men." The gentleman was struck with the account and on his departure made them a handsome present. Some months afterwards, the young men being at work in their shop, were greatly surprised at the sudden arrival of their father, who threw himself into their arms; exclaiming at the same time, that he was fearful they had taken some unjust method to obtain the money for his ransom; for it was too great a sum for them to have gained by their ordinary occupation. They professed their ignorance of the whole affair, and could only suspect they owed their father's release to that stranger to whose generosity they had been before so much obliged. and imputing it to an avaricious in this occupation of waterdisposition: "Oh! sir," said the young men, "if you knew our reasons, you would ascribe it to a better motive. Our father, anxious to assist his family, scraped together all he was worth, and purchased a vessel for the purpose of trading to the coast of Barbary ; but was unfortunately taken by a pirate, carried to Tripoli, and sold for a slave. He writes word that he has luckily fallen into the hands of a master who treats him with great humanity; but that the sum demanded for his ransom is so exorbitant, that it will be impossible for him ever to raise it he adds, that we must therefore relinquish all hope of ever seeing him, and be contented; that he has as many comforts as his situation will admit. With the hopes of restoring to his family a beloved father, we are striving by every honest means in our power, to collect the sum necessary for his ransom, and we are not ashamed to employ ourselves After Montesquieu's death, an account of this affair was found among his papers, and the sum actually remitted to Tripoli for the old man's ran-Philanthropist, No. 11, som. p. 294. No. X. THE WAY TO HAPPINESS. Look thou to God, And ever prize 'bove all created good- The pledge of hope! the anchor of the soul! The bright and morning star! whose tranquil beam Of thousands and ten thousand times ten thousand Will cheer each heir of glory, that hour From him proceed-what blessings for his sake God hath prepared, and what felicities With lasting gratitude To join the evil throng, who share the gift The God that made them, and whose bounteous hand To the same fountain of all knowledge good! Its words shall sooth thy cares, remove thy doubts, COTTLE. REMARKS ON MR. SCHLEUSNER'S VIEWS OF THE SPIRIT OF GOD. THE learned Mr. Schleusner, a professed Trinitarian, in his Dictionary of the New Testament, on the word pneuma or spirit, has collected the several passages which he thought might be used in support of the personality of the spirit, or what he denominates the "third subjectum, which besides the Father and Son exists in God " The passages which he selected for this purpose are the following: Matt. xxviii. 19. John xiv. 1726. Ch. xv. 26. ch. xvi. 13, and 1 Cor. xii. 3, 4. Of these seven passages, five are those in which Jesus promised the spirit under the title of the comforter, advocate, or monitor. It is presumed no judicious person will deny, that whatever might be intended in the promise of the comforter, it was fulfilled, at least in part, on the day of Pentecost; and that the history called "The acts of the Apostles" contains an account of the events promised or predicted. We have indeed much said in that history of the effusion of the spirit, and the consequent miracles. Yet Mr. Schleusner in his manner of classing and explaining the texts, has set aside every instance in which the term spirit is used in the book of Acts, as affording no support to the doctrine that the spirit is a person. He has a class of texts in regard to which he says the Holy Spirit signifies "extraordinary gifts." This class includes Acts i, 5, 8. Ch. ii. 4, 17, 18, 33. V. 22. viii. 15, 17, 18, 19. ix. 17. X. 44, 45, 47. xi. 15, 16. xiii. 9. XV. 8. xix. 2, 6, and several others. He has another class in which the spirit signifies "Divine afflatus, inspiration, revelation, oracle." But what these are different from "extraordinary gifts" I do not under. stand. ex Now, if the Saviour's promise of the comforter might be fulfilled by shedding forth, or pouring out the Holy Spirit in " traordinary gifts," and inspiring men with knowledge, fortitude and comfort, and enabling them to perform signs and wonders in the name of Jesus; such unquestionably was the import of the promise. As it must be supposed that the promise and its fulfilment accord with each other, and as Mr. Schleusner has himself set aside the texts which relate to the fulfilment, as affording no evidence that the spirit is a person, we are fairly conducted to this conclusion, that the passages containing the promise do not imply the personality of the spirit. We may now examine the passage in 1 Cor. xii. 3, 4. "Wherefore I give you to understand that no man speaking by the spirit calleth Jesus ac xvi. 6, 7. xxiii. 8, 9. 12, 28. xiii. 2, 4. xx. 23. xxi. 4, 11. This is not all; the third verse of the passage we have now under consideration is also classed under this head; although he had before classed it as favouring the personality of the spirit. We have therefore Mr. Schleusner's authority for saying that this verse is no proof that the spirit is a person. The fourth verse it is believed, implies no more nor less than this, that God by the same spirit communicates a diversity of gifts. Mr. Schluesner then has only one text remaining in support of the doctrine in dispute, Matt. xxviii. 19. On this we may remark, that preparatory to the ministry of the Messiah "God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost." This took place at his baptism and inauguration; and the 66 great salvation which at the first began to be spoken by our Lord, was confirmed by them that heard him; God also bearing them witness both with signs and wonders and divers miraeles, and gifts (or distributions) of the Holy Ghost, according to his own will." Such was the manner in which the christian dispensation was introduced and established; and to these things the disputed text undoubtedly had reference, whether the spirit be a person or not. Let us now see whether Mr. Schleusner will not again help us out of difficulty, and enable us to set aside his only remaining proof. What then did he suppose was intended by the terms Holy Spirit, as used in reference to our Saviour's conception, his inauguration and miracles, and the miracles wrought by the Apostles? The passages are included by him under the three numbers "11," "12," "14." And the three definitions are as follows; 66 11. The divine influence by the intervention of which Jesus not only began to live, but was at his baptism inaugurated to his public office, &c." " 12. The divine power, by the aid of which Christ wrought his miracles on earth and completely executed the business committed to him by God." "14. The extraordinary gifts, as they are commonly called, of the Holy Spirit which fell to the Apostles on the day of Pentecost, after Christ's ascension, with which many Christians, and almost all the teachers of the christian religion in the primitive church, were furnished, &c." If in all this train of miracles for the introduction and establishment of Christianity, the Holy Spirit by the aid of which they were performed was not a person distinct from the Father; by what authority or what analogy can any one pretend, that by the very same terms a person is intended in the Apostle's commission? Has not then Mr. Schleusner furnished us with the means of completely setting aside every text which he could find in support of the personality of the spirit ? We may further remark that, exclusive of the many instances in which other words of the same import are adopted, the phrase Holy Spirit or Holy Ghost is used ninety times in the New Testament; and three only of these are included in the list of texts which Mr. Schleusner has selected for the support of his doctrine of a third subjectum or person. The instances in which he supposed the phrase did not mean a person are to those which he selected as proofs of the spirit's distinct personality, as twentynine to one. By classing and explaining other texts he has clearly shown how the three on which he relied may be fairly explained as affording no support to the disputed hypothesis. We may then ask, Can it be reasonable to suppose that in the three selected instances the phrase means a person distinct from the Father, while in the eighty-seven other instances no such idea is intended? Are not then the probabilities against the distinct personality of the spirit as great at least, as twenty-nine to one ? The following propositions are believed to be incontrovertible;-That the phrases holy spirit, spirit of God, and breath of God, are of precisely the same import, as used in the scriptures: That there is no analogy in the use of language which will justify us in saying that the spirit or breath of God is a distinct person, or that God and his spirit are two persons and that from the days of Abraham to the Messiah, no idea of the distinct personality of the spirit of God ever entered the mind of a pious Jew. The following propositions I believe to be equally true, but still they may be controverted: That the doctrine which represents God and his spirit as two persons is so far from tending to enhance the dignity and glory of Jehovah, that it really tends to divide and diminish them in the view of reflecting minds : That the greater the number of persons is supposed to be in the Holy One of Israel, the less each of those persons must appear, because these persons will be regarded as so many parts or portions of Deity: And, finally, that the time is at hand when the doctrine of the distinct personality of the spirit will be regarded by Christians in general, as one of the numerous productions of anti-christian controversy. LEARNED AND PIOUS REMARKS UPON HERESY, BY THE JOHN OWEN. "IT is no easy thing to show what heresy is in general; whether this or that particular error be an heresy in this or that man, especially if such things as stubbornness and pertinacy upon conviction, with the like, be required to make a man a heretic; for such things cannot be evidenced or made out but only (for the most part) by most obscure conjectures, and such as will scarcely satisfy a charitable judgement. Some things, indeed, are so clearly in the scripture laid down and determined, that to question or deny them, bespeaks a spirit self-condemned, in that which he doth profess. But generally errors are about things hard to be understood, not so clearly appearing, and concerning which it is very difficult to pass the sentence of heresy. No judge of heresy, since the Apostles' days, but hath been obnoxious to error in that judgement; and those who have been forwardest to assume a judicature, and DR. power of discerning between truth and error so far as to have others regulated thereby, have erred most foully. Of old it was generally conceived to be in councils. Now I should acknowledge myself obliged to any man that would direct me to a council, since that Acts xv. ; which I may not be forced from the Word to assert that it in something or other went astray. "LUTHER feared not to affirm of the first and best General Synod that he understood not the Holy Ghost to speak in it. Yea, and BEZA, that such was the folly, ignorance, ambition, wickedness of many Bishops in the best times that you would suppose the Devil President in their Assemblies. Insomuch as NAZIANZEN complained that he never saw a good of any; and affirmed that he was resolved never to come at them more. And in truth, the fightings and brawls, diabolical arts of defamation and accusing one another, abominable pride, ambition and |