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THE REV. EDWARD BURN.

LETTER I.

On the Principle of Mr. Burn's Objection to my Reasoning concerning the Perfon of Chrift.

REVEREND SIR,

AVING had many Letters, and treatises in almost

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every form, addressed to me on the subject of my religious opinions, and knowing your zeal for what is ufually called orthodoxy, I was not furprized to fee an advertisement of Letters of yours to me, though I could not imagine why they should be on the Infallibility of the Apoftolic Testimony concerning the Person of Christ, because it was an authority which I had never called in question.

I always took it for granted that the apostles, and all the early disciples of Chrift, knew very well what kind of being their master was; and in all my writings on the subject my only object has been to ascertain, by their own writings in the first place, and other media of proof in the fecond, what was their opinion. This, I should have thought, must have abundantly appeared from the whole ftrain of my controverfial works, which are written in a manner not very liable to be understood. For, having nothing to conceal, and being indifferent to all consequences, in the fimple purfuit of truth, I always write with great frankness, and confequently with fufficient perfpicuity.

Looking

Looking farther into your Letters, I was furprized to find that, without producing any evidence whatever from my own writings, you content yourself with taking it for granted that, in the queftion concerning the perfon of Christ, I intirely undervalue, and endeavour to invalidate, the authority of the feriptures, as knowing, or suspecting, it to be against me, and having recourfe to I know not what other shifts, as you call them, p. 28. (which of course implies difingenuity, and a defign to impofe upon my readers) to gain my purpose. All this is fo contrary to fact, and every appearance of fact, that, verfed as I am in controversy, I own myself for the first time, at a loss how to reply to such gross and unfounded calumny.

All the paffages you quote are from the Theological Repofitory*, in which I have maintained that fome texts in the Old Teftament have been improperly quoted by writers in the New. But this is not the queftion between us, but whether they were misled in their ideas concerning the perfon of Christ, so as to mislead others, by fuch mil-quotations. It does not follow that because I fuppofe the apoftles to have been fallible in fome things, that they were therefore fallible in all.

You must certainly, Sir, have written for the use of those only (and they are very many) who will never look into any of my writings, to fee whether your representations be fair or not. And, indeed, it is hardly poffible for plain men, accustomed to hear, and to speak truth, to suspect that such charges as those in your Letters could be advanced without fome foundation, especially as Letters published and indifcriminately fold, must be open to my inspection as well as that of the world at large, fo that your unfair conduct would be liable to be expofed.

* Mr. Burn only infers from the congruity of fentiment, and other cir cumstances, that the pieces he quotes in this work are mine. But this, in point of etiquette (obferved, I believe, by all writers) will not justify his quoting them as mine. However, had he read the last number of the laft volume of that work, he would have feen that I acknowledge those papers to be mine. I will add, that I do not yet see reason to retract any thing that I have advanced in them,

Not

Not imagining, as you might do with respect to me, that this charge of mine against you will be admitted without proof, I fhall not follow your example, in representing your fentiments in my words only, as in the above general statement, but shall give your own. And, indeed, I read the paffages feveral times before I could fatisfy myself that any man, and especially a chriftian, and a chriftian minifter, could advance fuch unfounded charges against a fellow christian.

"With the generality of Proteftants," you fay p. 9. "I "confider this teftimony," [viz. that of the apoftles concerning the person of Chrift] "as infallible. You have "taken confiderable pains to establish the contrary doctrine. "It is on this ground profeffedly that the argument from "the comparison of scripture with itself, in proof of Chrift's "divinity, has by you been rejected, as utterly impertinent " and inconclufive."

Taking it then for granted, that I confider the apostles as incompetent witneffes in the cafe, you fay, p. 15, "If the "restimony which the Spirit bore to Christ-left the apcf"tles ftill under the dominion of prejudice and mistake "concerning the person of the Meffiah, common sense will "oblige us to confider their qualifications as effentially de"ficient." Then you add (with what you would think to be some humour) "It will be difficult to conceive how "fuch conduct in the apoftles could confift with the pro"mife of their mafter, unless we fuppofe that leading others “into error, and in a point too which formed no inconfider"able part of their miffion*, may be admitted as the "evidence that they themselves were guided into all truth."

* Mr. Burn confiders the doctrine concerning the perfon of Chrift to be one of the objects of the apoftolic miffion; but it will not be easy for him to prove this. Nothing of this is said in our Saviour's own inftructions, or commiffion, which only require them to preach the gospel to every creature. That this is implied in the term gospel must be an arbitrary fuppofition,and certainly a thing of which the apostles could have no idea at the time of our Saviour's fpeaking to them. At that time, Mr. Burn himself must furely allow, that they confidered him as being a man, though a prophet. He always lived and converfed with them as fuch; and fince, in the whole · history

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You alfo give the following general view of my conduct in this controverfy, the whole of it, however, taken from your own imagination; neither producing, nor, I will venture to say, being able to produce, any evidence whatever for any one of the affertions in it, fome of which are indeed fufficiently contradictory to others.

"Let any man of candour attend to the manner, in "which you would difpofe of the argument from fcrip"ture in proof of the trinity: let him examine with care "your very ingenious attempt to bring this only decifive "mode of proof into difcredit by diverting the attention of "chriftians to early opinions and general confideratious, me"diums of proof which in the determination of this contro"verfy are little better than learned impertinences; let "him contemplate you, now depofing Chrift and his apof"tles from the feat of infallible authority; anon, exalting "them on the shoulders of Ebion, and other his worthy contemporaries, as teachers fent from God. Let him be"hold even Dr. Priestley floundering in the toils of popish fophiftry; at one time invalidating the authority of scrip"ture; at another, fupporting that authority by the testimony of the church: and again, when expedient, bring"ing the authority of both into question! And what will be "his inference from fuch conduct? Will he instantly con"clude that a divine, who can have recourse to shifts like "thefe is ferious, when he talks of the fcriptures as favour"able to his opinions?"

It appears to me that every thing that you have here laid down as facts, concerning my fentiments and conduct in the controverfy concerning the perfon of Chrift, has arifen not from any attention that you have given to my real conduct in it, because it has been the very reverse of what you

history of the Acts of the apostles, nothing is faid about his nature, it is evident that they had gained no new ideas on the fubject. Peter, after the defcent of the Spirit, when Mr. Burn fuppofes his mind to be molt fully illuminated, contents himself with calling Jefus a man approved of God by figns and wonders which God did by him, which is certainly defcriptive of nothing higher than a prophet.

defcribe

describe, but from your taking it for granted, that the doctrine of the divinity of Chrift is fo plainly taught in the fcriptures, that all but fools or knaves, muft fee and acknowledge it, "If" you say, p. 28, "the infallibility of this testimony can once be established, nothing farther seems "to be requifite to determine its fenfe in favour of orthodoxy, than a common understanding accompanied by "chriftian fimplicity."

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It follows, therefore, that, as I do not acknowledge this orthodox doctrine, as you call it, I must be deftitute either of common understanding, or of christian simplicity; and as you are pleased to allow me the former, you must of neceffity deny me the latter. Not being poffeffed, then, of chriftian fimplicity, I have recourfe to what you call shifts, that is, I fee the truth, and know it to be contained in the fcriptures, but, from fome principle, or fome caufe, which you call, p. 27, a love of innovation*, I perfift in denying it, and fighting against it, and against the fcriptures too, because they

contain it.

Now, Sir, let the person whom you have brought to the bar of the public be heard in his own defence, with respect to his treatment of the fcriptures, and the ufe that he has made of them in the controverfy concerning the person of Christ, that it may be feen whether it be true in fact, that I do reject the authority of the scriptures, as impertinent and

* To shew that I am actuated by a love of innovation (which, however, is an odd kind of principle, and leads to no certain end) Mr. Burn should shew that I am, or pretend to be, an innovator; whereas in all my theological opinions I am merely a follower of others. My ideas of inspiration, at which Mr. Burn takes the greatest alarm, are only those of Caftalio, Le Clerc, and many others, the most intelligent and excellent of men, and among the best chriftians of the ages in which they lived. With respect to my opinion concerning the person of Christ, Í certainly cannot be faid to be any innovator; for thousands confider him as merely a man inspired of God, and many from the earliest times, as well as of late years, before I was a writer, or before I was born, have been of opinion, as I am, that he was the legitimate son of Joseph and Mary. How then does it appear that I have been fo greatly milled by the love of innovation, when in fact I have innovated in nothing at all. I may as well charge Mr. Burn with the love of innovation. For his opinions are as peculiar to himself as mine are to me.

inconclufive,