Selected quad for the lemma: death_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
death_n	body_n	soul_n	spirit_n	17,497	5	5.6554	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A25775	A short history of Valentinus Gentilis, the tritheist tryed, condemned, and put to death by the Protestant reformed city and church of Bern in Switzerland, for asserting the three divine persons of the Trinity, to be [three distinct, eternal spirits, &c.] / wrote in Latin, by Benedictus Aretius, a divine of that church, and now translated into English for the use of Dr. Sherlock ...; Valentini Gentilis justo capitis supplicio affecti brevis historia. English	Aretius, Benedictus, d. 1574.; South, Robert, 1634-1716.	1696 (1696)	Wing A3629; ESTC R6675	62,571	156

A short HISTORY OF Valentinus Gentilis THE Tritheist Tryed Condemned and put to Death by the Protestant Reformed City and Church of Bern in Switzerland for Asserting the Three Divine Persons of the Trinity to be Three Distinct Eternal Spirits c. Wrote in Latin by Benedictus Aretius a Divine of that Church and now Translated into English for the use of Dr. Sherlock Humbly Tendred to the Consideration of the Arch-bishops and Bishops of this Church and Kingdom London Printed and Sold by E. Whitlock near Stationers-Hall 1696. TO THE Most Reverend the Archbishops and the Right Reverend the Bishops of the Church of England My Lords I Here present your Lordships with a short Account of the Proceedings of an Eminent Protestant Reformed Church and State against a Noted Tritheist for asserting Three Eternal Spirits in the Blessed Trinity induced thereto by the late fatal Growth of Tritheism in our Church first vented and asserted in the same and yet higher Terms by Dr. Sherlock in his pretended Vindication of the Doctrine of the Ever Blessed Trinity in the Year 1690. And since that by one J. B. Minister of Folkstone in Kent and styling himself A Presbyter of the Church of England to the extream Disgrace of it in a Book written in Defence of the said Dr. Sherlock and his Tritheistick Notions upon the same Article in the Year 1695. and since that also openly preached in the very Face of the whole University of Oxon by one Mr. Joseph Bingham then a Fellow of University-Colledge there on the 28th of October in 1695. And lastly maintained and with great and even foaming Vehemence preached up in one of the most Eminent Cathedrals in England by one of the Prebendaries of the same first on the 30th Nov. 95. and since that on the 12th of January 9. Whose Name together with the Heterodoxyes then and there delivered by him are ready to be produc'd as there shall be occasion So that your Lordships can need nothing further either to alarm or convince you That the Enemy has been sowing his Tares amongst us while you see them so plentifully coming up even under your Eyes As for Dr. Sherlock he has over and over declared and lately again renewed the same Declaration viz. That the Three Divine Persons are Three distinct Infinite Eternal Minds or Spirits and that it is Heresie and Nonsence to judge otherwise For He it seems may take upon him to declare Heresie without a Reprimand And as for Presbyter I. B. of Folkstone he asserts the very same in Print And not only so but likewise to the flagrant Scandal of our Church * professedly owns and prefers Genebrard 's Tritheistick Doctrine of the Blessed Trinity as better and more Orthodox than that of Calvin and his Followers whom he charges with denying the Nicene Faith as to that part of it God of God which yet Bellarmine himself as much as he hated Calvin vindicates him from in his 2d Book de Christo and 19. Chap. To whom we may further add Beza Brentius and Zanchius with several other Eminent Divines of the Reformation All of them with the utmost Calumny reviled and condemned by this Genebrard while on the other side he positively vouches the horrid Opinions of Gentilis for sound and Catholick And besides all this at one stroke charges all the Reformed Churches both of France and Germany sometimes with Sabellianism and sometimes with Arianism as the Reader will perceive by the Quotations here tendred him on the side This Genebrard I say is the Person followed and defended by Dr. Sherlock's Defender J. B. and that as to his Doctrine of the Trinity as may be more particularly and fully declared in another place But in the mean time how these Encomium's bestowed by a Presbyter of the Church of England upon such a Furious Tritheistick Papist in so foul a manner traducing the Doctrine of most of the Protestant Divines and Churchis about the blessed Trinity will sound in the ears of the Reformed Churches abroad whom we have been so long professing to Court is left to the Bishops of this Reformed Church to judge For some indeed have shewn themselves very zealous to quit a great part of our Ecclesiastical Constitution in order to our Union with those Churches beyond Sea Tho I confess I could never yet hear That those Churches alledged the Rites and Ceremonies of our Church as any Bar to their Communion with it But howsoever they do or may stand affected to us I dare undertake that our quitting all the Ceremonies hitherto enjoyned and received amongst us as Ancient Decent and Inoffensive as they certainly are will not be half so powerful to draw them to us as the Asserting Three Distinct Infinite Eternal Minds or Spirits in the Blessed Trinity or countenancing those who assert them will be effectual to make them abhor loath and fly from our Communion And when they are once gotten to such a distance from us I fear we shall hardly get them back again but by quitting our Church-Livings and Preferments to them and then we shall be throughly Reformed indeed That Tritheism therefore is in a thriving condition amongst us cannot be denied nor so much as questioned And the Causes of it are manifestly these two First The great and advantagious Station held by that Person in the Church who first broached it here And Secondly The connivence which has ever since attended him in the Assertion of it The first of which has created him several Dependencies amongst some poor empty Retainers acted by Hope and Hunger as Hunger and Emptiness generally go together who to serve their Interest by his Favour easily turn Proselytes to his Opinions it being not Imaginable that they should open their Mouths so wide for him but to have them fill'd by him But such mischiefs must always be expected from Heterodoxy in High Place which is never so formidable for what it holds as for what it has to give For this still made the Pope an Over-match for a Council and may at any time give an overgrown Heretick the vantage ground of Truth Tho miserable no doubt must the state of that Church needs be where men shall wear her Favours so much to the prejudice of her Faith As for the other Reason of the Fatal spreading of this Poyson viz. The Connivence and Encouragement attending the Person who first vented it I shall not stick to affirm That he who asserts any thing contrary to the Received Doctrine of the Church how much soever he may be favoured or abetted dignified or distinguished is a scandal to the Gown he wears and an Insufferable Reproach to the Church he wears it in I very well know That the judicial Proceedings of the Church and Senate of Bern against that wretehed Thitheist Gentilis are no rule for us to proceed by who have Laws of our own which allow of no such severity as I am far from desiring that they should

Substance in the Three thus united Gentilis says that in these and the like places Tertullian spoke waveringly and will have them refer to Montanus his Paraclete which notwithstanding all this are very Orthodox But on the contrary we say that Tertullian against Hermogenes did not only speak doubtfully but did actually make use of the Phrases and Expressions of Arius when he says There was a time when the Son of God was not which saying must of necessity be extreamly well lik'd by Gentilis as that which doth make the Son posterior to the Father in the order of the Godhead But it is plainly an Arian expression the same with the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which we have already mention'd out of Nicephorus lib. 8. cap. 8. But Tertullian doth often recollect himself and not only makes use of proper expressions but seems likewise to be Orthodox enough in his Notions as in the same Treatise against Hermogenes he says Divinitas gradum non habet utpote unica The Divinity or Godhead can admit of no degrees as being but one These and the like passages do sufficiently demonstrate that Tertullian acknowledg'd no separation no division in the Godhead but yet in respect of the different Persons he did allow of a Numerical distinction And thus much we thought fit to take out of Iustin Martyr Ignatius and Tertullian these being the Fathers to whom Gentilis lays so great a claim as if they were wholly Patrons of his Opinion I shall not concern my self much with any of the others since the Opinions of Hilary and Irenaeus are too well known to give any one just occasion to suspect that they were favourers of this Pestilential Error and those passages Gentilis quotes out of them are answer'd by the Authors themselves Nor shall I at present bring any Quotations out of the many other both Greek and Latin Writers since Gentilis rejects all their Authorities CHAP. XVI Concerning the other Fathers especially St. Austin GEntilis then without any distinction rejects all other both Greek and Latin Writers and who cannot but wonder at the daring confidence of such a Fellow Here we have a censorious Upstart who like another Aristarchus boldly arraigns and condemns all Antiquity unless they will acknowledge Three Eternal distinct Spirits in the Divine OEconomy and all the three hundred and eighteen Fathers assembled in the Nicene Council must be herded amongst the Hereticks because they confess'd but One God Eternal He prefers Arius before them all would he but have admitted the term 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as newly explain'd by himself But I will not oppose him with fallible Human Authority seeing we may easily consute this Blasphemous Error out of the Scripture it self And Arius whose wicked Spirit seems now to revive in or to rest upon this Monster of Iniquity was condemn'd of Old and confuted not by Human Authority but from the Holy Scriptures and Consent of the Church My design being Historically to make it appear that this wicked Man has set up a new Interpretation of Holy Scripture and to gain his Point the easier has without any modesty or civility taken liberty to rail at and calumniate not only the Fathers but likewise all the Orthodox Councils However he ought either to have submitted to such approv'd Authors and to the Consent of the Church or else to have confuted them out of the Word of God This he does not but cites some few places of Scripture upon which he puts a new Interpretation and when we deny this to be the true meaning of them and assert That the Church of God did never understand those places in such a manner and for proof of it appeal to all the Authentick Writers both amongst the Greeks and Latins he cries out That we are a parcel of Dogmatical Pedants and Hereticks and presently flies over to Arius and the Bishops which follow'd him as if there were a better Interpretation of Scripture amongst them than there is in Athanasius and those who approv'd of his Confession of Faith He treats St. Austin in a very scurrilous manner no ways deserv'd by so excellent a Writer He charges him as well as us with holding a Quaternity a Notion he never was so Phantastick as to dream of He styles that Reverend Father an Enthusiastick Writer a Magician and a Sophister such calumnies as he never receiv'd at the hands of his most Mortal Enemies The Trinity in Unity and Unity in Trinity he calls an Imaginary Being an Ens rationis and St. Austin's Goddess which is downright abominable Blasphemy And notwithstanding all this our crafty Scribler to reconcile himself to St. Austin and wipe off the Odium such rude expressions must necessarily bring upon him at last gravely pronounces this Oracular saying That he believes were St. Austin now alive and could enjoy but this clear light of the Gospel he would with his own hands throw his Books of the Trinity into the Flames A thing very likely indeed that St. Austin shou'd take Example from this vile Man and Perjure himself as he hath done But of this enough CHAP. XVII Concerning the Communication of Attributes or Proprieties THE Scripture speaking of the Son of God doth attribute that to one of his Natures which doth properly belong to the other as Ioh. 3. No one hath ascended up into heaven but the Son of man who is in heaven Christ indeed as he was the Son of Man could not then be in Heaven when he spoke these words nor did he take his Flesh from Heaven But all this is proper to the Divine Nature only and may be truly affirm'd of whole Christ by reason of the Personal Union of the Word with Man By a like form of Speech we say that God suffer'd and died for us which are very improper expressions if strictly taken since God cannot properly be said to suffer or to dye and therefore we use to add by way of Explication that it was in Carne assumptâ in the Flesh that he assum'd This way of speaking the Ancients call'd Communicatio Idiomatum or the Communication of Properties others call'd it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Damascene styles it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as if we should say by way of Exchange or Mutual distribution whereby we attribute that to the Human Nature which is proper to the Divine as to be in Heaven before the Incarnation or when contrariwise that is attributed to the Divine Nature which is proper only to the Human as to Dye and to Suffer or else we affirm that of the whole Person which is truly and properly said because Christ in his Human Nature did dye thô not in his Divine Nor is this way of speaking in any wise improper or absurd For don't we in respect of us Mortals upon the very same account say That such a Man is dead thô this cannot be properly said of the whole Man for Man is Mortal only in respect of his Body his Soul is

Immortal and survives after Death Yet because the Union of Soul and Body is that which makes the Man one hence it is that we affirm that of the whole Man which only agrees to one part of him So we say of Christ that he Suffer'd and is Dead which properly do not at all belong to the Divinity but agree to Christ as he is Man who is withal the same God and one and the same Christ. Here Gentilis cries out That we divide Christ and make a separation in him and yet allows that there are some properties which agree to the Word only before he took our Nature upon him Such is that Iohn 3. No one hath ascended up into heaven but he that came down from heaven the Son of man which is in heaven c. And Iohn 8. Before Abraham was I am And Heb. 1. By whom also he made the Worlds Now if as Gentilis grants these expressions can only agree to the Word before he was made Flesh I think it is plain that they are improperly attributed to the Human Nature and by consequence we rightly explain them by a Communication of Properties or Idioms And that we do not divide Christ nor make or maintain here any Separation is clear from the Doctrine of our Church wherein we do plainly acknowledge two Natures in Christ and yet without any confusion of the Natures the Personal Union making one and the same Christ the Son of God and the Blessed Virgin We likewise distinguish the Natures by their Properties but do not divide or separate them and by this means preserve whole and entire all the Offices of the Person of Christ. We say it is proper to the Human Nature to Weep to be Hungry to Sleep to Suffer to Dye to be circumscribed in a Place c. On the other hand it is proper to the Divine Nature to be impassible to make the Worlds to be with the Father from all Eternity before Abraham was c. We say that the Offices of Christ are to redeem Mankind to intercede for them to govern his Church and whatever else may be said to belong to Christ either as Prophet Priest or King Now Gentilis being able to deny nothing of all this 't is clear that he quarrels with the plainest expressions meerly out of heat and desire of Contention and doth therefore unjustly Style this Orthodox Doctrine such impertinent Trifles as deserve to be hiss'd out of the Church which he hath not only done in his Epistle Dedicatory to the King of Poland but hath also without any just or sufficient reason maliciously calumniated the same in the 12th Book of his Antidotes But there is yet at the bottom of all this something still more monstrously Heretical for he often affirms that the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 had truly and properly Flesh and Blood that the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was truly and properly Nail'd to the Cross and that the same 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 did properly Suffer Now had this been said of Christ it had been without Controversie true but since 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 doth signifie only the Divine Nature in Christ which is united to the Human Nature in the Person of Christ he must necessarily think that either a Spirit hath Flesh and Bones which our Saviour himself hath positively deny'd or else that the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was incorporated or rather turn'd into flesh or as the Monophysites did affirm both the Natures were made into one unless he will confess with us that 't is an improper way of speaking to say that the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 did Suffer or Dye whereby that is attributed to the Divine Nature which is proper only to the Human by reason of the Hypostatick union of both Natures in Christ which is what we call Communicatio Idiomatum CHAP. XVIII Containing some of Gentilis's Notorious Blasphemies ANother remarkable Instance of this Man's Impiety may be taken from that scurrilous impudent blasphemous Language he hath so freely bestow'd upon this most Sacred Mystery a Mystery that we ought rather in humility to adore than nicely to pry into It must be consess'd that even good Men do sometimes disagree in their Explication of Things and are not always of the same mind in their Interpretations of Scripture but yet they do it without railing without opprobrious Language and much more do they abstain from the blacker Crimes of Irreligion and Blasphemy 'T is no good sign of a Religious disposition to scandalize and bespatter the Subject in dispute and yet however Gentilis has been so liberal of his Railery that had he rak'd even Hell it self he could not have met with more dirty noisome Expressions nor more offensive to any Judicious Person He sticks not to call the Trinity an Idol the Tow'r of Babel a New Idol which we have erected above the Father a Tripersonate Mock-God a Diabolical Fictitious Person a Fictitious Propriety and Sophistical Person in a New God And pag. 8. An Imaginary Phantastick Person Pag. 28. he calls the Trinity Trium horrenda confusio Execrabilis Mixtura And pag. 33. says That we have invented this New God the Trinity out of our own Heads Pag. 39. he styles it a Fourth Idol which deserves to be thrust down into Hell And pag. 44. calls the first Person in the undivided Godhead a Magical Phantom an empty Spectrum that has begotten another Imaginary Person or meer Relation Antid 3. He calls the Deus Trinitas Nomen Monstrosum And pag. 56. he will have it be nothing but Magical Persons and Proprieties Again a Magical Propriety in a New Idol Pag. 34. The three Persons he calls Three Magical Impostures and the One God he styles a Fourth unknown Idol In his Printed Book Fol. 6. he calls the Trinity a meer human Invention diametrically opposite to the Truth of the Gospel The belief of a Trinity is perfect Sophistry And again the Trinity is Deus Trinomius a God only under three Names which last he seems to have borrow'd from Sabellius Again Fol. 8. The Trinity is call'd a New God indefinite Tripersonate a God which none of the Prophets or Patriarchs ever knew of which Christ never revealed nor the Apostles ever preach'd He styles our Blessed Saviour Christus tergeminus p. 14. of his Printed Book and in his Epistle to the Sons of the Church tells them Christ was transform'd into One which was not the Son of God Pag. 15. he calls him the Son of the Father that is says he of a meer empty Relation Then calls him a Tripartite Metamorphos'd Christ. God the Father he calls a fruitless idle unknown God But perhaps it will be said that these Railleries were design'd only against us not against the Mystery it self It is true indeed that Gentilis does generally endeavour to throw his Scandals upon us and bespatter our Doctrine with these abusive terms yet it can't be deny'd but that he is so