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A52606 A brief history of the Unitarians, called also Socinians in four letters, written to a friend. Nye, Stephen, 1648?-1719.; Biddle, John, 1615-1662.; Firmin, Thomas, 1632-1697. 1687 (1687) Wing N1505; ESTC R37735 58,564 186

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recited by St. Cyril and by St. Cyprian ad Numid and by Socrates Hist l. 1. c. 26. If the Compilers of this Creed had believed that either the Son or Spirit is God t is unaccountable that they should take no notice of it in a Greed and such a Creed as was purposely drawn up to represent all the necessary Articles of Religion If a Socinian say they were to draw up a Confession of his Faith he would do it in no other Words but these of the Apostles and on the contrary no Trinitarian after having described the Father by all the usual Characters of God saying he is God Almighty and Maker of Heaven and Earth would fail to mention the Divinity of the Son and Holy Spirit whence we must needs infer that the Apostles believed as the Socinians not as the Trinitarians believe concerning God Christ and the Holy Spirit 6. To conclude Theirs they say is an accountable and a reasonable Faith but that of the Trinitarians is absurd and contrary both to Reason and to it self and therefore not only false but impossible For you say they teach there are three almighty and most wise Persons and yet but one God as if every Almighty and most wise Person were not a God and consequently three such Persons three Gods. You add yet more absurdly that there are three Persons who are severally and each of them true God and yet there is but one true God This is an Error in counting or numbring which when stood in is of all others the most brutal and inexcusable and not to discern it is not to be a Man. But we would not say they trouble our selves at the non-sense of this Doctrine if it did not impose false Gods on us by advancing two to be Gods who are not so and rob also the one true God of the Honour due to him and of which he is jealous This Sir is the Doctrine of the Vnitarians more commonly by others call'd Socinians concerning Almighty God and these their Arguments which I have so related as not to judg or rail of their Persons because however learned and reasonable Men which is their Character among their worst Adversaries may be argued out of their Errors yet few will be swagger'd or chode out of them It remains that I make a brief and fair Deduction of their History from the time that they have been taken notice of in the World. They whom we call Socinians were by the Fathers and first Ages of Christianity called Nazarens by which name St. Paul is accused before Felix Acts 24. 5. They were also in those first times called Ebionites Mineans Artemonites Theodotians Symmachians Paulinists Samosatenians Photinians and Monarchians The Writings of these Ancients are all lost being destroyed by the Arians and Catholicks Notwithstanding they had I find some very considerable Men among them as 1. Theodotian who translated the Old Testament out of the Hebrew into Greek about the Year of our Lord 182. 2. Symmachus who published another Translation from the Hebrew also into Greek in the Year 193. Eusebius assures us both these were Ebionites or Nazarens and their Translations were greatly esteemed and much used in the Greek Churches 3. Paulus of Samosatum Bishop and Patriarch of Antioch a Man not only learned and eloquent but so much esteemed in that Capital City of the East that an Episcopal Council there assembled were not of sufficient Authority with his Citizens to cast him out of St. Peter's Chair 4. Photinus Bishop of Sirmium against whom other Bishops being by Imperial Authority assembled proceeded by Conciliary Acts and Censures of the Church but neither would his City part with him till the Emperour sent an Army to expel him Eusebius Hist l. 5. c. 28. and Theodoret Haer. Fab. l. 2. c. de Artem. say that these Nazarens constantly affirmed that they derived their Doctrine from the Apostles of our Lord and that it was the general Doctrine of the Church till the Popes Victor and Zepherin set themselves to root it up Victor say the Socinians began to persecute the Apostolick Doctrine of one God or what is the same that God is one in the Year 194 but with little Success till that which was afterwards the Doctrine of the Arians grew into general Credit and Accepance For Justin Martyr Origen and other principal Fathers teaching as the Arians afterwards did that the Father is indeed before the Son and Holy Spirit in Time in Dignity and in Power yet that the Word or Son who in the fulness of time took our nature on him was generated or created some time before the World and was the Father's Servant and Minister in making the World and that the Holy Ghost was the Creature of the Son and subservient to him in making all things this Doctrine being advanced by Justin Origen and others of note in the Church and seeming more for the Honour of the Son than the plain and simple Doctrine of the Nazarens by the Help of Persecution prevailed against theirs and became the more current Doctrine of the Church till in the Council of Nice it was condemned and another more popular and so more taking than that as attributing to the Son Eternity and Equality with the Father did generally obtain being supported by Imperial Authority But did Superstition say the Socinians stop here No for there shortly arose another Doctrine that the Son and Holy Spirit are the same God with the Father not only as the Nicene Fathers explained this matter by Unity of Wills and specifical Identity or sameness of Substance but by numerical or true Identity and sameness of Substance and Nature This last has been establish'd by so many terrible penal Laws partly obtained of the Roman Emperours by Catholick Bishops partly made by Popes in the times of their Omnipotence that now not only the Nazaren Faith but the Arian and the Nicene truly so called are no where openly profest in the Territories of Christian Princes and States except in a few Cities of Transilvania and some Churches of the United Netherlands in which Countries Liberty of Conscience makes a part of their Civil Rights and Franchises But in the Turkish and other Mahometan and Pagan Dominions where also the conquered Provinces of Christians have Liberty of Conscience the Nazaren and Arian Churches are very numerous Much of the new Conquests of his present Imperial Majesty in Hungaria Sclavonia and Illyricum are Arian But though the open and avowed Profession of the Unity of God as 't is taught by the Nazarens or Socinians and by the Arians be supprest yet 't is observed that not a few of the most learned and celebrated Writers of the Church whether Catholick or Reformed have certainly been either Arians or Socinians or great Favourers of them though they have used much Caution in so expressing themselves as not to lye too open to Exception Envy or a legal Prosecution 1. D. Erasmus the restorer of Learning hath given