the Sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work; thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy man servant, nor thy maid servant, nor thy cattle, nor the stranger that is within thy gates: for in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath-day, and hallowed it.

V. Honour thy father and thy mother, that thy days may be long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee. VI. Thou shalt not kill.

VII. Thou shalt not commit adultery.

VIII. Thou shalt not steal.

IX. Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour. X. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house; thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife, nor his man servant, nor his maid servant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour's. Quest. 3. Where is the Christian religion most fully opened, and entirely contained?

Answ. In the holy Scriptures, especially of the New Testament; where, by Christ, and his Apostles, and Evangelists, inspired by his Spirit, the history of Christ and his Apostles is sufficiently delivered, the promises and doctrine of faith are perfected, the covenant of grace most clearly opened, and church offices, worship, and discipline established. In the understanding whereof the strongest Christians may increase whilst they live on earth.

The Explained Profession of the Christian Religion.

I. I BELIEVE that there is one God, an infinite Spirit of life, understanding, and will, perfectly powerful, wise, and good; the Father, the Word, and the Spirit; the Creator, Governor, and End of all things; our absolute Owner, our most just Ruler, and our most gracious Benefactor, and most amiable Good.

II. I believe that man, being made in the image of God, an embodied spirit of life, understanding, and will, with holy vivacity, wisdom, and love, to know, and love, and serve his Creator, here and for ever, did, by wilful sinning, fall from his God, his holiness, and innocency, under the wrath of God, the condemnation of his law, and the slavery of the flesh, the world, and the devil and that God so loved the world that he gave his only Son to be their Redeemer, who, being God, and one with the Father, took our nature, and became man; being con

ceived by the Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary, called Jesus Christ, whow as perfectly holy, sinless, fulfilling all righteousness, overcame the devil and the world, and gave himself a sacrifice for our sins, by suffering a cursed death on the cross, to ransom us, and reconcile us unto God, and was buried and went among the dead: the third day he rose again, having conquered death. And he fully established the covenant of grace, that all that truly repent and believe, shall have the love of the Father, the grace of the Son, and the communion of the Holy Spirit; and if they love God, and obey him sincerely to the death, they shall be glorified with him in heaven for ever; and the unbelievers, impenitent, and ungodly, shall go to everlasting punishment. And having commanded his apostles to preach the Gospel to all the world, and promised his Spirit, he ascended into heaven; where he is the glorified Head over all things to the church, and our prevailing Intercessor with the Father; who will there receive the departed souls of the justified, and at the end of this world will come again, and raise all the dead, and will judge all according to their works, and justly execute his judgment.

III. I believe that God, the Holy Spirit, was given by the Father and the Son to the Prophets, Apostles, and Evangelists, to be their infallible guide in preaching and recording the doctrine of salvation, and the witness of its certain truth, by his manifold divine operations; and to quicken, illuminate, and sanctify all true believers, that they may overcome the flesh, the world, and the devil. And all that are thus sanctified are one holy Catholic church of Christ, and must live in holy communion, and have the pardon of their sins, and shall have everlasting life.

Believing in God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, I do presently, absolutely, and resolvedly, give up myself to him, my Creator and reconciled God and Father, my Saviour and Sanctifier; and, repenting of my sins, I renounce the devil, the world, and the sinful desires of the flesh; and, denying myself, and taking up my cross, I consent to follow Christ, the Captain of my salvation, in hope of his promised grace and glory.

A Short Catechism for those that have learned the First.

Q. 1. WHAT do you believe concerning God?

1. Assent. Answ. There is one only God, an infinite Spirit of life, understanding, and will, most perfectly powerful, wise, and good; the Father, the Word, and the Spirit: the Creator,

Governor, and End of all things; our absolute Owner, our most just Ruler, and our most gracious and most amiable Father.

1. The word 'God,' signifieth both the nature and the relations.

I. God's nature or essence is not known to us in itself immediately, but in the glass of the creatures, as the cause in the effects, and especially by God's image on our own souls. Therefore we have no name, or words of God, but such as are borrowed from creatures, as the first things signified in our use of them. Though God only be signified by them in this our application. Therefore we are fain to describe God in terms. 1. Of generical notion. 2. Of formal or specifical notion. 3. Of accidental notion. Though God is not properly matter or form, genus or species, nor accident.

1. The generical notion is that he is a Spirit, which includeth the more general notions of a substance and a being, as distinct from accidents and nothing. A spirit chiefly signifieth, not only negatively that which is no body, but also positively a pure substance, transcending our sensitive conception or apprehension, which some call metaphysical matter: for before we think what form or virtue a spirit is possessed of, we think it of a something substantial, though not corporeal. But of the substance of a spirit, as different from a body, before we come to the formal virtues, we can have no satisfying conception but its purity, and transcending the most perfect sense. Whatsoever some say of penetrability and indivisibility, which are also considerable, if any say that the true nature of fire is a spirit, and so that a spirit is sensible, as far as motion, light, and heat are, I only say, if that were true, yet motion, light, and heat are not sensed by us in pure fire, but only as from fire incorporate in air at least. But the word 'spirit' also includeth the formal special notion of it, by which we most clearly discern it from a body, called matter; which is, that it is formally a life, or an active nature; in which is included the three notions of power, force (vis), and inclination, and, altogether, may be called a virtue; so that to be a pure substance, transcending sense, not accidentally having, but naturally being, an active, vital virtue, is to be a spirit.

2. But though this formal notion be included in the word 'spirit,' yet it is of distinct conception from essence and substance and this one formal virtue in God is wonderfully, yet certainly, therein one, that is, 1. Vital, active virtue.

tue. 2. Intellective virtue. 3. Volitive or willing virtue. This spiritual virtue is not an accident in God, but his essence; not his essence as essence, but his essence in its formal or specific notion as distinct from other essences. It is one substantially and formally. It is three, as active on a three-fold object, or by connotation of the object, at the least. All this we certainly gather from our souls, which are God's image, of which anon; and yet the word 'spirit,' understanding, will, and life of man, signify that which is not at all of the same kind or sort with that which the same words signify of God: but yet there is in us an image of what is in God.

And when I speak of active virtue, it must be remembered that it is another property of spirit, that it is not passion from a body, or any inferior nature; for all action proceedeth orderly from the first active cause, and so down. God worketh upon all things. An intellectual spirit can operate on a sensitive, and that on a vegetative, and that, as the rest, on passive matter or bodies, but not contrarily.

3. Though we are fain to use names of God, which signify but modes or qualities in men, and so mention powerful, wise, and good; yet these, in God, are his very essence, under the notion of modal perfection.

4. As we think of creatures, in respect of quantity and degrees, as well as kind, so we are fain to mention God's attributes and I comprehend a multitude in one, which is infiniteness, or perfection, which have the same signification, saving that one soundeth better as applied to essence, and the other as to quality. When I say that God is infinite, it respecteth, 1. Duration, or time, and so it is his eternity. 2. Or space and extension, by analogy to which, it is his immensity; and perfection of power, wisdom, and goodness, excludeth all imperfection, and includeth that which to man is incomprehensible, though certainly known. This one God is three persons, the Father, the Word (or Son), and the Spirit (or Holy Ghost), whose properties are to beget, to be begotten, and to proceed. The mystery is fulliest opened in Athanasius's Creed; and we have no reason to think it contradictory or incredible, when the aforesaid Trinity of principles, life, understanding, and will, in one spiritual virtue and essence, is so clear and sure in our own souls, and so in God.

2. The relations of God respect his creatures: 1. In their being, and so he is, 1. Fundamentally their Creator, 2. And

thence their Owner. 2. Or in their well-being, and so he is their Benefactor, or the first cause of all their good. 3. Or their Action, and so he is, 1. The Mover, 2. The Ruler, and, 3. The End of every thing in its kind; but of man, in a special manner, agreeable to his intellectual nature. But the moral relation which we have here reason practically to note, are all comprehended in the word 'Father,' which signifieth that he is fundamentally our Creator; and thence, 1. Our Owner. 2. Our Ruler. 3. Our most amiable Good. For a father giveth being to his child; and thence, by nature, the child is his own, and being incapable of self-government, it is the father who hath 1. That authority, 2. wisdom, 3. And love which make him meet to be the ruler; and nature teacheth the child to love his father, as the cause of his very being. But in this last consideration God is more than a father, and is to be loved more than ourselves, and more for his own goodness, which is his amiableness, than for ourselves. I had put the word 'Friend' for the third relation, as being most short and full to the sense intended, but that it will be thought to sound too familiarly; though Abraham and Christ's disciples have that title.

The attribute of God, as our Owner, is absolute, and as our Ruler, he is just, in which his truth, which is the justness of his sayings, is included; and as our Father or Friend, he is doubly considered: 1. As good to us, and so he is gracious, or loving and merciful. 2. As good in himself; and so he is our ultimate end, and the ultimate object of our love, where the soul resteth in the perpetual act of loving him, and in feeling his love. And this is the highest notion of God's relation to us, and of all relation.

Note, that the attributes of God must not be cast together on a heap, but distinctly laid down. First, the attributes of his essence, that he is One, eternal, immense, necessary, independent, immutable, &c. Then the attributes proper to each person, and those proper to each active principle, which, summarily, are perfection; and then the attributes of God's relations, which are so many that I may not here stay to name any more.

The proof that there is a God, is so evident in nature, that he is well called a fool in Scripture (Psalm xiv. 1) who denieth it. All things which we see in the world preach God to us, telling us that they have a cause above them and in them which must needs be able to make and uphold the world, because we see that it is made and upheld, while every part is insufficient for itself;