[1] 1807.
Letter III.p.

38.
They (the Jews) did not deny that to be God's own Son was to be equal with the Father, nor did they allege that such an equality would destroy the divine unity: a thought of this kind never seems to have occurred to their minds.
In so truly excellent a book as this is, I regret that this position should rest on an assertion.

The equality of Christ would not, indeed, destroy the unity of God the Father, considered as one Person: but, unless we presume the Jews in question acquainted with the great truth of the Tri-unity, we must admit that it would be considered as implying Ditheism.

Now that some among the Jews had made very near approaches, though blended with errors, to the doctrine taught in John, c.i., we can prove from the writings of Philo;--and the Socinians can never prove that these Jews did not know at least of the doctrine of their schools concerning the only-begotten Word--[Greek: Logos monogenaes],--not as an attribute, much less as an abstraction or personification--but as a distinct 'Hypostasis' [Greek: symphysikae]:-and hence it might be shown that their offence was that the carpenter's son, the Galilean, should call himself the [Greek: Theos phaneros].

This might have been rendered more than probable by the concluding sentence of Christ's answer to the disciples of John;--'and blessed is he, whosoever shall not be offended in me' (Luke vii.