270.
The general mode of commencing and concluding the Epistles of St.
Paul, is a prayer of supplication for the parties, to whom they were addressed; in which he says, 'Grace to you and peace from God our Father, and'-- from whom besides?
--'the Lord Jesus Christ'; in which our Saviour is at times invoked alone, as 'the Grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all'; and is even 'invoked' the first at times as, 'the Grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Ghost, be with you all'; shews us plainly, &c.
Invoked! Surely a pious wish is not an invocation.

"May good angels attend you!" is no invocation or worship of angels.

The essence of religions adoration consists in the attributing, by an act of prayer or praise, a necessary presence to an object--which not being distinguishable, if the object be sensuously present, we may safely define adoration as an acknowledgement of the actual and necessary presence of an intelligent being not present to our senses.

"May lucky stars shoot influence on you!" would be a very foolish superstition, -- but to say in earnest! "O ye stars, I pray to you, shoot influences on me," would be idolatry.

Christ was visually present to Stephen; his invocation therefore was not perforce an act of religious adoration, an acknowledgment of Christ's deity.
[Footnote 1: The Origin of Arianism Disclosed.