of all seeds; but when it is grown it is the greatest among herbs, and becometh a tree, so that the birds of the air come and lodge in the branches thereof.” Matt. xiii. 31, 32.

That this parable was intended to set forth the small beginning of Christianity in the world, and its subsequent extension and victory, can scarcely be doubted by any sober commentator; and we may freely allow that it also bears an allusion to the growth in grace of the individual believer in Jesus; but that the mustard-seed is here equivalent to Christ himself, in his inward appearance to the soul, is surely a notion without the smallest foundation either in reason or in Scripture. The seed which the sower went forth to sow, in another parable, is explained by our Lord as signifying the word of Divine truth, as it is preached and heard; it cannot, therefore, signify Christ, who, in his character of a prophet or teacher, is represented as the sower; and equally obvious is it that it cannot be identical * (as some persons appear to imagine) with the light of the Spirit of Christ in the hearts of all men. The influence of the Holy Spirit, through which the believer is born again, may probably be represented by the term “seed” in 1 Pet. i. 21-23; "Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever." And this grace abiding in the heart of the believer, appears to be spoken of under the same term in 1 John iii. 9; "Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin, for his seed remaineth in him; and he cannot sin, because he is born of God."

I have sometimes heard it asserted, that the revelation of Christ in the heart is the everlasting foundation-the rock on which the Church is built. This erroneous statement has probably arisen from a mistaken view of the meaning of our Lord's address to Peter in the following passage: "He saith unto them, But whom say ye that I am? And Simon Peter answered and said, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona; for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto

*This, and the preceding exposition of our Lord's parable of the mustard-seed, is so obviously their meaning, and in their native simplicity so full of interest, that we trust they may come under the observation, and claim the close attention, of some in the Society whose minds are of that mystical cast, that we know instances where they have been urged in exactly the same sense by Evangelical Friends, they have been rejected, as going quite into the letter. We wish they may incline to take in better part this indirect reproof, and profit by it.

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