in them, there clearly was not strength enough to prevent any one nation, not favoured with the light of divine revelation, from running into the extravagancies of polytheism; from having gods many, and lords many. This being the case, then, while we allow that reason may evince the high probability of the point in question, yet we look for absolute certainty on this subject to the oracles of God; and the mind of the Christian reposes with full assurance on such declarations as these: "Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God is one Lord." (Deut. vi. 4.) "Thus saith the Lord the King of Israel, and his Redeemer the Lord of hosts; I am the first, and I am the last; and beside me there is no God.” (Isaiah xliv. 6.)

This unity of the Divine Being should ever be constantly kept in view, being essential to all true religion. For what is divine worship and service, but the worship and the service of the whole man? a service to be performed with all the heart, and soul, and mind, and strength? Now were there two beings, who had equal claims to our religious regards, it is obvious that we must be guilty of the impiety of entirely disregarding one of them; or that we must regard each of them with a divided homage only, that is, pay divine worship to neither.

While, however, the Scripture teaches us that

there is but one eternal, omnipotent, and omniscient being, whom we call God, it further teaches us, and this is a doctrine of pure reve lation,

2. That this one God subsists under three relations or, as we commonly say, in three persons, the Father, the Son, aud the Holy Ghost. This use of the term person seems to be sanctioned by that passage of the epistle to the Hebrews, chap. i. 3, in which the Son is described as the express image of the Father's person. The word, however, is not applied to this subject altogether in its usual signification; if it were, when we speak of three persons, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, we should be understood to speak of three separate gods. But this is very far from being our meaning. It has already appeared that we insist on the unity of the Divine Being as strenuously as even those can do, who, denying the essential doctrine of the Trinity in unity, would arrogate to themselves exclusively the title of Unitarians. When the Father, then, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, are termed persons, all that is meant is this, that those things are said of each of them, which imply persona] agency.

We find that from the very beginning of time, intimations were given of a plurality of persons

in the Godhead. Take, for instance, the passage which occurs in the first lesson for this morning's service, in which God is represented as saying, "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness." (Gen. i. 26.) God cannot here be calling on the angels to co-operate with him, for the work in hand was the work of creation, a work peculiar to God alone; neither was man made after the image of the angels, but after that of God himself. And how derogatory is it to the divine Majesty to suppose, that, in imitation of earthly monarchs, he adopts the plural number, as a means of adding to his importance! But a Trinity, as well as a plurality of persons, was intimated to the church under the Old Testament dispensation. One instance may be mentioned: it shall be that which occurs in the thirty-third Psalm, where, in the sixth verse, we read as follows: "By the word of the Lord," or of Jehovah, were the heavens made; and all the host of them by the breath," or spirit, " of his mouth." Here the three persons, Jehovah, the Word, and the Spirit, are mentioned as concurring in the work of creation. But whatever intimations respecting the Trinity of Persons in the Godhead are contained in the Old Testament, they are altogether eclipsed by the far clearer declarations on the subject, which are contained

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in the New. this point.

The text is one manifest proof of The prescribed form of baptism (Matt. xxviii. 19) is another; the salutation of St. John to the seven churches of Asia (Rev. i. 4, 5) is a third; while we are furnished with a fourth by that appearance of each of the three persons at the baptism of our Lord, of which we heard in the second lesson this morning. At that baptism we have the Father uttering a voice from heaven, the Son manifest in the flesh, and the Holy Spirit appearing in the emblematical shape of a dove. (Matt. iii. 16, 17.) We gather further from the Scriptures,

3. That these three Persons, though in a manner inconceivable by us, are distinct from each other. Those distinct enumerations of the three Persons, and that distinct manifestation of them, which we have just noticed, are proofs of the proposition before us. Again, "I am one," saith our Lord, that bear witness of myself, and the Father that sent me beareth witness of me," (John viii. 18.) He here speaks of his Father and himself as being two distinct witnesses, and consequently two distinct Persons. Yet again,

I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever; even the Spirit of truth." (John xiv. 16,

17.) Here the Holy Spirit is obviously represented as distinct from the Son, as the Father was in the passage just mentioned. Further, they are distinguished by their peculiar personal relations and properties. Thus the Father is said to beget the Son; the Son to be begotten of the Father; and the Holy Spirit to proceed from both. Still further, the Christian receives distinct blessings from each of the three Persons; blessings these, which are styled in the text, the love of the Father, the grace of the Son, and the communion of the Holy Ghost. Once more, a distinct province is assigned to each of the three Persons in the work of redemption. For instance, the Father is represented as contriving and purposing the work of redemption; the Son as actually paying the ransom; and the Holy Spirit as applying the redemption, thus contrived and purchased, to the soul of the sinner. So numerous and varied are the proofs of that important distinction between the three Persons in the Godhead; the precise nature of which distinction, however, we are very far from being able to comprehend.

4. It is to be observed, in the fourth place, that the Scriptures teach us, that each of these three Persons is truly and perfectly divine. That the Father is God, is universally allowed.