The Life of Samuel Taylor Coleridge: 1838Gillman, James
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The Life of Samuel Taylor Coleridge: 1838
Gillman, James
Coleridge, Samuel Taylor, 1772-1834; Critics -- Great Britain -- Biography; Poets, English -- 19th century -- Biography
This reasoning may now be applied in illustration of the Trinity. We
are too much in the habit of viewing our Saviour Jesus Christ, through
the medium of his body. 'A body was prepared for him,' but this body
was mere matter; as insensible in itself, as every human frame when
deserted by the soul. If therefore the Spirit that was in Christ, was
the Spirit of the Father: if no thought, no vibration, no spiritual
communication, or miraculous display, existed in, or proceeded from
Christ, not immediately and consubstantially identified with JEHOVAH,
the Great First cause; if all these operating principles were thus
derived, in consistency alone with the conjoint divine attributes; of
this Spirit of the Father ruled and reigned in Christ as his own
manifestation, then, in the strictest sense, Christ exhibited 'the
God-head bodily,' and was undeniably ''one' with the Father;'
confirmatory of the Saviour's words; 'Of myself,' (my body) 'I can do
nothing, the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works.'
But though I speak of the body, as inert in itself, and necessarily
allied to matter, yet this declaration must not be understood as
militating against the Christian doctrine of the 'resurrection of the
body'. In its grosser form, the thought is not to be admitted, for,
'flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God,' but, that the
body, without losing its consciousness, and individuality, may be
subjected, by the illimitable power of Omnipotence, to a sublimating
process, so as to be rendered compatible with spiritual association,
is not opposed to reason, in its severe abstract exercises, while in
attestation of this 'exhilarating belief', there are many remote
analogies in nature exemplifying the same truth, while it is in the
strictest accordance with that final dispensation, which must, as
Christians, regulate all our speculations. I proceed now to say, that:
If the postulate be thus admitted, that one mind influencing two
bodies, would only involve a diversity of operations, but in reality
be one in essence; or otherwise, (as an hypothetical argument,
illustrative of truth) if one preeminent mind, or spiritual
subsistence, unconnected with matter, possessed an undivided and
sovereign dominion over two or more disembodied minds, so as to become
the exclusive source of all their subtlest volitions and exercises,
the 'unity', however complex the modus of its manifestation, would be
fully established; and this principle extends to DEITY itself, and
shows the true sense, as I conceive, in which Christ and the Father
are one.
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