Selected quad for the lemma: book_n
Text snippets containing the quad
|
ID |
Title |
Author |
Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) |
STC |
Words |
Pages |
|
A43713
|
Hagnelion jechidatho ruahh turak Jehovah ehhad. Or, Eye-salve recommended to the world in a short essay, occasion'd by the sight of a discourse set forth since the Kings injunctions, call'd, Some considerations concerning the Trinity.
|
|
1696
(1696)
|
Wing H190A; ESTC R221262
|
14,424
|
16
|
Hagnelion Jechidatho Ruahh Turak Jehovah Ehhad OR EYE-SALVE Recommended to the World in a Short Essay Occasion'd by the sight of a Discourse set forth Since the Kings Injunctions CALL'D Some CONSIDERATIONS CONCERNING THE TRINITY Ps 8. 2. Out of the Mouths of Babes and Sucklings hast thou ordain'd strength because of thy Enemies that thou mayst still the Enemy and the avenger LONDON Printed in the Year 1696. The Authour TO His Book on the Holy TRINITY MY 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a most sad and lamentable Consideration it is on which I can neither think Speak or write without great Concern and Grief of Heart that the present age being fill'd with Controversie about no less a matter than the Holy Trinity it self the greatest Divines in the Church should be mistaken as they are in the most fundamentall Article of the Christian Faith the Profession and Belief of which is formally and essentially necessary to Baptisme to be Administer'd always in the Name of the Father of the Son and of the Holy Ghost by the special Command and Order of Christ himself the great Apostle of our Profession and that the Church should thereby be fill'd with Scandal as it is not only to the Confirming of Deists and Arians in their wickness and Heresy but also to the turning aside of God's People from the right way who seeing their Leaders Contesting so hotly with each other as they do about the very springs of all Divinity and Religion cannot therefore but waver and be brought to doubt of the Verity and Sacro-Sanctitie thereof Surely to be fear'd it is that Christendom is even now call'd to an Account and Recconning for this and I am tempted methinks upon it with Jesus Ananai in Josephus to fill the streets of our Citys with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for it For what can be the Consequence and Effect of such great Mistake but that our Blessed Saviour so little Faith being found in the Land should come at last in Judgment against us and that our Jerusalem should be destroy'd Is there any Remedy or Prevention for so great an Evil There is one only that the Mistake be rectify'd Wherefore I tell Thee and Tell it Thou agen to all that read thee that the wrapping up the Doctrine of the Holy Trinity which God hath reveal'd and the Church in her Holy Creeds sufficiently Explain'd in the Clowd of Misteriousness has been the cause of this Evil it being a Papistical Doctrine which serves only as it has been made use of to cover over another Error as bad or worse that of Transsubstantiation Must we look on now and suffer this let those who are so Earnest to bear up the Grandeur of the Church more then Gods Holy Truths making Religion to be a Scala ad Eminentiam instead of a Scala Coeli Consider of it I for my part for the Truth 's sake choose rather to take up the Cross of Christ as a Donative of his who took it up for me first that I might obtain Eternal Life and be Number'd amongst those blessed ones who having their Reward in Heaven shall for ever praise him Go therefore My little Book into the world dreadless fearing neither Kings nor Princes Pope nor Cardinals Arch-Bishops nor Bishops Conclave nor Sanedrim and carry thy Eye-Salve to them all telling them it 's the Counsel of him who is King of Kings and Lord of Lords to anoint their Eyes with it that they may See Go and God Bless thee with good Success So prayeth he who beleiveth a Trinity in Vnity and Vnity in Trinity but does not believe that Trinity Is Vnity or that Vnity is Trinity that is Believes three Persons to be one God so is no Tritheita that Three Persons are one Person cannot Believe so is no Sabellian S◠THESE Three are One. OR A Distinction of Persons in the Trinity yet in Vnity cleerly tho' briefly asserted HATH this Church the Church of England at this Day need of Eye-Salve it appears by the many Errors concerning the Trinity which go abroad in Print that it hath yea that it hath need of more Epistles yet from him who walks betwixt the Candle-Sticks and holds the Seven Stars in his right hand Wherefore choosing to be under Hherem rather than Suffer the Truth to fail for Sion's sake I shall not hold my Peace Once have I written and twice will I do it making only this Apology for saying so little on a Subject controverted so much that the less is said of it if it be enough it is so much the better So Aspirante Spiritu Sancto into the Deep I lanch forth craving leave in Order to what I shall say to premise this little That as I do and must grant that there is but One God which we are as sure of as that there is but one Sun to rule the Day and One Moon to give light in the Night So it be granted me likewise that there were two more before the Worlds were made what ever we may take 'em to be WITH THIS ONE GOD. This will be granted me I presume by all because he that denies it owns not Revelation and 't is Confest by the Arrian So that The Questions to be regarded by us are whether he who is said to be begotten the Other who is said to proceed in Scripture from the One God be truly and properly each of 'em Themselves God Further whither these Two are together with him who is call'd in Scripture the Father THE ONE GOD or no What to let go Socinus does the Arrian say to this He Poor Man I call him so because he 's a follower of Ebion denies it utterly yet in my Eye not without reason because of the Scandal that 's given him For he knows as well as any man that to say that Three Distinct Infinites are one Single Infinite as he is told Implies and is false that to say a Mode a property or Faculty can Constitute a Distinct Person as he 's told likewise Obtrudes on him an Impossible Notion He says therefore The Son and the Holy Ghost cannot be God which we are sure is false if the Holy Scriptures be true What next does the Authour of the Considerations mention'd in the Title-Page Say He likewise seeing the same Absurdities as the Arian doth and very well perceiving the Son and Holy Spirit 's Characters in Scripture Concludes because he dares not go against his Creeds and Litany that they are Persons but that they are not so distinct as Three Angels are c. No Saith he it 's an Impossible thing this What lastly say I now truely what he averr's I cannot possibly grant him Here my Author wants Eye-Salve Consequently in Opposition to what he Contends for so Earnestly as if 't were the Faith once deliver'd to the Saints I lay down this for Truth First that the Father Son and Holy Ghost are Persons and that as Distinct as three Angels Persons or as the Persons of Peter James
and John are Secondly That the Son and Holy Ghost Persons as distinct as I 've Express'd 'em to be are in the Concrete truely and properly God and that each of 'em is Infinite Thirdly Forasmuch as the Godhead in the Abstract is and can be but One That the Son and the Holy Ghost their Personal Distinction notwithstanding are together with the Father ONE and the SAME GOD. Will some say perhaps startling is this the Truth I answer that 't is for certain the Mistery and must be maintain'd if any thing may be done to Convince our Modern Arians who are so rooted and Confirm'd in their Misbeleife that 't is hard to move 'em in regard they are so much poison'd by that Miscreant Bernardin Odhinus the Authour of MO-CHRI MA call'd so amongst his Freinds but set out under the Name of his Labyrinths as also by that Spawn of his lately set out by an Anonym who wrote Notes on the Creed of St. Athanasius which by the way is not as some would have it to be falsly so call'd but truely witness that Arian who wrote that Pestiferous Sheet himself he viz. tells us that the Greeks meaning Arian Bishops no Question said that the Holy Father was drunk when he made his Creed then that he made it is plain Quoting for it Gennadius Bishop of Constantinople in his Catul. Illustr vir per 〈◊〉 Schol. A. which Gennadius lived in the next Century after the Death of Athanasius It will be Objected here must we then Maintain a Substantial Trinity distinct Persons we all Know are distinct Intelligent Substances and may we say they are one Substance agen here 's the Riddle here 's the Knot is it to be unty'd by us Yes say I. For the Nature of Spiritual Substances is such that if they are Intimately in Unity they may truly be said to be Vnius Substantiae and are sure enough Vnum Totum Spirituale If Spirit Soul and Body for being in Unity are one Individual Man why should not the Persons in the Holy Trinity being much less Different from each other as all will acknowledge than Spirit and Body are be One Individual God Surely Dr. Sherlock the Reverend Dean of St. Pauls in that he assert's a Substantial Trinity is in the Right what he is wrong in is this that he asserts the three Persons in the Trinity to be three DISTINCT INFINITES For herein he is false the Difference is so wide that it Constitutes Tritheism For my part I deny Absolutely that they are three DISTINCT Infinites yet that they are each of 'em Infinite I as positively affirm Is it a Contradiction this No such matter St. Athanasius tells us that the Godhead of the three Persons is but One and that the Son and Holy Ghost are Co that is to say WITH GOD Here is Distinction then plainly how can they be With God else but then he tells us also that they are Equal with the Father How I pray may this be he says for having the Father's Glory So also that they are Co-eternal how agen for having he says the Eternal Majesty of the Father Is not this plain surely granting the Unity that the Son is begotten in Unity that the Holy Ghost Proceeded in Unity with the Fathers Glory and Majesty I do not see how it is possible they should not be God Themselves and the Same God seeing that each of 'em is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 cleerly for what I pray is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It is if we take the word as the Nicene Fathers not as Paulus Saemosatenus understood it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is as much as Another Person having the Unbegotten Substance of the Father Undividely or having the same Substance which the Father hath together with his Own What 's the sequel of all this is it not that they are after the same Manner Co-Infinite too as they are Co-Eternal and Co-Equal surely Yes Therefore say I The Father is Infinite The Son is Infinite And the Holy Ghost is Infinite And yet there are not three Infinites but One Infinite The reason is because they are all three Infinite not by sundry or diverse Infinities peculiar to each Person One but by One and the same Infinity Common to 'em All. The Convocation at Oxford should have taken Notice of This when they Issued out their Decree irrespectively to what is suggested Had they so done they might have Escaped the Censure of those who say they trusted not their own Judgments in the sence of their Creeds but Abetted only the Hypothesis of a Reverend writer whose Learned Book no Man need be at the pains to Answer because he has Answer'd what he himself writ solving the Mistery at last by Modes whereas before he had determin'd it I wonder it was not Spy'd to be altogether unintelligable and past the reach of human Understanding But To come close the Authour of the Considerations are the three Persons so distinct indeed as three Angels or three mens Persons are No saith he take heed of saying it here 's a manifest Implicat so it 's an impossible thing and false Is it so we are undone if it be but praise be to God it is not so I confess it seems a Riddle somewhat difficult but 't is not so difficult for all that but it may be Explicated I shall distinguish therefore between a Person and it 's Shechinah What 's a Person first it is an Intelligent Substance is it not it is so Is every Angel a Person therefore it is surely And is not a Soul tho' distinct from the Body a Person too it is likewise Yea a Soul tho' separate by Death I aver to be a Compleat Person tho' it be not a Compleat Man For Man is a Person in Unity with Earthly Substance he is Maden or Man'e that 's his Root for which he 's call'd Man Shall we call the Soul being separate from the Body but a peice of a Person God forbid What is wanting to make it a Person is it not Substance is it not Intelligent It must be granted this A Person therefore it must needs be or we are to seek for it's Definition yea it is nothing at all What 's a Shechinah next it is that which a Person dwells in is it not it's the very same For it cometh from Shachan the English of which is He Dwelleth and the Constant word it is in Scripture when the Sublime Mysteries of our Faith are spoken of there yea if rightly and well Understood I conceive it would solve all Mysteries clearly For that which I say I shall referr at present only to the Eighth Chapter of the Proverbs of Solomon where Wisdom the same whom St. Paul calls the Wisdom of the Father says thus Ani Chochmah Shachanti Cnormah 't is a Metaphor taken from the Mathematicks the Hebrew Gnormah seeming to answer Norma in the Latine which shews that the Divine Counsel is the Rule of all things made I wisdom