rable, that there can be no living God but the true, no true God but the living. "The Lord is the true God, he is the living God, and an everlasting King," saith the prophet Jeremy, Jer. x. 10; and St. Paul putteth the Thessalonians in mind, how they "turned from idols, to serve the living and true God." Now life is otherwise in God than in the creatures; in him originally, in them derivatively; in him as in the fountain of absolute perfection, in them by way of dependence and participation; .our life is in him, but his is in himself; and as "the Father hath life in himself, so hath he given to the Son to have life in himself;" both the same life, both in themselves, both in the same degree, as the one, so the other; but only with this difference, the Father giveth it, and the Son receiveth it. From whence he professeth of himself, that "the living Father sent him, and that he liveth by the Father," John vi. 57.

We must not therefore so far endeavour to involve ourselves in the darkness of this mystery, as to deny that glory which is clearly due unto the Father; whose preeminence undeniably consisteth in this, that he is God not of any other, but of himself, and that there is no other person who is God, but is God of him. It is no diminu tion to the Son, to say he is from another, for his very name imports as much; but it were a diminution to the Father to speak so of him: and there must be some pre-eminence, where there is place for derogation. What the Father is, he is from none; what the Son is, he is from him: what the first is, he giveth; what the second is, he receiveth. The first is a Father indeed by reason of his Son, but he is not God by reason of him; whereas the Son is not so only in regard of the Father, but also God by reason of the same.

Upon this pre-eminence, as I conceive, may safely be grounded the congruity of the divine mission. We often read that Christ was sent, from whence he bears the name of an apostle himself, as well as those whom he therefore named so, because as the "Father sent him so sent he them." The Holy Ghost is also said to be sent, sometimes by the Father, sometimes by the Son. But we never read that the Father was sent at all, there being an authority

in that name which seems inconsistent with this mission. In the parable, "a certain householder which planted a vineyard," first "sent his servants to the husbandmen, and again other servants; but last of all he sent unto them his son." It had been inconsistent even with the literal sense of an historical parable, as not at all consonant to the rational customs of men, to have said, that last of all the Son sent his Father to them. So God, placing man in the vineyard of his church, first sent his servants the prophets, by whom he "spake at sundry times and in divers manners," but " in the last days he sent his Son:" and it were as incongruous and inconsistent with the divine generation, that the Son should send the Father into the world. "As the living Father hath sent me, and I live by the Father," saith our Saviour; intimating, that by whom he lived, by him he was sent, and therefore sent by him, because he lived by him, laying his generation as the proper ground of his mission. Thus he which begetteth sendeth, and he which is begotten is sent. "For I am from him, and he hath sent me,” saith the Son; from whom I received my essence by communication, from him also received I this commission. As therefore it is more worthy to give than to receive, to send than to be sent, so in respect of the sonship there is some priority in the divine paternity: from whence divers of the ancients read that place of St. John with this addition, "The Father, which sent me, is greater than I," John xiv. 28. He then is that “God who sent forth his Son made of a woman, that God who hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, Abba, Father." So that the authority of sending is in the Father; which therefore ought to be acknowledged, because upon this mission is founded the highest testimony of his love to man; for "Herein is love," saith St. John, "not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins."

Again; the dignity of the Father will farther yet appear from the order of the Persons in the blessed Trinity, of which he is undoubtedly the first; for although in some passages of the apostolical discourses the Son may first be named, (as in that of St. Paul, "The grace of our

Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Ghost be with you all," 2 Cor. xiii. 14; the latter part of which is nothing but an addition unto his constant benediction,) and in others the Holy Ghost precedes the Son (as, "Now there are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit; and there are differences of administrations, but the same Lord; and there are diversities of operations, but it is the same God which worketh all in all,") 1 Cor. xii. 4; yet where the three Persons are barely enumerated, and delivered unto us as the rule of faith, there that order is observed which is proper to them; witness the form of baptism," In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost;" which order hath been perpetuated in all confessions of faith, and is for ever inviolably to be observed. For that which is not instituted or invented by the will or design of man, but founded in the nature of things themselves, is not to be altered at the pleasure of man. Now this priority doth properly and naturally result from the divine Paternity; so that the Son must necessarily be second unto the Father, from whom he receiveth his origination, and the Holy Ghost unto the Son. Neither can we be thought to want a sufficient foundation for this priority of the first Person of the Trinity, if we look upon the numerous testimonies of the ancient doctors of the church, who have not stuck to call the Father the origin, the cause, the author, the root, the fountain, and the head of the Son, or the whole Divinity. For by these titles it appeareth clearly, first, that they made a considerable difference between the Person of the Father, "of whom are all things," and the Person of the Son, "by whom are all things;"-secondly, that the difference consisteth properly in this, that as the branch is from the root, and the river from the fountain, and by their origination from them receive that being which they have, whereas the root receiveth nothing from the branch, or fountain from the river; so the Son is from the Father, receiving his subsistence by generation from him; the Father is not from the Son, as being what he is from none.

Some indeed of the ancients may seem to have made yet a farther difference between the Persons of the Fa

ther and the Son, laying upon that relation terms of greater opposition. As if, because the Son hath not his essence from himself, the Father had; because he was not begotten of himself, the Father had been so; because he is not the cause of himself, the Father were. Whereas, if we speak properly, God the Father hath neither his being from another, nor from himself; not from another, that were repugnant to his paternity; not from himself, that were a contradiction in itself. And therefore those expressions are not to be understood positively and affirmatively, but negatively and exclusively, that he hath his essence from none, that he is not begotten of any, nor hath he any cause of his existence. So that the proper notion of the Father in whom we believe is this, that he is a Person subsisting eternally in the one infinite essence of the Godhead; which essence or subsistence he hath received from no other person, but hath communicated the same essence, in which himself subsisteth, by generation to another person, who by that generation is the Son.

Howsoever, it is most reasonable to assert that there is but one Person who is from none; and the very generation of the Son and procession of the Holy Ghost undeniably prove, that neither of those two can be that Person. For whosoever is generated is from him which is the genitor, and whosoever proceedeth is from him from whom he proceedeth, whatsoever the nature of the generation or procession be. It followeth therefore that this Person is the Father, which name speaks nothing of dependence, nor supposeth any kind of priority in another.

From hence it is observed that the name of God, taken absolutely, is often in the scriptures spoken of the Father: as when we read of "God sending his own Son;" of "the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God;" and generally wheresoever Christ is called the Son of God, or the Word of God, the name of God is to be taken particularly for the Father, because he is no Son but of the Father. From hence he is styled "One God;" "The true God;" "The only true God;" "The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ."

Which, as it is most true and so fit to be believed, is also a most necessary truth, and therefore to be acknowledged, for the avoiding multiplication and plurality of Gods. For if there were more than one which were from none, it could not be denied but there were more Gods than one. Wherefore this origination in the divine paternity hath anciently been looked upon as the assertion of the unity; and therefore the Son and Holy Ghost have been believed to be but one God with the Father, because both are from the Father, who is one, and so the union of them.

Secondly; it is necessary thus to believe in the Father, because our salvation is propounded to us by an access unto the Father. We are all gone away and fallen from God, and we must be brought to him again. There is no other notion under which we can be brought to God as to be saved, but the notion of the Father; and there is no other person can bring us to the Father, but the Son of that Father: for, as the apostle teacheth us, "through him we have an access by one Spirit unto the Father," Eph. ii. 18.

Having thus described the true nature and notion of the divine paternity, in all the several degrees and eminencies belonging to it, I may now clearly deliver, and every particular Christian understand, what it is he speaks, when he makes his confession in these words, I be lieve in God the Father: by which I conceive him to express thus much-As I am assured that there is an infinite and independent Being, whom we call a God, and that it is impossible there should be more infinities than one; so I assure myself that this one God is the Father of all things, especially of all men and angels, so far as the mere act of creation may be styled generation; that he is farther yet, and in a more peculiar manner, the Father of all those whom he regenerateth by his Spirit, whom he adopteth in his Son, as heirs and co-heirs with him, whom he crowneth with the reward of an eternal inheritance in the heavens. But beyond and far above all this, besides his general offspring and peculiar people, "to whom he hath given power to become the sons of God," I believe him the Father, in a more eminent and trans