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In the Body of my Letter I have faid, "that the Right of punishing was vested "in God as the fovereign Lawgiver of the "whole, who could not confistently with "the common Good of the whole, for "ought we can prove, have remitted the "Punishment without a Satisfaction." This you will scarce be able to disprove. "Why "might not then our Saviour fatisfy to God "the Father, confidered in this Capacity?” You will answer; that if God was the fupreme Lawgiver, and our Saviour God, then the fupreme Lawgiver fatisfied to the fupreme Lawgiver. But what if our Saviour might be truly God, (i, e. ennobled with all the Effential Perfections of the Godhead) at the fame Time that he divested himself of the Capacity of a Lawgiver; I mean, during the Time that he was tranfacting the gracious Scheme of our Redemption? For to be the fovereign Lawgiver is no effential Perfection of the Deity—If it were, He could never have been without it. He must have been Lawgiver ab æterno: That is, he must have been Lawgiver when there were no Beings to give Laws to. It is plain then, that to be fovereign Lawgiver is no effential Perfection of the Deity, but only a relative Property.

This feems to overturn your main Argument, that the Divine Nature fatisfied itself. For if God did not require Satisfaction, as vefted with the Divine Nature, or, as God, but as the fupreme Lawgiver; then your Argument, to have been valid, ought to have run thus: That the fupreme Lawgiver fatisfied the fupreme Lawgiver: Which I have fhewn, was not the Cafe.

To be Lawgiver, then, is no Perfection effential to the Nature of the Deity-Confequently our Saviour, ftill retaining the effential Properties of the Godhead, might put off the Character of Lawgiver-consequently needed no Satisfaction himself-and fo might fatisfy the Father, in whom that Character was lodged. The reft your own Thoughts will fupply.

THE

THE SECOND LETTER.

DEAR SIR,

A

FTER having attempted to fhew, that you had proved no abfolute Impoffibility in the Doctrine of the Satisfaction, my Intention was to caution you against mistaking Difficulties for Impoffibilities, and letting your Thoughts fally out into Matters where you could have no SureFooting. My Caution was well meant. I was afraid the Difputer of this World would get the better of the Chriftian. If my Fears were ill-grounded, pardon my Mistake, and accept of my good Defign. Though No-body can have an higher Opinion of your diftinguished Abilities and difinterested Love of Truth; yet I confidered, that an Affectation of being wife above what was written in the deep Things of God, and of pushing our Inquiries beyond our Capacities, had mifled the ablest Writers, down from CARTESIUS and MALEBRANCHE, to NEWTON, CLARKE, etc. into almost as great Abfurdities, as an implicit Acquiefcence in the common received Notions of their Country has betrayed the unthinking Vulgar. There is a speculative D d Fool

Fool-hardiness, a metaphyfical Quixotifm in Men of very great but enterprizing Geniuses, which prompts them to grapple with Objects, to which every judicious By-stander fees their Strength to be vaftly unequal.

Notwithstanding all your Art and Finesse, your Propofition, which I excepted to, will not, I doubt, admit of thofe Softenings, with which you would qualify its Harshness. "I must own it," you fay, "to be my "firm Perfuafion, that it is impoffible

Christianity fhould be true, if what relates "to this Point in the Scripture appears to "be abfurd." Relates to what Point, I befeech you, Sir? Why? To a Point to which our Faculties are not fuited, viz. How the Divine Nature could fatisfy itself. Your Senfe is confined, by your own Words, to Points too fublime for human Comprehenfion, and refolves into this Propofition: "In Matters wherein (because they bear "no Proportion to our Faculties) we cannot હૃદ diftinctly perceive a Doctrine to be abfurd, "we ought to difcard that Doctrine, if "it have but the Appearance of an Abfur"dity.". -By what appears to be abfurd, must be understood, either what we evidently perceive to be a Falfhood, or what we only conceive to be fo. If the former; it is true, that evident Perception neceffarily extorts our Affent; but this is foreign to your Purpofe here. Indeed you explain yourself

in that Senfe, but the Subject we are upon must exclude that Meaning. For, fince our Ideas of the intrinfick Nature of God, the Unity and Diftinction of that Nature, are very obfcure, short, and indiftinct; fince our Knowledge can rife no higher than our Ideas; we never can have any certain, clear, and distinct Knowledge, where all our Ideas are obfcure and indistinct.

The latter Senfe of your Expreffion, viz. what appears to be abfurd, you will not contend for: It is plain from numerous Inftances, that we may conceive, or (if you will give me Leave to ufe an Expreffion fo highly obnoxious to you) fancy a thousand Things to be abfurd which are not fo. We may form precipitate Judgments (the main Source of Error) without diftin& Perception. We may go before the Light, instead of following it. If then you have clear and diftinct Ideas of the unfathomable Depths of the Divine Nature, which produce distinct Knowledge in you; though they must be your own peculiar Property, yet be fo generous as to impart them to a Friend. But if you have not; do not complain that I took Advantage of the Inaccuracy of your Expreffion; but fairly confefs, that your Words either meant nothing at all, or must mean your conceiving a Thing to be abfurd from your very indiftinct Notices.

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