Page:A Compendium of the Chief Doctrines of the True Christian Religion.djvu/27

Rh human race are at this day subject, was miraculously effected for the sake of their regeneration, which was in future to be conducted through the external medium of instruction directed to the understanding, in conjunction with the interior operations of the divine mercy. In this way a new will, a new heart, together with new affections of love, and new perceptions of wisdom, were to be, and still may be, formed in man, and he himself restored, if not to the same high degree of perfection as before, yet to a near resemblance of it, and to an equal participation in the happiness of eternal life.

NO sooner had man eaten of the forbidden fruit, than a merciful promise was made of his future redemption and salvation, which were to be effected by the exertion of a divine power in his behalf, bruising the head of the serpent, thereby delivering him from the dominion of evil and infidelity, and restoring him to that happiness, from which he had so wofully fallen. To effect this great end, the one God, Jehovah himself, in the fulness of time descended, and, according to the principles of his own divine order, assumed a human essence and form by incarnation; in and by which form, as a medium suited to the states and perceptions of his creatures, he might not only become visible to them, but might also gradually introduce among them, from the fountain of pure divinity within that medium, such a measure of his divine influence as would tend to remove the impending destruction from their heads, and at length raise them to a state of final happiness.