than that taught by Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ, according to the confession of Unitarians themselves, was a teacher of truth, and a teacher of nothing but truth. Then all he taught was truth. Therefore, to be truly a Christian believer, truly a follower of Christ, it is necessary to believe, explicitly or implicitly, all the truth he taught. Hence, the commission to the Aposles was to teach all nations, and to teach them to observe all things whatsoever their Master had commanded them. St. Matt. xxviii. 20.

The truth which Jesus Christ taught or revealed appertains, in part, at least, to the supernatural order. By the supernatural order we understand the order above nature, that is, above the order of creation. All creatures, whether brute matter, vegetables, animals, men, or angels, are in God, and without him could neither be, live, nor move. But God has created them all "after their kinds," and each with a specific nature. What is included in this nature, or promised by it, although having its origin and first motion in God, is what is meant by natural. Supernatural is something above this, and superadded. God transcends nature, and is supernatural; but regarded solely as the author, upholder, and governor of nature, he is natural, and hence the knowledge of him as such is always termed natural theology. But as the author of grace, he is strictly supernatural; because grace, though having the same origin, is above the order of creation, is not included in it, nor promised by it. It is, so to speak, an excess of the Divine Fulness not exhausted in creation, but reserved to be superadded to it according to the Divine will and pleasure. Thus God may be said to be both natural and supernatural. As natural, that is, as the author, sustainer, and governor of nature, he is naturally intelligible, according to what Saint Paul tells us, Rom. i. 20. Invisibilia enim ipsius, a creatura mundi, per ea quæ facta sunt intellecta, conspiciuntur; sempiterna quoque ejus virtus, et divinitas: "For the invisible things of God, even his eternal power and divinity, from 'he creation of the world, are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made." But as

supernatural, that is, as the author of grace, he is not naturally intelligible, and can be known only as supernaturally revealed. The fact that he is the author of grace, or that there is grace, is not a fact of natural reason, or intrinsically evident to natural reason. It, therefore, is not and cannot be a matter of science, but must be a matter of faith. Hence, the Apostle says again, Heb. xi. 6, Credere enim, oportet accedentem ad Deum quia est, et in inquirentibus se remunerator sit: "He that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that seek him." That he is as author of nature, we know, but that he is as author of grace, or that he is a rewarder of them that seek him, we believe.

Now, the revelation of Jesus Christ is pre-eminently the revelation of God as the author and dispenser of grace, and therefore pre-eminently the revelation of the supernatural. "The law was given by Moses, but grace and truth by Jesus Christ." St. John, i. 17. Hence, to believe the truth and all the truth which Jesus Christ taught is to believe truth pertaining to the supernatural order,

Unitarians, it is true, eliminate from the Gospel a great part of the mysteries, and reduce it, so to speak, to a mere republication of the law of nature; their theology is in the main natural theology; their faith in God is in him as the author of nature, and the immortality they look for is merely a natural immortality; but the sounder part of them, do, nevertheless, to some extent, admit that Jesus Christ revealed truths not naturally intelligible, and which pertain to the supernatural order. They admit that the Gospel is itself, in some sense, a revelation of grace, and therefore a revelation of the supernatural. They also admit the necessity, in order to be Christian believers, of believing in several particular things which pertain to the supernatural order. Among these we may instance remission of sins, the resurrection of the dead, and final beatitude, or the heavenly reward. We are not aware that they question these; and we are sure no one can question them without losing all right to the Christian name. But these all pertain to the supernatural order.

Remission of sin, whatever else it may mean, means at least, remission of the penalty which God has annexed to transgres· sion. The penalty is annexed by God either as author and sovereign of nature, or as supernatural. If by God as supernatural, the penalty must itself be supernatural; and therefore he who believes in its remission must believe in the supernatural, for no man can believe in the remission of a penalty which he does not believe to have been annexed. If God annexes the penalty as author and sovereign of nature, its remission must be supernatural. To assume that the order of nature remits it, is to assume nature to be in contradiction with herself, or to deny the remission by denying the existence of any penalty to remit. Where the remission begins, there ends the penalty. If the remission be in the order of nature, then the order of nature imposes no penalty beyond the point where the remission begins; and then there is no remission, for nothing is remitted. To say that God as author and sovereign of nature remits what in the same character he imposes is to assume that he imposes no penalty that goes farther than the commencement of the remission. Then, in fact, no remission. The penalty, in this case, would be exhausted, not remitted. Remission, then, must be by God as supernatural, not as natural; not as author and sovereign of nature, but as author and dispenser of grace. Remission is necessarily an act of grace, and therefore supernatural. Then, whatever, view be taken of the penalty itself, he who believes in its remission must believe in the supernatural order.

So of the resurrection of the dead. We do not mean to say that by natural reason we cannot demonstrate a future continued existence, but that a fact answering to the term resurrection is naturally neither cognoscible nor demonstrable. Resurrection means rising again, and evidently pertains, not to the soul, which never dies, but to the body, and implies that the same body which died is raised; for if not, it would not be a resurrection, but a simple surrection, or perhaps new creation. Now, by no natural light we possess can we come to the know

Yet we are

ledge of the fact that our bodies shall rise again. undeniably taught in the Gospel that such is the fact.

Moreover, the Apostle Paul tells us that the body shall not only be raised, but it shall be raised in a supernatural condition. "It is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body." It is to be made like to our blessed Saviour's glorious body. But a glorified body does not pertain to the order of nature; because the natural body it is said, is to be “made like to the body of his glory," which implies that it must be changed from its natural to a supernatural condition, before it is a glorified body. But by what natural powers we possess do we arrive at the fact that there are glorified bodies, much more, that our vile bodies shall be changed into glorified And by what process of reasoning, not dependent for its data on the revelation, can we, now we are told it shall be so, prove that it will be so?

So, again, as to our final destiny. The truth we are to believe pertains to the supernatural order. St. Peter says, "By whom (Jesus Christ) he hath given us very great and precious promises, that by these you may be made partakers of the divine nature,"efficiamini divinia consortes naturæ. 2 Pet. i. 4. That this is to partake of the divine nature in a supernatural sense, and not in the sense in which we naturally partake of it, in being made to the image and likeness of God, is evident from the fact that the Apostle calls it a gift, and says it is that which is promised. What pertains to nature is not a gift, and what is already possessed cannot be said to be something promised. Therefore the participation of the divine nature in question is not a natural, but a supernatural, participation. The blessed Apostle John tells us, "We are now the sons of God, and it hath not yet appeared what we shall be. We know that when he shall appear we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is." 1 John iii. 2. Here it is asserted that we are to be something more than sons of God in the sense we now are; for we know not, even being sons of God, what we shall be. But this we do know, that when he

shall appear we shall be like him. But this likeness is supernatural, not that to which we were created; otherwise it would be a likeness possessed, not to be possessed. How by the light of nature learn this fact, that we are to become like God, partakers of the divine nature, in a supernatural sens?? Again, the blessed Apostle in the same passage says, “We shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is." So St. Paul, 1 Cor. xiii. 12: "Now we see through a glass, darkly, but then face to face; now I know in part, but then I shall know even as I am known." The fact here asserted, to wit, that our future destiny is the beatific vision, that is, to see God as he is, and to know him even as we ourselves are known, is not naturally intelligible, nor demonstrable by natural reason. Moreover, to see God as he is exceeds our nature; for naturally we cannot see God as he is, that is, as he is in himself. The destiny, then, which the Gospel reveals for them that love the Lord is supernatural. For "It is written, The eye hath not seen, ear heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man, what things God hath prepared for them that love him." 1 Cor. ii. 9. Therefore, to believe the Gospel, or the truth which Jesus Christ taught, it is necessary to believe not only truth supernaturally communicated, but truth pertaining to the supernatural order. But we have already proved that it is necessary to salvation to believe the truth and all the truth which Jesus taught. Therefore it is necessary to believe truth which pertains to the supernatural order.

The result thus far is, that, in order to be Christians, to be saved, to enter into life, to secure the rewards of heaven, it is necessary to believe the truth which Jesus Christ taught, and that we cannot believe this without believing in that which is supernatural, and supernatural both as to the mode of communication and as to the matter communicated. The truth which Jesus Christ taught is, in general terms, the Gospel, or Christian revelation; and the Christian revelation is a supernatural revelation, and, in part at least, a revelation of the supernatural. This revelation and its contents we must believe, or resign our