Chapter XXIX: Preface (1)

In preparing this Lecture for the press, after an examination in its printed form of that to which it is a Reply, I do not find that the Trinitarian argument has been strengthened by additional evidence, or by a more logical statement, so as to require any modification of my impressions of its weight and character.

Mr. Bates has in his Appendix _drawn out_ some of his scriptural evidence, and I can only require any one to examine it, in order not only to estimate its cogency in reference to this particular question, but also to obtain a very accurate idea of the peculiar genius of Trinitarian interpretation. I shall select two passages as perfectly descriptive of the manner in which the believer in a verbal and logical revelation draws doctrinal conclusions from the mere words of scripture.

Here is one of the Trinitarian _Scriptural proofs_ of Three Persons in the Unity of the Godhead.

“2 Thess. iii. 5. ‘The LORD direct your hearts into the love of GOD, and into the patient waiting for CHRIST.’

“In these passages the Three Persons are distinguished. The LORD to whom the prayer is in both instances directed; GOD, _even our Father_; and our _Lord Jesus_ CHRIST. That the LORD thus distinguished from _God the Father_, and our _Lord Jesus Christ_, and addressed in prayer, is the HOLY GHOST, is evident from the analogy of Scripture, which teaches that _sanctification_, for which the Apostle prays, is the peculiar work of the Holy Ghost.”—_Mr. Bates’ Appendix, p. 590._

Now, using the same description of logic, we have only to quote a passage in which _sanctification_ is ascribed _not_ to the Holy Ghost, but to GOD our FATHER, in order to overthrow the whole of this verbal and mournful trifling with the sublime and vast purport of revelation.

“Holy FATHER, keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me, that _they_ may be one, _as_ we are.... _Sanctify_ them through thy truth: thy word is truth.”—John xvii. 11, 17.

The second descriptive specimen I select, of the genius of Trinitarian interpretation, is the following alleged _scriptural proof_ of the separate Deity and Personality of the Holy Spirit.

“Rev. i. 4. ‘JOHN to the seven Churches which are in Asia: Grace be unto you, and peace, from him which is, and which was, and which is to come; and from the seven Spirits which are before his throne.’”

The _seven_ Spirits, we are told, is a symbolical designation of the One Spirit. Nothing however can be more clear, even on the _verbal_ principle, than that the seven Spirits are the seven Messengers, Angels, or Ministers, which, partaking themselves of God’s Spirit, were His instruments of communication with the seven Churches of Asia enumerated by the Author of the Apocalypse, and which are represented as being before his throne, deriving their own inspiration from Him.—“The mystery of the seven stars which thou sawest in my right hand, and the seven golden candlesticks. The seven stars are the angels of the seven Churches; and the seven candlesticks which thou sawest are the seven Churches.”—Rev. i. 20.

On this, the last opportunity, perhaps, which I may have, of saying any thing in connexion with these Lectures, I cannot but express my own regret, and point it out to public notice, that we have been necessitated by circumstances, not to prepare merely and deliver as pulpit addresses, but to print and fix in a permanent form, dissertations upon most important and agitated questions, within a period of time altogether insufficient to do any justice, I will not say to the subjects, but even to our own ideas of the subjects. The accidental advantage, in this respect, obtained by the Lecturers on the Trinitarian Theology, with ample time and undivided strength to bring out a single Lecture on a single topic, ought to be included as an element of judgment, if the real value of the contrasted views is to be estimated by any, by the results of the present controversy. For myself, it is with great pain that I think of so much written, in the most sacred cause, almost extempore. That this necessity has occasioned any defects except such as have been _an injury to our own views of Truth_, by failing to bring out its full strength, I am not aware. I am not aware that, in any respect, we have, through haste, _overstated_ our case. I am aware, for my own part, that it might have been much strengthened by additional force of evidence, and clearness of statement. I may be allowed to state, that in the course of three months I have been obliged to write and print to the extent of an octavo volume of nearly four hundred pages. It is impossible that such an exposition of our views should not be crowded with imperfections, and indefinitely feebler than it might be. May we ask that this consideration will be taken into the account by all those who are now forming an opinion of the merits of the Trinitarian and Unitarian Theology, from this discussion of it. May we ask those who, in the love of the Truth, and in confidence in the God of Truth that no Truth can injure them, wish the real evidence to be presented to their minds, to read the original sources, the New and the Old Scriptures, afresh, without fear, without an unfair and biassing horror of what they have been cradled to dread as heresy, without the intellectual infidelity of studying a revelation from God with the previous interpretations of men, colouring all their associations with the very words of the document, and preventing their ever receiving a pure impression from the original evidence unmixed with the whispers and suggestions of some self-authorized _Interpreter_ who is in terror lest they should miss _the essentials_ of the _revealed_ religion, and derive from it some ideas that would destroy.

_Liverpool, April 1839._

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LECTURE IX.

THE COMFORTER, EVEN THE SPIRIT OF TRUTH,
WHO DWELLETH IN US, AND TEACHETH ALL THINGS.

By REV. JOHN HAMILTON THOM.

“IF YE LOVE ME, KEEP MY COMMANDMENTS: AND 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; WHOM THE WORLD CANNOT RECEIVE,
BECAUSE IT SEETH HIM NOT, NEITHER KNOWETH HIM: BUT YE KNOW HIM, FOR
HE DWELLETH WITH YOU, AND SHALL BE IN YOU. I WILL NOT LEAVE YOU
COMFORTLESS; I WILL COME TO YOU.”—_John_ xiv. 15-18

It is very remarkable that whenever the doctrine of the Trinity is discussed, the debate is almost always exclusively occupied by the single question of the deity of the Christ, and if that can be established, the controversy is considered at an end. Controversialists glide from the doctrine of the deity of the Son to the separate deity of the Holy Spirit, in a way which plainly shows that one inroad being effected on the personal unity of God, and the principle once loosened, another division of it is conceded upon much easier terms, without fear, without caution, without reverence. Why indeed should men scruple to admit three persons into the unity of the Godhead after having got over the first great difficulty of admitting two? A third person adds nothing to the difficulty of a second person, and if we cannot maintain unbroken the principle of one God, in our own sense of oneness, then the extent to which the principle is violated, whether by three persons, or any other number, is really a matter of a very minor importance. Having admitted that there may be two persons in the godhead, it would be very absurd to take an objection against there being three; for the analogy of unity, in the only sense we are acquainted with it, the unity of a human being, having once failed us, we must never plead it again. The principle that admits two minds in the being of one God will equally admit any number whatever, provided Scripture accords to them the dignity, and our struggle and reluctance will be felt most strongly on the first of these invasions of our own idea of unity, and will yield more and more readily at each successive one.

This is the only explanation I can conceive, and a very natural one it is, of the weak and unguarded state in which Trinitarians have left the separate personality and deity of the Holy Ghost. I do not wonder at their preference for that word, _Ghost_, in this connection. It materializes the word Spirit, puts the true idea out of immediate sight, and is so far a preparation for introducing the conception of a third _person_, which never would naturally have arisen from the use of the more intelligible expression “the Holy Spirit,” “the Spirit of God.” I apprehend that all minds, though long familiarized with the idea of a plurality of persons in the godhead, would be greatly shocked, if that plurality was conceived to be either more or less than the mystic number three. A multitude of deities, discharging different offices, but partaking of the one Essence of the godhead, would be thought a completely Heathen conception—and a reduction of the present orthodox idea, so as to represent only two persons in the one God, would strike a Christian mind as scarcely less pagan. Yet upon Trinitarian principles this is evidently a mere prejudice of Custom. There is no more reason, so far as our understanding is concerned, for there being three persons in the godhead than for there being only two, and whether there be one, two, three, or a countless number, is a question to which our Reason ought to be entirely indifferent, having no _a priori_ opinion or principle of its own upon the subject: and submitting to the letter of the Revelation with equal readiness, whether it distributes the Essence of the Deity among a Trinity, or among any other plurality of minds. Now I would ask Trinitarians whether they have schooled themselves into submission to this principle—whether they would receive four persons in the Godhead as readily as they receive three, provided the same mode of inferential interpretation which now establishes the Trinity, succeeded in showing that a further distribution of the essence of the godhead was required, in order to make our Theology consistent with the exact wording of the Scriptures. I apprehend that most minds amongst us would revolt at the idea of four persons in one God, _contemplated as a mere possibility_. Yet surely in a Trinitarian this would be very unreasonable. As a _Scripture_ doctrine he might reasonably discard it as unfounded—but as a possibility, as a subject on which, previous to Revelation, he ought to have no prejudice whatever, he must on his own principles have no objection to the plurality of divine persons extending to any number, and be as prompt, to submit his faith to five as to three, provided five can be shown to be the proper inference from the words of Scripture. A consistent Trinitarian must feel no _a priori_ objection to any number of divine persons united together. Having conceded that on this subject his Reason is no guide, and his Nature no analogy, there is but one question he has a right to ask,—“Is it so written?”

And even if it should be granted that Scripture reveals three divine persons and reveals no more, yet upon his own principles, a consistent Trinitarian should be cautious in asserting that there _are_ no more. Scripture nowhere asserts that there are _only_ three persons in the godhead—and surely it is being wise above what is written, for a Trinitarian to confine God’s essence within the limits in which He has been pleased to reveal Himself, and to make the communications He has opened upon us the measures of the infinite possibilities of His being. A Trinitarian reverently and with becoming modesty stating his own doctrine, and not presuming to know more of God than is revealed, ought to content himself with saying—that Scripture discloses three divine minds in one Deity, but that whether there are any _more_ than three, Scripture does not declare, and he would hold it arrogant to assert. If the Unitarian is wise _contrary_ to what is written in confining the unity of God to one person; the Trinitarian is wise _above_ what is written in confining it to three persons, and with less excuse, for that one is neither more nor less than one is at least a natural supposition—but after having admitted that one may be three, there is nothing but precipitancy and dogmatism in determining that it can be _only_ three. A consistent and scripturally modest Trinitarian should simply state, that God his Father, God his Redeemer, and God his Sanctifier, contained all the revelation that was required for the salvation of his soul—but as to whether there might not be other divine persons in the plurality of the godhead, he held it to be a high mystery, which he did not presume to speak upon—that only these were revealed, and therefore he knew no more, but yet he did not dare to assert that his necessities, the requirements of a being so feeble, comprised and exhausted the whole capabilities and personalities of the godhead. But Trinitarians are not so modest. They charge the Unitarian with presumption for limiting the divine essence to one Person—and then they proceed themselves, with no warrant from Scripture, and none _they_ assert from Reason, to limit it to Three.

If two not three had been the favourite mythological number, if a Duality and not a Trinity had been the Platonic conception, then, I am satisfied, that the Christian world, though it might have witnessed the deification of the Christ, would never have heard of the separate deity of the Holy Spirit. And this assertion is amply borne out by the historical fact, that the deification of the Spirit followed afterwards as a consequence from the deification of the Son, and that the earliest form of the charge made against the Platonizing Christians by stricter believers in the unity of the Deity, states the whole extent of their heresy to be that of introducing a _second_ God,—nothing as yet being said about third.

It is well known to all in whom duty has so far prevailed over distaste, as to make them turn in sorrow the heavy pages of Ecclesiastical History, that there was no discussion respecting the divinity of the third person in the Trinity until nearly the end of the fourth century. Nothing can surpass the cool and easy confidence which sets aside this undeniable fact by boldly asserting that up to this time the doctrine was never disputed—and that the absence of evidence in support of this doctrine only arises from the absence of doubt, that nobody stated what nobody denied. What, the separate deity and personality of the Holy Ghost never doubted, and yet not one prayer addressed to Him in Scripture, not one ascription of praise, not one doxology in which his name is introduced, so that when the Church desired to associate the third person in the honours of Christian worship it could find no Scripture formula, and had to make one for the occasion;—not one debate for nearly four hundred years upon the deity of the Holy Ghost, although the deity of the Second Person, to whom the Third Person even after his deification was held to be subordinate, was constantly debated, and yet the doctrine never doubted nor denied! Now if the doctrine was never doubted or denied, since the doctrine of the deity of the Son was most certainly both doubted and denied, why is it that the Holy Spirit does not appear as the Second person in the Trinity instead of the Third—why is it that the Council of Nice previous to this time, when the doctrine _began_ to be doubted and denied, asserts the deity of the Father, and the deity of the Son, but does not assert the deity of the Holy Ghost—and why is it that the earliest charge against the philosophizing Christians was that of introducing a _second_ God, if there was already a second divine person acknowledged, and therefore the true charge should have been that of introducing a _third_? It is remarkable that the same very learned writer, the late Professor Burton, who is the great Trinitarian authority upon these subjects, after having resolved the absence of controversy into the possible absence of doubt as to the deity of the holy Ghost, records the very first instance in which the Holy Spirit is introduced into a doxology of the Church as taking place in the fourth century. He quotes Philostorgius the Arian historian, who declares, “that Flavianus of Antioch, having assembled a number of monks, was the first to shout out, Glory to the Father, _and_ to the Son, _and_ to the holy Spirit; for before his time some had said, Glory to the Father, _through_ the Son _in_ the holy Spirit, which was the expression in most general use; and others, Glory to the Father, in the Son and holy Spirit.”[524] Gibbon relates this matter thus. He is speaking of a temporary triumph of the Arians over the Athanasians, and of the means employed by the Athanasian laity to manifest their unwilling acceptance of the Arian Bishops. “The Catholics,” says the historian, “might prove to the world, that they were not involved in the guilt and heresy of their ecclesiastical governor, by publicly testifying their dissent, or by totally separating themselves from his communion. The first of these methods was invented at Antioch, and practised with such success, that it was soon diffused over the Christian world. The doxology, or sacred hymn, which celebrates the glory of the Trinity, is susceptible of very nice, but material inflections; and the substance of an orthodox or heretical creed, may be expressed by the difference of a disjunctive or a copulative particle. Alternate responses, and a more regular psalmody were introduced into the public Service by Flavianus and Diodorus, two devout and active laymen, who were attached to the Nicene faith. Under their conduct, a swarm of monks issued from the adjacent desert, bands of well-disciplined singers were stationed in the cathedral of Antioch, the Glory to the Father, AND the Son, AND the Holy Ghost, was triumphantly chaunted by a full chorus of voices: and the Catholics insulted, by the purity of their doctrine, the Arian prelate, who had usurped the throne of the venerable Eustathius.” Out of such disorders in the Church, from the rebellious device of laymen to insult an heretical Bishop, sprung the doxology of our present creeds.

It is very instructive to look a little closely into some of the passages from the early Fathers which are brought by Trinitarians as evidence of the recognition of their doctrines by the primitive Church. There is unquestionably much vague language that will readily coalesce with the conceptions of a modern orthodox believer; but as soon as you examine with any strictness, you find that though they use language very loosely, nothing could be further from their modes of thinking than modern orthodoxy. For instance, we find the Son and the Holy Spirit mentioned as objects of a Christian’s reverence—but it is very remarkable how many of these cases occur when the writers are defending themselves against a charge of Atheism, as if they were desirous when repelling such charge to show how many sources of veneration their religion disclosed. The early Christians who believed in only one God were called Atheists by the Heathens. To believe in only one God was in their estimation the next thing to believing in none at all. Those who believed in many gods were likely enough to call the Christians Atheists, just as in the present day lecturers in Christ Church call Unitarianism a God denying Heresy.[525] In vindicating themselves against this dangerous calumny the early Christians were naturally led to extend rather than to diminish their objects of worship, and accordingly in a passage quoted by Professor Burton, from the earliest Father on whom dependence can be placed, we find not only the Son and the Spirit, but interposed between the Son and the Spirit, the angels of Heaven, associated together in their reverence. Hence the passage is quoted by Roman Catholics in support of the worship of Angels. And if it is good for the one purpose, it is equally good for the other; nay, if it is any proof of the separate deity of the Holy Spirit, it is equally proof of the deity of the angels who are mentioned before him. The passage is from Justin Martyr whom Professor Burton places A. D. 150. “Hence it is that we are called Atheists: and we confess that we are Atheists with respect to such reputed gods as these: but not with respect to the true God, the Father of justice, temperance, and every other virtue, with whom is no mixture of evil. But Him, and the Son who came from Him and gave us this instruction, and the host of the other good angels which attend upon and resemble them, and the prophetic Spirit we worship and adore, paying them a reasonable and true honour, and not refusing to deliver to any one else, who wishes to be taught, what we ourselves have learnt.”[526] There is another passage from Justin Martyr, also given by Burton as evidence of the early recognition of the Trinity, but which is manifestly nothing more than the natural anxiety of the writer when meeting a charge that perilled his life, the charge of Atheism, to show the full extent of his sentiments of reverence. “That we are not Atheists,” says Justin Martyr, “who would not acknowledge, when we worship the Creator of this Universe, and Jesus Christ who was our instructor in these things, knowing him to be the Son of this true God, and assigning to him the _Second_ place. And I shall prove presently, that we honour the prophetic Spirit in the _third_ rank, and that we are reasonable in so doing.”[527] Now let it be recollected that these two passages, extending as far as possible the objects of a Christian’s reverence, occur in Justin Martyr’s Apology for Christianity against its Gentile oppressors, in which he complains that the Christians were treated as Atheists, and unjustly punished for not worshipping the gods. I shall only quote one other passage exhibiting the modes of thinking respecting the Holy Spirit among the early Fathers. It is from Origen, A. D. 240, perhaps the most eminent of them all, and shows clearly, notwithstanding the frequent vagueness and obscurity of their writings, how far they were removed from modern Trinitarianism, and that their forms of thought were derived from Platonism much more than from Christianity, or more strictly from Platonism engrafted on Christianity. He is speaking of the Son, and commenting on those words at the beginning of St. John’s Gospel—“all things were made by him.”

“If it is true,” says Origen, “that _all things were made by him_, we must inquire whether the Holy Ghost was made by him: for as it seems to me, if a person says that the Holy Ghost was made, and if he grants that all things were made by the Logos, he must necessarily admit that the Holy Ghost was also made by the Logos, the latter preceding him in order of time. But if a person does not choose to say that the Holy Ghost was made by Christ, it follows that he must call him unproduced, if he thinks that this passage in the gospel is true. But there may be a third opinion, beside that of admitting that the Holy Ghost was made by the Logos, and that of supposing him to be uncreated, namely, the notion of there being no substantial individual existence of the Holy Ghost distinct from the Father and the Son. We, however, being persuaded that there are three hypostases (persons), the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, and believing that nothing is unproduced beside the Father, adopt this as the more pious and the true opinion, that all things being made by the Logos, the Holy Ghost is more honourable than all of them, and more so in rank than all the things which were made by the Father through Christ. And perhaps this is the reason why he is not called the very Son of God, there being only one who by nature and origin is Son, viz. the only begotten, who seems to have been necessary to the Holy Ghost, and to have assisted in forming his hypostasis, not only that he might exist, but also that he might have wisdom, and reason, and righteousness, and whatever else we suppose him to have, according to his participation in those qualities which we have before mentioned as attributed to Christ.” “Such,” says Burton, “is this extraordinary, and I must add unfortunate passage of Origen, which I have quoted at length, and have endeavoured to translate with the utmost fairness. If the reader should decide from it that Origen did not believe in the eternity of the Holy Ghost, he will think that the enemies of Origen were not without grounds when they questioned his orthodoxy. It is not my intention entirely to exculpate him. He is at least guilty of indiscretion in entering upon such perilous grounds and in speculating so deeply upon points which after all must elude the grasp of human ideas and phraseology.” Professor Burton calls this passage “unfortunate,” for no reason that we can see, except that it discloses too plainly Origen’s ignorance of Modern Trinitarianism, and shows too clearly in what sense we are to understand the Platonic language of the Fathers.

There are two modes of proof by which Trinitarians undertake to establish the separate existence of the Holy Spirit as a third person in the godhead. The first mode is by inferences from such passages of scripture as seem to attribute the titles and offices of deity to the Holy Spirit. The second method of proof is by independent considerations of Theology which profess to demonstrate the necessity of a third person in the godhead in order to compleat the work of man’s salvation.

Trinitarians say, that Scripture both calls the Holy Spirit God, and assigns to Him a work which none but God could accomplish. Now in both these respects we have not a shadow of difference with the Trinitarians. We believe as firmly and we hope as fervently as they do, that the Holy Spirit is God, and that the Holy Spirit has connections with our souls which none but our God could hold. We have no controversy with the Trinitarians, when they assert the Deity, and Personality, and Operations of the Holy Spirit. It is a mere piece of controversial dexterity to put these points prominently forward as the true grounds of our difference—and, whether designedly or not, an unfair impression is produced against us, by such a mode of statement, as if we were deniers of the deity and agency of the spirit of God—if indeed any meaning could be found in such a denial, supposing we were extravagant enough to make it. To deny the deity of the Spirit of God, would be a proposition as absolutely without meaning as to deny the humanity of the spirit of man. We were told by the Lecturer in Christ Church to whom this subject was committed, that it was of no avail for Unitarians to advance passages in which the Holy Spirit signified not God himself, but his power and influence exerted upon man, for that these occasional meanings of the expression were fully conceded; and that what we have to do, is to disprove the Trinitarian interpretation of _other_ passages which attribute to the Holy Spirit, deity, personality, and operation. Now the Trinitarians must allow us the privilege of taking our faith from ourselves, not from them, and in carving out for us this employment, the Lecturer at Christ Church would set us to the task of disproving our own convictions, of overthrowing our own interpretations, of answering and opposing _ourselves_. There is only one point of difference between the Trinitarians and ourselves upon this subject, and that is the only point to which their arguments never have a reference. They maintain and we maintain that the Holy Spirit is God. They concede and we concede that the expression “Holy Spirit” in scripture frequently signifies that portion of God’s spirit which is given to man naturally or supernaturally. They maintain however that the Holy Spirit is, not the one God, but a third person in the godhead—_and here we separate from them_, maintaining that the Scripture evidence for such a distribution of the Godhead among several persons is totally imaginary, and that the theological reasons for such a distribution betray the most arbitrary and unworthy limitations assigned by man to the infinite and spiritual nature of God. Now will it be believed that when Trinitarian controversialists treat this subject they uniformly put forward those views of it which we do not deny, as if we denied them, and they as uniformly pass over the only point of difference between us, and avoid all close grappling with it, laboriously proving that the holy Spirit is God, which of course we believe, and then taking for granted that he _is a third person_ in a Trinity, leaving the argument at the very point where argument ought to have commenced? Will it be believed that the Lecturer at Christ Church exhausted his strength and time in assiduously proving that the spirit of God was God, and that it had understanding, will, and power? Will it be believed that of nearly a three hours’ lecture, certainly not more than five minutes was devoted to the only point of difference between us—that the common parts of our faith were laboriously proved—if indeed such an identical proposition, as that the spirit of God is God, can be called faith—and the single controverted part left intact? I in my turn take the liberty of declaring that it is of no avail that Trinitarians adduce passages of scripture attesting the Deity, Personality, and Operations of the Holy Spirit, for that this is conceded, if an identical proposition can be conceded,—and that what they have to do is to prove that the spirit of God is not the one God, but a third person in the godhead—and if the Lecturer had devoted his three hours to this, the only point in controversy, he might have greatly aided, or greatly injured his cause, and have afforded an opportunity for testing the mutual strength of our views in a way which is now not possible. Disappointed of finding the controversy conducted with any closeness by the Lecturer in Christ Church on the only point by us denied, namely a deity of the Holy Spirit, personally separate from the deity of our one God, I turn to a published sermon of Dr. Tattershall’s, in the hope of finding some discussion of our true difference from an associated authority. But here unfortunately again precisely the same principle is pursued of proving what is not denied, and of passing most slightly over the only point of difference. In a sermon consisting of thirty-four pages just three are devoted to the matter in controversy,[528] and these I grieve to say occupied with reasonings so verbal and unsatisfactory, that one is amazed that a manly and reverential mind could offer or could accept them as the solid and substantial proofs of a doctrine that affects to such an extent the being and nature of God. I think it not unbecoming here to declare, that with respect to the two modes of proof adopted by Trinitarians to establish the separate deity of the Holy Spirit, the Scriptural proof, and the Theological proof, I have long and laboriously sought in their own writers, for some distinct controversial statement of the scriptural and theological adjustments of this subject; I have examined their scholars and critics for the verbal part of the argument, and their divines for the theological part of it, and nowhere can I find anything definite or tangible to grapple with or oppose. It is at least my conviction that never was so serious a doctrine as that of a third person in the godhead admitted upon evidence so small, and I cannot conceal my strengthened impression, that it has glided into most minds as an easy consequence from the deity of Christ. Again we avow our belief that the Holy Spirit is God, but we declare that we cannot find any scriptural evidence that he is a separate God (personally) from God our Father, or any theological evidence that He performs a work within our souls, which work may not be performed by God our Father. If Trinitarians wish to establish their own doctrine, it is to these two points that they ought to confine themselves.

Abandoned then to our own methods of discussing this subject by opponents who assert a doctrine that we deny, and prove only those portions of it that we admit, I shall endeavour to ascertain, first, the Scriptural meaning of the expression, “the Holy Spirit” or “Spirit of God.”

I shall examine the more difficult passages which are usually appealed to in this controversy.

I shall examine what Trinitarians call “the work of the Spirit,” in order to ascertain whether it requires a third person in the godhead, or whether God our Father is not sufficient for it.

And I shall close with some statement of our own views of the connections of the spirit of God with the spirit of man.

The expression “Holy Spirit” when used in scripture will I think always be found to designate not God as he is in Himself, whom no man knoweth, but God in communication with the spirit of man. Whether the Deity holds intercourse with his creatures naturally or supernaturally, the name applied to Him in scripture, with respect to those felt or manifested connections, is that of the Holy Spirit. And there is most holy and beautiful reason for this peculiar usage. God is a spirit; and he is therefore only spiritually discerned. Through our spirits He speaks to us. In our spirits He abides with us. Eye hath not seen him; ear hath not heard him—but through that portion of his spirit which He has given us, we know Him, and are His. It is not God without us, but God _within_ us that we know and feel. Externally we know Him not; personally we conceive him not; as He is, in his own essence and perfections we cannot think of Him—but He has put His own spirit within us, and that, in proportion as we have it and cherish it, reveals Him unto us—He has lighted up from Himself a candle of the Lord in our spiritual being, and if by communion with Him we keep oil in our lamps, and our lamps trimmed and burning, His spirit which bloweth where it listeth, listeth to blow upon us and to feed our flame. And how shall the spirit of man prepare itself for fresh communications from the spirit of God? Only by removing from his own spirit whatever is at variance with the spirit of God—by cleansing the temple, that the holy one may be able to come to us and manifest himself to a nature that has reverently sought to put away all deadening impurity, and to brighten the spiritual image in which it was made—by courting the voices of the soul—by listening amid the tumults of the world to hear God speaking in our conscience—by cherishing through obedience, and inviting through prayer the intimations, that by His spirit, from which ours are derived, He gives us of His will. The spirit of God originally made the spirit of Man: the spirit of God retains its connections with the spirit of Man so long as man does not by unholiness and alien sympathies drive out that holy Spirit: and in measures more abundantly as we prepare ourselves to receive of His, does He hold communion with us through affections and affinities fitted to apprehend Him; and He transforms the will that obeys Him from glory to glory as by the spirit of the Lord. I apprehend that the preparation which was made by God for the reception of the gospel and spirit of Jesus Christ, shows the preparation which all men must make who would qualify themselves for fresh communications from the Holy Spirit of our Father. The baptism of repentance prepared the way for the baptism of the holy spirit and of fire. The heart had to be cleansed before the spirit of God could descend upon it, and hold communication with it. And ever must there be a Baptist Ministry breaking the dread repose of sin, awakening the dead heart, and creating the consciousness of want, before the Christ of God can breathe in his gentle breath upon our souls, saying unto us, “receive ye the holy spirit.” The holy spirit of God reveals itself to the spirit of man in proportion as we remove unholiness from us. What use of language then can be more affectingly elevating and solemn than that which designates God, when in communication with man, as the Holy Spirit? A spirit, he is spiritually discerned: and holy, only those that are holy have affinities with Him.

Such then is the primary signification of the expression Holy Spirit when used in the Scriptures—the Holy Spirit of God naturally or supernaturally in communication with the spirit of man, and in fuller communication in proportion as man by holiness seeks it and prepares himself for it. From this however there is derived a secondary signification, and so natural and easy is the derivative meaning, that it is a strong confirmation of its primary. That portion of his spirit which God communicates to man, may be regarded as separated from Him. It has entered into man and become his. It is a gift, an inspiration from our God. Man has become the possessor of it, but still God is the origin of it, and therefore though imparted to us it may still be spoken of as God’s holy spirit. There are therefore in Scripture two significations of the Holy Spirit—the primary one—God in communication with man—and the secondary one—that portion of his spirit which God has communicated, naturally or supernaturally, and which has become ours. We have received the Holy Spirit, when we have spiritually received what only God can communicate. These two comprise, I believe, all the meanings of the expression, Holy Spirit, _first_, God communicating to man, and _secondly_ that portion of His spirit, which, by communication, man’s spirit has received.

I shall give some instances of each of these applications of the phrase.

There can be no difficulty in all those cases in which the holy Spirit signifies God himself in spiritual communication with man.—“And when they bring you into the synagogues, and unto magistrates, and powers; take ye no thought how or what thing ye shall answer, or what ye shall say. For the Holy Ghost shall teach you, in that same hour, what ye ought to say.”—Luke xii. 11, 12. Now in the parallel passage in St. Matthew’s Gospel we have the expression, the Holy Ghost, explained to mean the spirit of God our Father. “But when they deliver you up, take no thought how or what ye shall speak. For it shall be given you in that same hour what ye shall speak. For it is not ye that speak, but the spirit of your Father which speaketh in you.”—Matt. x. 19, 20. “Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the Scripture is of any private interpretation. For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men spake, as they were moved by the Holy Spirit.” “As they ministered to the Lord and fasted, the Holy Spirit said, Separate me Barnabas and Saul for the work whereunto I have called them—so they being sent forth by the Holy Spirit departed unto Seleucia.”—Acts xiii. 2, 4.

The expression the “Spirit of God” is sometimes used with the same signification, only with this difference, that “the Spirit of God” frequently signifies the essence and being of God as He is in Himself, whilst the expression “the Holy Spirit” is I believe never employed except to designate our heavenly Father when in living communication with the spirits of his children. “What man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of a man that is in him? Even so the things of God knoweth no man [or no one] but the spirit of God.”—1 Cor. ii. 11. Here if the spirit of man means man, the spirit of God must mean God, and how in opposition to language so precise and definite, a separate personality could be introduced into the godhead, called the spirit of God, it is difficult to imagine. “Whither shall I go from thy spirit? or whither shall I flee from thy presence?”—Ps. cxxxix. “By his spirit he has garnished the heavens: his hand has formed the crooked serpent (the galaxy).”—Job, xxvi. 13.

I shall now adduce some of the more remarkable cases in which the various expressions, “spirit,” “holy spirit,” and “spirit of God,” are used to designate that portion of God’s spirit which naturally or supernaturally has entered into man, and become ours, but which in reference to Him from whom it was derived, and with whom it retains blessed connections, is called the spirit of God. God being a Spirit, and man being a spirit, whatever man knows or feels of God, may, not figuratively, but with the strictest truth, be called the Holy Spirit within him. “If ye then being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him.”—Luke, xi. 13. Now that the Holy Spirit signifies here not a third person in the godhead, but our heavenly Father’s gifts and inspirations to the soul, is clearly shown by the parallel passage in St. Matthew’s gospel—“If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in Heaven give _good things_ to them that ask Him.”—Matt. vii. 11. “But as it is written, eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him. But God hath revealed them unto us by his spirit: for the spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God.”—1 Cor. ii. 9, 10. Now here the spirit is used first in its primary sense of God in communication with man, and immediately after in its secondary sense of that portion of His spirit communicated to man, for it is just in proportion as it partakes of His spirit that the spirit of man searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God. God enlightens and man receives—but the light which has entered into man, since it came from God, may well continue to be called the Spirit of God. “Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God;—but the natural man receiveth not the things of the spirit of God: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. But we have the mind of Christ.”—1 Cor. ii. 12-16. Here the Apostle distinctly declares that our portion of the spirit of God is “the mind of Christ.” In proportion as we have that we know Him, the only true God, whom to know is life eternal. “Likewise the spirit also helpeth our infirmities: for we know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings that cannot be uttered.”—Rom. viii. 26. Now nothing can be more marvellous in all the marvels of scripture interpretation, than that this spirit within us which vents itself in groanings that cannot be uttered should ever have been referred to a third personality in the godhead. How beautiful is this passage when truly and _spiritually_ considered! We know not what to pray for as we ought; our spiritual apprehension is feeble and dim; and our vague yearnings after the heavenly and the perfect are not distinct enough to present clearly-defined objects to our pursuit and love; yet we have a holy impulse within us, a divine tendency leading us towards God; God has given us this Spirit, and partaking of His nature it sighs after the perfection to which it is akin; it knows not fully its heavenly origin and end, but still true to the divine instinct it yearns after Him and tends towards Him; it sighs for a glory and a happiness which it cannot distinctly conceive or express, but God who gave it understands the prayer, and hears this intercession of His own spirit—that divine impulse planted by Himself which now supplicates Him to make bright its dim longings and to help it forwards unto that glory towards which the divinity within it tends—and He who searcheth the heart knoweth what is the mind of that spirit which He himself put there, and that it maketh intercession with Him, for all holy ones,[529] that He would fulfil the promise of the heavenly impulse that sighs for good.[530] How has Trinitarianism destroyed the spiritual power of the Scriptures, by taking all this beautiful and holy meaning out of the individual heart, and for the sighings which cannot be uttered after the immortal and the good, which God, who inspired them, comprehends and blesses, substituting a third Person in the godhead who intercedes for us to another Person, with groanings that cannot be uttered!

I believe that these two significations of the expression, “Holy Spirit,” so closely connected as scarcely to be two, will explain all the cases of its scriptural occurrence; first, God Himself in communication with the Soul, and secondly, that portion of His spirit which He has communicated to man, and which as being His, derived from Him, and a portion of the true knowledge of His Mind, is called His Holy Spirit.

I shall now examine the Scriptural evidence which is chiefly relied upon in this controversy, as proving, not the personality and deity of the Holy Spirit, for here we agree, but a personality and deity distinct from those of God our Father.

“Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.”—Matt. xxviii. 19; or, into the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, the word, “name,” by an idiom of the Hebrew language, being redundant.

To baptize into a person was a form of expression signifying the reception of the religious ideas associated with that person. Thus the Jews were said to be baptized into Moses, because they received the religious ideas associated with the institutions of that Prophet: and on the other hand, the Samaritans were said to be baptized into Mount Gerizim, because they received the religious ideas associated with the belief that there, and not at Jerusalem, was the appointed place of the Temple. The formula then of baptizing in the name of the Father, and of the Christ, and of the Holy Spirit, signified nothing more than the acceptance of the religious ideas associated with God in this new manifestation of Himself, revealed through the Christ, and accompanied by the operations of His Spirit, witnessing, both internally and externally, to the new light that had come into the world, the promised reign of the spirit of God. These were the words which most readily were associated with, and suggested those religious ideas which were looked upon as constituting the characteristic faith of one who was willing to enter into the gospel kingdom of Heaven, that is, to adopt the _Christian_ idea of God and of Religion. The Father, the Christ, the Spirit of God in us giving us some communion with that Father, by uniting us through spiritual sympathies with that Christ—is not this of the very soul of Christianity? God manifested in Jesus, and our souls accepting the revelation, because the spirit of our Father within us draws us towards him who had the same spirit without measure—is not this to express in a few words all the characteristic and peculiar ideas of Christianity, and therefore most fit to be used as suggesting summarily to matured converts the new faith into which they were baptized? The same set of ideas might have been as fully expressed by the shorter form of being baptized “into Christ,” for this would imply the possession and acceptance of all the religious ideas associated with his person and ministry—and accordingly we find that in every recorded case of baptism or allusion to baptism in the Acts of the Apostles, and in the Epistles, the expression simply and briefly is to “baptize into Christ,” and never once is there an allusion to the form of baptism into the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Now this demonstrates two things: first that the Apostles did not look upon these words as _a form prescribed by Christ_: and secondly, that they did not regard them as a confession of faith in a tri-personal God, else would they never have neglected all mention of the _first_ and _third_ persons, and simply baptized into Christ, that is, into the religion of the Christ. There is a remarkable confirmation of this view, if indeed it can be supposed to want confirmation, in the language of Paul to some disciples at Ephesus, who had not received the witnessing power and presence of the Holy Spirit. They declare that they had not so much as heard whether there was any Holy Spirit. To _what_, then, says the Apostle were you baptized; not into _whom_, observe, but into _what_ were you baptized,—that is, was not the manifestation and participation of God’s Spirit one of the religious ideas and expectations of your faith as converts. And they answer that they had only been baptized into the baptism of John, who had _promised_ the Holy Spirit, but had no power to _confer_ it. And then Paul baptized them into Jesus, and they received the Holy Spirit. Now can any one read this passage and believe that the Holy Ghost implies the third person in a Trinity: was it not simply a portion of God’s spirit received by the first believers as an attestation to the religion of the Christ?

Nothing can be more arbitrary than to assert that baptism implies the personality and deity of that into which a person is baptized. The Apostle Paul says that Christians were baptized into the death of Christ. Rom. vi. 3. Is the death of Christ therefore a person and a God? Is it not simply one of the religious ideas which their faith embraced?

The personality and deity of the Holy Spirit we indeed do not deny; but the methods by which Trinitarians attempt the proof of this self-evident proposition, are, like all proofs of identical propositions, unsatisfactory to an extreme. The Lecturer in Christ Church, when meeting the objection, that baptism into Christ was no proof of his deity, because we have also the expression, “baptism into Moses,” dropped out of sight the true bearing of the objection against the _deity_ of Jesus, and argued that the expression, baptism into Moses, was so far a proof of the personality of the Holy Spirit, because Moses was a person. Was the death of Christ, a person? Was Mount Gerizim, a person? We do not deny the personality of the Holy Spirit—though this is no way of proving it. We do deny that the deity of Christ is implied in baptism into his name, and the force of the expression, baptism into Moses, in this bearing of it, was either not seen or was put aside.