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ID Title Author Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) STC Words Pages
A70690 Observations on the four letters of Dr. John Wallis concerning the Trinity and the Creed of Athanasius Nye, Stephen, 1648?-1719. 1691 (1691) Wing N1508A; ESTC R41199 24,893 22

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c. is to be understood of Paul himself and every other regenerate Person or not Socinus denies they are spoken of Paul or other regenerate Person and adds that a Force how great soever is rather to be used to the words than to admit such a pernicious Opinion that is than admit that St. Paul or a regenerate Man is Carnal sold under Sin c. These words are indeed hyperbolical but considering the occasion capable of and intended in an honest sense as any candid Man will acknowledg Lett. 3. pag. 44. He saith Sandius that great Friend of the Socinians and Promoter of their Cause published a Thesis against the Divinity of the Holy Ghost and was so answered by Wittichius that a Friend of Sandius and his Partner in maintaining that Thesis did after the Death of Sandius publish to the World that Sandius himself was satisfied and changed his Opinion This Matter is both unskilfully and unfairly related First Sandius was no Socinian but an Arian and not only often wrote against the Socinians but endeavours in that very Thesis mentioned by the Doctor to confute the Opinion of the Socinians about the Holy Ghost Secondly As Sandius denied the Divinity and believed the Personality of the Holy Spirit so it came into his Mind that perhaps by the Holy Spirit is meant the whole kind of Holy Angels or Spirits as by the Devil and Satan is often meant the whole Race of wicked apostate or fallen Spirits This Opinion he calls a Paradox Problema Paradoxum and propounds it to be disputed by Learned Men himself alledging the Arguments for it in the aforementioned Thesis Wittichius so replied that as Sandius his Associate reports Sandius was satisfied not of the Divinity of the Holy Spirit but that the Spirit is One Person as the Arians always held not more Persons or Spirits I said in my former Letter that a Respondent for his Degree at Oxford put for one of his Questions such a Thesis against the Socinians as Dr. Wallis objects to them viz. That they preferred Reason above Scripture and that his Learned Antagonist thô neither then nor since a Socinian made it appear that the Respondent had not read the Books of the Socinians but accused them by hearsay I added That if Dr. Wallis were urged to defend his Charge against the Socinians I doubted he could acquit himself no better than that Candidate for his Degree did The Doctor has increased my Suspicion by his third and fourth Letters for I cannot believe of him that he would knowingly and deliberately pervert the Words of Authors long since dead and who never did him wrong by Word or Deed. Therefore I suppose his Quotations were borrowed from S. Maresius or perhaps from S. Lubbertus who cared not what he said of any Adversary especially of a Remonstrant or a Socinian But were this whole Accusation of Socinus as true as 't is notoriously false the Vnitarians though they are by others called Socinians do not think themselves concerned in it for they do not profess to follow Socinus but the Scripture If Socinus has at any time spoken erroneously or unadvisedly or hyperbolically 't is not Socinus who is their Master but Christ As great Chillingworth somewhere says the Bible the Bible the Bible is our both Rule and Guide not Calvin not Luther nor Socinus but the Bible I am come now within sight of my Conclusion it only remains that I answer briefly to some exceptionable Passages and incompetent Answers to what I had objected in my first Letter I may be very brief because the Doctor as is the custom of eloquent Men and Orators has said but a little in a great deal First Whereas he has up and down in these Letters objected several Texts against the Socinian Heresy of but One God and in defence of the Catholic and Orthodox Doctrine of Three Gods as to those Texts which he has only cited without inlarging or criticizing upon them I refer my self to the Explications in the Brief History of the Socinians and to the Defence of that History He saith Lett. 3. pag. 42. that Dr. Sherlock has confuted that History I observe that the Orthodox Writers cry up one anothers Books as clear Victories though those Books are as contrary to one another as they are to the Socinians and if any one of them has confuted the Socinians he has at the same time confuted all his own Party and even Holy-mother Church her self If Dr. Sherlock has confuted the Brief History he must needs too have confuted Dr. Wallis his four Sabellian Letters If he has proved that there are Three Infinite Intelligent Beings Minds and Spirits then he has confuted those that say the Trinity is Three Somewhats without true Name or true Notion Three Capacities or Respects Three Names or Titles of God Three Modes or Relations to his Creatures namely Creator Redeemer and Sanctifier And if Dr. Wallis has proved this last in his celebrated Letter he has without doubt confuted Dr. Sherlock who asserts Three Infinite Spirits and Beings who are one God only as they are Mutually Conscious or know and feel one anothers Minds and Actions And both of them have confuted Mother Church who hath in several General Councils Anathematized the Doctrine of Sabellius whom Dr. Wallis follows and the Heresy of Philoponus and Abbat Joachim who are followed by Dr. Sherlock That a Sabellian should tell a Tritheist he has confuted the Socinians is such a Complement that if the Vindicator doth not take it for a Jeer he is without doubt so much a Gentleman as by way of requital to publish to the World in his Next that Dr. Wallis has eternally and irrefragably confuted the Neighbour and the Neighbour's Friend In the mean time I cannot but wonder that the Orthodox Writers being so badly agreed what their Trinity is that they have nothing left in common among them but only the word Trinity I wonder I say that they should so earnestly contend for a Word which themselves confess is neither found in Scripture nor was known to first and pure Antiquity The two great Reformers Luther and Calvin were not so much taken with this Word as we are now adays M. Luther Postil major Dominic says The word Trinity sounds odly and is an humane Invention It were better to call Almighty God God than Trinity J. Calvin Admon 1. ad Polonos says I like not this Prayer O Holy Blessed and Glorious Trinity It savours of Barbarity the word Trinity is barbarous insipid profane an humane Invention grounded on no Testimony of God's Word the Popish God unknown to the Prophets and Apostles I observed in my former Letter that our Saviour says John 17.1 3. Father this is Life eternal that they know Thee the only true God and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent Or Jesus Christ thy Messenger I alledged this Text to prove that only the Father is the true God The Doctor at Lett. 3. pag. 51. gives