They did not invent the terms; but took them and used them as they were taken and applied by Philo and both the Greek and Oriental sages.

Nay, the precise and orthodox, yet frequent, use of these terms by Philo, and by the Jewish authors of that traditionalae wisdom,--degraded in after times, but which in its purest parts existed long before the Christian aera,--is the strongest extrinsic argument against the Arians, Socinians, and Unitarians, in proof that St.John must have meant to deceive his readers, if he did not use them in the known and received sense.

To a Materialist indeed, or to those who deny all knowledges not resolvable into notices from the five senses, these terms as applied to spiritual beings must appear inexplicable or senseless.

But so must spirit.

To me, (why do I say to me ?) to Bull, to Waterland, to Gregory Nazianzen, Basil, Athanasius, Augustine, the terms, Word and generation, have appeared admirably, yea, most awfully pregnant and appropriate;--but still as the language of those who know that they are placed with their backs to substances--and which therefore they can name only from the correspondent shadows--yet not (God forbid!) as if the substances were the same as the shadows;--which yet Leighton supposed in this his censure,--for if he did not, he then censures himself and a number of his most beautiful passages.