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    certainly appears to be valued in proportion to the rarity of such a supposed testimony-by all the defenders of the doctrine . Dr . S . has taken due pains to guard agakist the supposition of the word God not being genuine , as well as against the conjectural emendation of Slichtingius and Taylor , which we lament to see adopted by Mr . B els ham , of £ y S instead of 6 £ v .

    Thus far he has our entire concurrence , as well as that , we suppose , of nearly the whole body of Unitarians in the present day . The question is , whether the words in the text , as they now stand , clearly and unambiguously express or teach the doctrine of the deity of Christ . The Unitarians contend that the words may indeed be so explained without grammatical impropriety , but that they may as well be explained differently , and that no

    early Christian could have thought of so taking them as to make them express this doctrine . It is , and it must be to serve their purpose , insisted on the other side that the words will properly admit of no other construction than that which makes them expressive of the doctrine . We shall spend no time in considering the plan adopted by Mr . Locke , of placing the point

    after Tcavrav , because , though he may have shewn his accustomed sagacity in discovering the Apostle ' s general meaning in the passage , it is now pretty well agreed that the construction he supposes would not be a good one ; and the other being esteemed most plausible by our adversaries , we may , with perfect fairness , confine our attention to it .

    We translate the words then— " Whose are the fathers , and of whom is Christ , as it respects the flesh , " i . e . as to his descent . " God who is over all be blessed for ever . Amen . " To this it is objected by Dr . S ., first , that " it is an evasion to serve a purpose ; for every Greek scholar must admit that the fair and just construction of the sentence is that which is

    generally received . " We admit nothing of the kind . Many of those whose opinion we adopt are usually esteemed Greek scholars , and WetsteuVs quotations seem to prove , beyond contradiction , that in the earliest times our construction was generally followed . That the Fathers afterwards , with the growing corruption of the Church , came to patronise the construction now generally received , is nothing to the purpose , since we do

    not deny it to be grammatically good , nor do we doubt the disposition of those Fathers to find or make evidence for the deity of Christ ; but the numerous testimonies against Christ having ever been called in scripture <* God over all , * ' shew how the words were understood by those whose authority is most valuable . Secondly , it is objected that our construction " is contrary to grammatical propriety , for 6 &v must refer to the foregoing noun

    as the subject , while that which follows is the predicate ; except in cases in which there is no preceding nominative , but the article contains the predicate and becomes in effect a pronoun . To render the construction tenable , the form of the sentence must have been considerably different ; " either , it is added in a note , O 8 e 0 co $ 6 cov M irdvrcov EvKoyyrbs $ l <; rwq alSvocq or Ev \ oyr } rbt q Beds a civ inl itavTw , rf <; to « £ alwvaq , whereas the present words

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    823 t Dr . J * P . Smith's Scripture Testimony to the Messiah .

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Dec. 2, 1831, page 822, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2604/page/26/