r 73 J ,and perhaps not unprofitably, dire& our Attention to the uncorrupted Knowledge, which the true Believers, from Abraham down to Chrift, pofl'effed of the Trinity in GOD. IfPlotinus could fay, " That this Do&rine of " a Trinity, FATHER, MIND, and SOUL, was no late In- " vention, but an antient Tenet," corrupted as it was among the Heathens themfelves : Surely it may be ex- _ peed, that thisTruth ofGOD mull remain much more uncontaminated among his own People But this De- du&îon will, in a Meafure, be rendered unneceffary here ; fince many Proofs of it, from the facred Writ- ings, will occafionally appear in the fubfequent Work. The Reader will perhaps excufe the prolix Detail already given, when it is confidered, that the Do&rine maintained is of the utmoft Confequence to the very Being of all Religion and Revelation from the Foundation ofthe World. For, if there be not `Three Perfons, or Hypoftafes, in the divine Eflence; Jefus Chríf could not be IMMANUEL, GOD WITH US, or that divine Savior, which Patriarchs and Prophets, as well as Himfelf and his Apoftles, declared Him to be. And if He be not JEHovAH in our Nature; then the Whole of Religion, both under the Old Teftament and the New, is not only the moil daring Illufion, that ever was paired upon Mankind ; but there is not a fingle Man upon Earth, who has the leaft folid Ground to expea a Life of Immortality. In that Cafe, we might dream over what Heathens have dreamed before, and live and die as uncertain and hopelefs as they. If Lu- ther could fay, of the Do&tine of Juftification by Faith alone, that it is Articulus fiantis vel cadentis Ec- clefiee, s' an Article on which the Church flands or falls ;" we have Reafon to go farther, and conclude, that, upon the Do&tine of the Trinity, and of thepro- per Divinity and Coëfl'entiality of each of the three Per- fons in it (as exhibited to us in the Bible), all ourHope as Men, and Comfort as Chriftians, either rife into ;veflaíting Joy, or vanith into a bafelefs Dream. In
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