139 
theology is — whether the Christian conscience has everaccepte. 
their view, or Swedenborg's, as to the Eternal Father ; viz 
that He is neither “ known nor loved?"* Whether the 
passages quoted by them, as to “ the Eternal ’’ being unseen 
and unapproachable, have been ever understood as shutting out 
the vision of God from His saints? — The Christian schools no 
doubt affirm that God is not “ per se not urn” ; but that “to 
know Thee the only true God," and “ Jesus Christ Whom He 
sent " is eternal life ; and that to “love God, whom we have not 
seen," is our future hope and joy. The Christian Church has 
never doubted this. — “The Spirit searcheth all things — -yea, 
the deeps of God." 
And now that such minds as those of these authors are 
seriously turned to religious philosophy and theology, we 
cannot but augur a clearness of eventual conclusions, of which, 
indeed, the present volume gives no sign; (simply because the 
authors have not hitherto been “theologians of any kind.") 
Our Lord’s “Our Father which art in heaven" leads us at 
once to the Father. Aud does not our Lord’s last action, 
which we are to continue “till He comes again," “show 
forth His death," to the Father in heaven, as well as to us on 
earth? 
77. In true “access to the Father" by the Spirit (without 
which there is no “ Grace of Christ, no Love of God, no Com- 
munion of the Holy Ghost," in the sense made known by the 
Incarnate), there is even direct knowledge of God by laitk; 
and our authors seem to catch sight of this truth in a 
* The idea is so ingenuously relied on by our authors, that the generality oi 
Christians accept a mysterious Trinity in the Godhead, so as to make way 
for the hypothesis (based on a few texts), that the Divine Father can never 
be known, approached, or loved by us, that it seems right to point out the 
completeness of this misapprehension. In this country, probably, there is no 
sect or party of Christians to whom such a thought would be tolerable, 
except the iSwedeuborgians. In the Church of Koine it would be condemned 
as contrary to the foundations of the faith, the highest worship being 
always offered to the Father through the Son. In the Church of England, 
nearly every Collect in her Prayer-book, (and scarcely less her whole Litany,) 
and without doubt her Eucharist, is directed to the Almighty Father. Even 
the most isolated and independent of “ Evangelical ” followers of Scripture 
would aspire to be led into “ the knowledge of God,” and “ the love ot the 
father ” ; while among those who are termed “ broader ” believers, the 
“ Fatherhood of God,” and our love towards the Father, are taught with 
emphasis. Indeed, Christ’s rebuke of the unbelieving Jews that the “love 
of God was not in them,” is apparently regarded by the Apostle who recorded 
the words, as equivalent to the “love of the Father is not in them.” 
(Comp. St. John v. 37—42, and St. John iii. 1, and iv. 8 — 14.) 
