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SERMON IX.*

SAINT MATTHEW, xxviii. 19.

"Go YE, THEREFORE, AND TEACH ALL NATIONS, BAPTIZING THEM IN THE NAME OF THE FATHER, and OF THE SON, AND OF THE HOLY GHOST."

"THE idols of the Heathen," saith the Psalmist, “are silver and gold, the work of men's hands. They that make them are like unto them; so is every one that trusteth in them." Thus does man, in every state, from the gross idolater, to the pure in heart, who see and bear the image of the true God, resemble the being that he worships. Whatever, in a word, we approve as good, or feel as a source of happiness within us, these materials we combine and expand, as wide as thought can carry; and hence results our real notion of God. We believe that God is wise, and just, and benevo

* Preached in St. Peter's Church, Dublin, on Trinity Sunday, June 14th, 1829, on behalf of the National Institution for the education of the Deaf and Dumb children of the poor in Ireland. Originally published at the desire of the Committee of the Institution, and of the congregation.

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lent; because we are conscious, that in these the perfection of our own nature consists.

The same principle leads us to suppose, that God is not, in his essence, a solitary, but a social being. There must be something in the great original, to which all that is most amiable in the copy answers. Our kindly affections one to another, must have their archetypes in God. God, who is thus essential love, must have had some object from eternity, on whom to exercise this unchangeable and primest attribute of his nature; and that object, if eternal, must be God.

Hence it is argued, on mere rational principles, that there is a plurality in the Godhead; something which we call, for want, perhaps, of a more suitable term, a distinction of persons. Amongst the Heathen, ancient and modern, both in their popular and their profounder systems, it is well known what abundant traces of this doctrine are to be found. Nay, so unequivocal are these intimations, that the early Christians stand accused, by their infidel opponents, of having borrowed their notions of a Trinity, from the heathen philosophers.

If we turn to Scripture, we find this fundamental truth, in the very first instance of the oracles of God. "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth." The plural substan

tive Elohim, joined, as it is here, to the singular verb, which we translate "created," is both an intimation and an illustration of the Trinity in Unity: the Persons distinct, but blended in the same essence; one in will, in design, and nature. At man's creation, we hear God thus speaking: "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness." And afterwards, at his fall in Adam: Behold, the man has become as one of us, to know good and evil."

Of the three sacred Persons, mentioned in my text, no doubt has ever been raised respecting the divine nature of the first. All that admit his existence, admit that he is God.

Of the Son, the Apostle John thus speaks: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." "He was in the form of God, and thought it not robbery to be equal with God;" says St. Paul to the Philippians. And the same Apostle to the Colossians: "By him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers."

But to these positive texts, which could be multiplied far beyond what the present occasion would allow, I shall add one argument, which I conceive to be, of itself, decisive, as to the divinity

of the Son of God. The Scriptures, both of the Old and New Testament, hold up the undivided love of God, as the first and great commandment; as the fulfilment of the prime duty; the end of all religion. "Hear, O Israel; the Lord our God is one Lord: And thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength." This leading doctrine, our blessed Lord himself never ceased, in every form and variety of expression, to enforce; namely, that renouncing every idol, and banishing from our bosom every rival of God's love, we should rest in him with an entire and infinite affection. Hence it follows, that our Lord, if a teacher of truth, must have been God; because he offers himself to man, as his soul's repose, his chief good, and his supreme felicity. "Come unto me," says he, "all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." "Whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him, shall never thirst." The profound sensibilities of the human heart shall find repose in me. The vast desires of the spiritual nature, shall be satisfied in me. "I am the bread of life; he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst."

I could pursue this head much farther, but time will not admit. Let me, then, bring this argu

ment to a point. Our Lord teaches us, in express terms, to set our supreme affection on God alone. In many passages of Scripture, he proposes himself, as the object of this supreme affection; as the food, the life, and happiness of the soul. What conclusion can we draw from these two facts, but one or other of the following: either that Christ has misled his followers upon the all-important point, claiming for a creature, what he himself pronounces as due to God alone: or that he is himself very God, the centre of all souls, their original, and their end?

"Such as the Father is, such is the Son, and such also is the Holy Ghost." In proof of the distinct personality, and full divinity of the third Person of the Trinity, I shall quote but two verses. In proof of his personality, I shall select, from a multitude of passages, the 13th verse of the 16th chapter of St. John. It is of itself decisive. "When He, the Spirit of Truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak." And, in proof of his divinity, I shall, from a still larger number of concurrent scriptures, point to the commencement of the 5th chapter of the Acts of the Apostles. "Why," says St. Peter to Ananias, " hath Satan filled thine'