DISSERTATION IV. 297 Inferior ideas so distinct as one would wish. And this is not strange, because they wanted that clear revelation of the union pf God and a creature, in one Jesus Christ, one complex princi- ple of action, which we christians enjoy by thegospel. And yet even the most part of christian writers seem to have unhappily fallen into the same confusions, when they treat of these transactions of the word, before the incarnation : And though they have framed different schemes for the reconciliation pf these difficulties, it has been hitherto without any great success. And the reason, perhaps, is this, because each of them generally ,attribute all that is saidof the " memra," or " Logos" merely to his divine and supreme nature, or they apply Rail merely to his created, Or inferior nature ; or else they drop one of these natures entirely ; and thus miss the mark, for want of supposing such an union between a divine and created nature, before the incarnation of Christ : Whereas this union discovers a proper Complex subject for these different attributions. The christian writers who cite those passages out of the targums and Philo the Jew, interpret them according to their own scheme of divinity, and their particular sentiments of the person of Christ ; as ap- pears if we consider their writings. Sandius is generally known to be a follower, or imitator, of the Arian scheme, and he applies as many of these glorious expressions as he can, to the great archangel, that first-born spirit, which the Arians suppose to be the divinest nature of Christ, and while he makes this to serve for a human spirit to the Messiah, he dotti not allow any superior, or divine nature, to belong to him. He sums up his collections out of Philo, which he had elsewhere made, in these words, " The" Logos" is a second god, next to the first ; and governs the world by command of the first God : That God himself and his word are two things: That the supreme God is unbegotten and invisible, . and the God of the Logos ; but the Logos is begotten and visi- ble, the minister of God, and the intercessor with God for men, the - ambassador of God to men, and a middle being, or me- dium, betwixt God and - creatures." Sandii Nucleus Hi.storiee Itccles,astgC, page 108. Seemany other citations of his out of Philo, in his Interpretutiones Puradoxe, 8fc. Mr. Nye, on the other hand, who bath been accused as ap- proaching the Sabellian principles, seems, in his Letters against Dr. Allix, to drop this glorious spirit, or archangel, which is called the " Logos,". as a mere Jewish notion ; and does not make it enter into the composition of the person of Christ ; but supposes the sublimer character of the " Loges," to belong to theessential wisdom of God, or the Word, which Was personally United to the man Jesus'at his incarnation. Seehis First Let- ter against Dr. Allix. .
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