dislikes those who are for reverencing the Mystery of the Trinity without ever looking into it at all who think it proposed to us only as a Trial and Exercise of our Faith and the more implicit that is the fuller do we express our Trust and Reliance upon God Now if by not looking into it at all he means not enquiring what they are to believe concerning the Trinity nor why they believe it this I acknowledge is a very odd sort of Faith but I believe he cannot name any such men whose avowed Principle this is An Implicit Faith is only meritorious in the Church of Rome but then an Implicit Faith is to believe without knowing what or why but these Ignoramus or Mystery-Trinitarians as some late Socinian Considerers have insolently and reproachfully called them and whom our Author ought not to have imitated never teach such an Implicit Faith as this much less admire the Triumph and Merit of Faith in believing Contradictions and the more the better Under all the appearance of Modesty and Temper these are very severe and scandalous Reflections upon some of the Wisest and Greatest Men amongst us and which this Considerer had little reason for as will soon appear The Doctrine of the Holy Trinity is the most Fundamental Article of the whole Christian Faith and therefore an explicite Knowledge and Belief of it is essential to the Christian Profession and thus all Protestant Divines teach and whatever Voluminous Disputes there may be about it the true Christian Faith of the Trinity is comprized in a few words and the Proofs of it are plain and easy For the Scriptures plainly and expresly teach us that there is but One God and that the Father is God the Son is God and the Holy Ghost is God that the Father is not the Son nor the Son the Father nor the Holy Ghost either Father or Son as I have already explained it This we all teach our people to believe upon the Authority of Scripture which is the only Authority we can have for matters of pure Revelation and expound those Texts to them which expresly contain this Faith and vindicate them from the Cavils and perverse Comments of Hereticks And this I think is not to reverence the Mystery without ever looking into it at all when we look as far as we can till Revelation bounds our prospect And this is to look into it as far as God would have us and as far as is necessary to all the purposes of Religion that is as far as the knowledge of this Mystery is of any use to us Now when this is done there are a great many wise men who think we ought to look into this Mystery no further and there seems to be a very good reason for it viz. because with all our looking we can see no further There are indeed some curious Questions started about reconciling the Unity of God with the belief of a Trinity in which there are Three each of whom is by himself True and Perfect God for if there be but One God how can there be Three each of whom is True God Now whatever Answer may be given to such kind of Objections and pretended Contradictions these Learned Men think there is no reason to clog the Christian Faith with them nor to disturb the minds of ordinary Christians with such Subtilties That the Authority of God who has revealed this and the acknowledged Incomprehensibility of the Divine Nature is a sufficient Answer to all Objections and as ridiculously as a Witty Man may represent this That is the truest Faith not which can believe Contradictions but which can despise the pretence of Contradictions when opposed to a Divine Revelation for that resolves Faith wholly into Divine Authority which is the true Notion of a Divine Faith To say that this will not suppress any of our Doubts or Disputes in Religion is a manifest mistake for such a profound Veneration for the Authority of God would silence them all And whatever is the Natural Propension of the Soul to the search of Truth Natural Reason will tell us that there are a thousand things which we can know nothing of and that it is in vain to search after them but that the Divine Wisdom is unsearchable and therefore God is to be believed beyond our own knowledge or comprehension and when we are agreed about the Truth and Certainty of the Revelation that will silence all our Disputes about what is revealed and set bounds to our Enquiries And I never knew before the danger of submitting our Reason to Faith of a blind resignation of judgment as he is pleased to call it to a Divine Revelation for that is the matter in debate Blasphemies and Contradictions may and have been imposed upon mens Faith under the Venerable Name of Mysteries but such Blasphemies and Contradictions were never revealed in Scripture and therefore belong not to the present Enquiry which only concerns believing what we allow to be revealed without looking any farther into it We allow all men to examine the Truth and Certainty of the Revelation and to examine what is revealed but here we must stop and not pretend to judge of what is revealed by the measures of human Reason which is so inadequate a Rule for Divine and Supernatural Truths This is all very plain and if he will allow the Truth of this he must confess that what he has said upon this first Head is nothing to the purpose It is a very popular thing to decry Mysteries and to cry up Reason but to be very cautiously imitated because it is generally found that such men are either no great Believers or no very deep Reasoners 2. In the next place he tells us of a very strange sort of men who call the Doctrine of the Trinity an Incomprehensible Mystery and yet are at a great deal of pains to bring it down to a level with Human Vnderstanding and are all very earnest to have their own particular Explications acknowledged as necessary Articles of Faith An Incomprehensible Mystery is what Human Reason cannot comprehend to bring an Incomprehensible Mystery down to the level of Human Vnderstandings is to make it comprehensible by Reason and those are notable men indeed who undertake to make that comprehensible by Reason which at the same time they acknowledge to be incomprehensible It is to be hoped this Considerer does a little mistake them Men may be-believe the Trinity to be an Incomprehensible Mystery and yet speak of it in words which may be understood which does not pretend to make the Mystery comprehensible but to deliver it from Nonsense Jargon and Heresy that is not to explain the Mystery which is and will be a Mystery still but to secure the true Christian Doctrine of the Trinity which they desire may continue an Article of the Christian Faith still There are he tells us a third sort of men who are for no Mystery that is the
received this Doctrine from the Apostles it being the Faith of those Churches which were planted by the Apostles received their Faith from them and always lived in Communion with them 2. This makes it reasonable to believe that this very Faith is contained in the Writings of the New Testament for I suppose no man questions but that the Apostles taught the same Faith by Writing which they did by Preaching and then this is a Demonstration against all such Interpretations of Scripture as contradict the Catholick Faith whatever fine Colours Wit and Criticism may give them Nay 3. It is a certain Proof That these Primitive Christians who received these Inspired Writings from the Apostles which now make up the Canon of the New Testament did believe that the same Faith which the Apostles and Apostolical men had taught them by Word of Mouth was contained in their Writings for they could not possibly have believed both what the Apostles taught and what they writ if their Preaching and Writings had contradicted each other We know what the Faith of the Primitive Church was and we know they received these Apostolical Writings with the profoundest Veneration as an Inspired Rule of Faith and had we no other presumption of it but this we might safely conclude That they found the same Faith in these Writings which the Apostles had before taught them by Word of Mouth But besides this we find that all the Catholick Writers appeal to the Scriptures and prove their Faith from them and the Authority of such men who were so near the Fountain of Apostolick Tradition must be very Venerable 4. I shall only add this That since we know what the Catholick Faith was and how the Catholick Fathers expounded Scripture if the Words of Scripture will naturally and easily admit that Sense much more if they will not admit any other Sense without great force and violence let any man judge which is most safe and reasonable to expound Scripture as the Catholick Faith and Catholick Fathers expound it and as the Scripture most easily and naturally expounds it self or to force New Senses and Old Heresies upon Scripture which the Catholick Church has always rejected and condemned This I hope may satisfy our Considerer that he did very ill in rejecting a Traditionary Faith and venturing to expound Scripture by his Natural Sentiments which is a very Unsafe Rule in Matters of Pure Revelation of which mere Natural Reason is no competent Judge SECT III. What is sufficient to be believed concerning the Trinity THus far I fear our Considerer has been a little unfortunate or if it do not prove a Misfortune to him in forming his Notion of a Trinity his Luck is better than his Choice Let us proceed to his next Enquiry What is sufficient for Christians to believe concerning the Trinity or which is all one in this case what is necessary to be believed What the meaning of this Question is I can't well tell nor why he makes sufficient and necessary all one for at least they are not always so That is sufficient which is enough for any man to believe that is strictly necessary which every man must believe But let him take his own way he quits the Term sufficient and enquires what is necessary to be believed whereas in many cases that which is absolutely necessary for all may not be sufficient for some I should much rather have enquired how much may be known concerning this Glorious Mystery than how little will serve the turn which argues no great Zeal for it Well What is necessary to be believed concerning the Trinity He answers Nothing but 1. What 's possible to be believed And 2. What 's plainly revealed Here we begin to see what the effect is of consulting nothing but Scripture and Natural Sentiments I hope he meant honestly in this but if he did he expressed himself very incautiously for these two Conditions are very ill put together when applied to matters of Revelation Plainly revealed had been enough in all reason unless he would insinuate that what is plainly revealed may be impossible to be believed and that how plain soever the Revelation be men must judge of the possibility of the thing by their own Natural Sentiments before they are bound to believe it which makes Natural Reason not Scripture the final Judge of Controversies But we must follow him where he leads us and thus he divides his whole Work 1. To consider how far it is possible to believe a Trinity 2. What the Scripture requires us to believe in this matter As for the first he tells us There are two requisites to make it possible for us to believe a thing 1. That we know the Terms of what we are to assent to 2. That it imply no Contradiction to our former Knowledge Such Knowledge I mean as is accompanied with Certainty and Evidence This in some sense may be true but as it is thus loosely and generally expressed it is very like the Socinian Cant and Sophistry By knowing the Terms he means having distinct Natural Ideas of what is signified by such Terms as he himself explains it I can believe it no farther than the Terms of which it is made up are known and understood and the Ideas signified by them consistent So that all Divine Mysteries must be examined by our Natural Ideas and what we have no Natural Ideas of we cannot we must not believe And this once for all condemns all Supernatural Faith or the belief of Supernatural Objects though never so plainly revealed for we have no Natural Ideas of Supernatural Objects And though Revelation may furnish us from the Resemblances and Analogies in Nature with some Artificial Ideas this will not serve the turn for though they know what such Terms signify when applied to Natural they know not what they signify when applied to Supernatural Objects nor have they any Ideas to answer them As for Instance We know what Father and Son signify when applied to Men but when we say God is not only Eternal himself but an Eternal Father who begot an Eternal Son these Terms of Father and Son begetting and being begotten must signify quite otherwise than they do among men something which we have no Idea of and therefore say the Socinians All this is unintelligible and impossible to be believed unless we can believe without understanding the Terms This Considerer asserts the Premises he had best consider again how he will avoid the Conclusion Another Socinian Topick is Contradiction and this our Considerer makes another requisite to the possibility of believing That the thing do not imply a Contradiction to our former knowledge that is to any Natural Ideas And here he learnedly disputes against believing Contradictions and that it is not consistent with the Wisdom Iustice and Goodness of God to require us to believe Contradictions But if instead of all this he had only said That God cannot reveal such plain and evident
Disputes amongst themselves which their common Adversaries are so apt to improve into Scepticism Infidelity or Heresy And therefore for a Conclusion I shall only take a brief Review of the Doctrine of the Fathers concerning this Article of a Trinity in Unity and apply it in a few words to our Socinian Adversaries The Faith of the Catholick Church taught by Christ and his Apostles is that there is but One God but this One God is a Father who has an Eternal Son and an Eternal Spirit in the Essential Unity of the same Undivided and Undiversified Godhead And this is the Faith which all the Catholick Fathers have owned and taught in their several Ages The whole Christian Church Baptizes as our Saviour commanded in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost and this is the Rule of their Faith to believe in Father Son and Holy Ghost A plain simple Faith could Men have been contented to believe God concerning himself Let our Socinian Adversaries tell us what there is absurd impossible or contradictious in this Faith Will they venture to say That it is absurd or contradictious that God should have a Son No! in some sense they will allow this true they themselves believe in Father Son and Holy Ghost they acknowledge Jesus Christ to be the Son of God as he is frequently called in Scripture and that in a higher sense than any other Man is the Son of God but that he is but a Man after all though advanced by God to Divine Honours above all Principalities and Powers and made the Judge both of the Quick and of the Dead and this they affirm to be all that the Scripture means in calling Christ the Son of God But this is not the present Dispute They know that the Catholick Church believed otherwise that Christ is the Eternal Son of God begotten of his Father before all worlds God of God very God of very God and they know also that thus the Catholick Fathers expounded those Texts which concern the Sonship and Divinity of our Saviour and they cannot but confess That they are very capable of such an Exposition nay that it is very difficult to put any other sense upon many Texts and the only reason why they reject these Catholick Expositions is the pretended Absurdity and Contradiction of the Catholick Faith Here then we join issue with them and desire them to shew us what is impossible or contradictious in this Faith That there is something incomprehensible in this Mystery that is something which we have no Natural adequate Ideas of we readily acknowledge with the whole Catholick Church and some of our Adversaries grant That it is possible for a thing to be whereof we have no Idea and then it seems to me very unreasonable to add but we are no ways concerned nor can we Reason or Discourse about those things whereof we have no Ideas For the direct contrary seems to be the more natural consequence that if God thinks fit to reveal such things to us of which we have no Ideas we are concerned and obliged to believe them for if they may be true they are the proper Objects of Faith though they want the Evidence of Natural Ideas But I do not intend to dispute this now but refer them to the Bishop of Worcester ' s Answer to Mr. Lock ' s Second Letter and to a late Sermon and its Vindication Concerning the Danger of Corrupting the Faith by Philosophy What I have now to say is of another Nature viz. That we have an Idea of a Trinity in Unity and such an Idea as contains nothing absurd impossible or contradictious in it That very Idea which I have so largely explained One Absolute Divinity with Two Eternal Essential Processions in the Unity and Identity of Nature The Eternal Father Eternal Self-originated Mind with his Eternal Word his Eternal Son and the Eternal Spirit of Father and Son This is that Idea which the Scripture gives us of it and which the Catholick Church hath always taught Every Man may understand what is meant by it and therefore it is not Jargon and Nonsense and I think I have sufficiently vindicated it from Tritheism and Contradiction and have no more to say of that nature till I hear what they have to object against what is already said and when they come to consider this Matter again as Men that shall certainly be called to an Account for it in this World as well as in the next I hope they will see reason to grow out of conceit with their own Philosophy about Emanations and Processions a Priority of Time and Priority of Nature Self-Existence and Necessary Existence and such like Arian Objections which were made and answered many Ages since and which they may find sufficiently answered in this Treatise This brings back the Dispute to Scripture where the last Appeal must lie in all such Matters without appealing for the Sense of Scripture to Natural Ideas and Philosophy And if the Interpretations of the Catholick Fathers were of any Authority with these Men I have already shewn how they expounded Scripture which will always be a venerable Authority to modest Men and sober Christians how much soever it be despised by Hereticks But it is time to put an end to this Treatise we may consider their Expositions of Scripture some other time THE END DR Sherloc◠Dean of St. Paul's Vindication of the Doctrine of the Trinity Third Edition Quarto Apology for Writing against Socinians Quarto The Danger of Corrupting the Faith by Philosophy A Sermon Quarto A Vindication of the Sermon in Answer to some Socinian Remarks An Answer to the Animad versions on the Dean of St. Paul's Vindication of the Trinity By I. B. A. M. Quarto A Defence of the Dean of St. Paul's Apology for Writing against Socinians Quarto A Defence of Dr. Sherlock's Notion of a Trinity in Unity Quarto The Distinction between Real and Nominal Trinitarians examined in Answer to a Socinian Pamphlet Quarto All Printed for William Rogers Quâ nec dicuntur ut cogitantur nec cogitantur ut sunt Aug. de Trinit l. 5. c. 3. Cùm ergo quaeritur quid tria vel quid tres conferimus nos ad inventendum aliquod speciale vel generale nomen quo complectamur haec tria neque occurrit animo quia excedit supereminentia divinitatis usitati eloquii facultatem Aug. de Trin. l. 7. c. 3. Ad se quippe Pater dicitur Persona non ad Filium aut Spiritum Sanctum Aug. de Trin. l. 7. c. 6. Cur ergo non haec tria simul unam Personam dicimus sicut unam Essentiam Deum sed tres dicimus Personas cùm tres Deos aut tres essentias non dicamus nisi quia volumus vel unum aliquod vocabulum servire huic significationi quâ intelligitur Trinitas ne emnino taceremus interrogati quid tres cùm tres esse fateremur Ibid.
23. r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 165. l. 17. r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 188. l. 16. marg r. ex iâ—demutabilis p. 208. l. 24. Identity p. 216. l. 5. â— Man's r. Man p. 225. l. 34. marg r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 230. l. 2. r. Identity p. 236. l. 14. marg 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 245. l. 10. r. an Angel p. 304. l. 2. marg 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 322. l. 12. de Trin. l. 2. marg l. 15. de Trin. l. 7. l. 32 videri p. 347. l. 14. r. his p. 349. l. 12 13. r. where-ever p 350 marg l. 8. r 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Curious Reader may observe â—ome other Mistakes which I hope will not disturb the Sense THE PRESENT STATE OF THE SOCINIAN Controversy CHAP. I. SECT I. The Present State of the Socinian Controversy the unreasonableness of it and how to reduce the Dispute to the Original Question THE Faith of the Holy Trinity is so fundamental to the Christian Religion that if Christianity be worth contending for That is For if God have not an Eternal Son and an Eternal Spirit the whole Mystery of our Redemption by Christ and of our Sanctification by the Spirit which in its Consequences is the whole of the Gospel and distinguishes it from all other Religions is utterly lost Those various Heresies relating to the Divinity Person and Offices of Christ and the Holy Spirit which began to appear even in the Apostolick Age and have ever since under several forms and disguises disturbed the Peace of the Church is proof enough how much the great Enemy of Mankind thinks himself concerned by all possible means to corrupt this Faith and that great unwearied unconquerable Zeal wherewith the Catholick Fathers have always defended this Faith shews of what importance they thought it and therefore it is no wonder and ought to give no scandal to Christians that these Disputes are again revived among us with as much fury and insolence as ever for there never was a more unhappy Season for the Enemy to sow his Tares But that which is most to be lamented is That the lukewarmness of some and the intemperate Zeal of others have given greater scandal to the World and more shaken the Faith of Christians than all the Opposition of our Adversaries could have done I need say no more the Case is too well known and the Evil Effects too visible among us I will make no new Quarrels if I can help it but sincerely endeavour to prevent the Mischiefs of what has already happened as far as is necâ—ssary to secure the Faith of Christians and to wrest those Weapons out of our Enemies hands which some professed Friends have unwarily furnished them with To do this I shall endeavour in the first place to restore this Controversie to its original state and take off those Vizards which make it appear very frightful to ordinary Christians This Dispute about the Holy and ever Blessed Trinity has of late been dressed up anew with some old School-Terms which how proper soever they may be to give Learned Men a more distinct Idea and Conception of that Adorable Mystery only amuse common Christians and confound them instead of teaching them better This as it was at first occasioned by Hereticks who denied or corrupted the Christian Faith which forced the Catholick Fathers to use some unscriptural Termâ— which by degrees improved into great Subtilties and disturbed the Church with very nice and wrangling Disputes so our Modern Socinians at this day place the main strength of their Cause in these Disputes and think it a sufficient Confutation of the Faith of the Ever Blessed Trinity that the Trinitarians themselves cannot agree about the Sense of Person Hypostasis Substance Nature Essence nor in what Sense God is One and Three but advance very different and as they think contrary Hypotheses to reconcile the Unity of God with the distinction of Three Persons in the Godhead As if there were no difference between what is fundamental in this Faith and such Metaphysical Speculations As if no man could believe in Father Son and Holy Ghost without determining all the Disputes of the Schools Learned men may dispute these matters and things may so happen as to make such Disputes necessary but the Faith of Christians may be secured and Heresies may be confuted without them The Faith is plain and certain even all that is necessary to the purposes of Religion but men may leap out of their depths where they can find no footing and when such Questions are asked as no man can certainly answer it is very likely that they will be answered very different ways and upon very different Hypotheses and there is no great hurt in this neither while these different Hypotheses are neither made new Articles of Faith nor new Heresies but serve only for Hypotheses to give a probable Answer to such Questions as ought never to have been asked and to stop the mouths of Hereticks when they charge the Catholick Faith with Nonsense and Contradiction To distinguish rightly between these two will set this Controversy upon its true ancient bottom which will spoil the Triumph of our Adversaries and possibly may rectify the Mistakes and allay and qualify the intemperate Heats and Animosities of those whom a common Faith ought to make Friends SECT II. How to reduce this Dispute concerning the Trinity to Scripture Terms THE Catholick Fathers have always appealed to the Form of Baptism as the Rule and Standard of Faith that as we are baptized so we must believe In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost This is a plain simple Faith which every Christian may understand and which every Christian must profess That there is an Eternal Father who has an Eternal Son and an Eternal Spirit of the same Nature and inseparably united to himself and that this Father Son and Holy Ghost are the joint Object of the Christian Faith and Worship This is the true Christian Faith and this is all that we are concerned to defend against our Adversaries and would men stick to this without engaging in Philosophical Disputes which we know little or nothing of and which the Scripture takes no notice of we should soon find how weak and impotent all the Attempts of Hereticks would prove Whatever Disputes there are about the signification of those words Nature Essence Substance Person Hypostasis Subsistences Relations c. there is no Dispute about the signification of Father Son and Holy Spirit we have natural Idea's belong to these words when applied to Creatures and when God is pleased in Scripture to represent himself to us under thâ—se Characters if we must understand any thing by them we can understand nothing else but what the words signify all the World over only allowing for that infinite distance there is between God and Creatures which requires us to abstract from all material and creature imperfections We
be but One God but yet requires us to believe his Eternal Son to be true and perfect God and his Eternal Spirit to be true and perfect God it is certain that the Divinity of the Son and of the Holy Ghost is very reconcilable with the Unity of God For as far as Revelation must decide this Dispute we are as much obliged to believe That the Father is God the Son God and the Holy Ghost God as we are to believe That there is but One God Those who will not acquiesce in this must appeal from Scripture to Natural Reason which is a very absurd and impudent Appeal for the plain sense of it is this That they will believe their own Reason before the Scriptures in matters relating to the Divine Nature and Unity which all wise men acknowledge to be so much above human comprehension That is That they know the Unity of God better than God himself does or which is the same thing That they will never believe any Revelation to come from God or any thing how express soever the words are to be the meaning of the Revelation any farther than their own Reason approves it Of which more elsewhere And yet I dare appeal to any man of a free and unbiass'd Reason in this Cause What is that Natural Notion we have of One God Is it any thing more than that there is and can be but One Eternal Self-originated Being who is the Principle or Cause of all other Beings And does not the Scripture do not all Trinitarians with the whole Catholick Church own this Do not all the Christian Creeds teach us to profess our Faith in One God the Father from whom the Son and the Holy Spirit receive their Godhead Thus far then Scripture and Reason and the Catholick Faith agree Does Reason then deny that God can beget of himself an Eternal Son his own perfect Image and Likeness If it does then indeed Scripture and Reason contradict each other But I believe these men will not pretend to prove from Reason That God could not beget an Eternal Son and if this cannot be proved by Reason as I am certain it never can then Reason does not contradict Scripture which teaches us that God has an only begotten Son And if God have an only begotten Son Reason will teach us that the Son of God must be True and Perfect God and yet not another God because he has one and the same Nature with his Father This is all that any Christian need to believe concerning this matter and all this every Christian may understand and all this every one who sincerely believes the Faith of the Holy Trinity does and must agree in Those who do not I will at any time undertake to prove to be secret Hereticks and Enemies to the Christian Faith and as for those who do I will never dispute with them about some Terms of Art and the Propriety of Words in a matter which is so much above all words and forms of speech And here I leave this matter upon a sure Bottom and here we are ready to join Issue with our Socinian Adversaries Our only Controversy as to the Doctrine of the Trinity with them is Whether the Son and the Holy Spirit each of them be True and Perfect God If we can prove this which has been the Faith of the Catholick Church in all Ages we need dispute no other matters with them nor can any Disputes among our selves give any Support to their Cause A Dispute about Words may look like a difference in Faith when both contending Parties may mean the same thing as those must do who sincerely own and believe That the Son is True and Perfect God and the Holy Ghost is True and Perfect God and that neither of them are the Father nor each other And therefore those different Explications of the Doctrine of the Trinity which the Socinians of late have so much triumphed in and made more and greater than really they are and more sensless too by their false Representations can do them no real service among Wise Men tho it may help to amuse the Ignorant If any men have subtilly distinguished away the Catholick Faith they may take them to themselves and increase their Party by them But if this were the Case as I hope it is not it is no Objection against the Catholick Faith that some men openly oppose it and others at least in some mens opinions do secretly undermine it There is reason to guard the Christian Faith against all inconvenient or dangerous Explications which seem to approach near Heresy if this be done with due Christian Temper and Moderation but I hope the Disputes of the Trinitarians are not so irreconcilable but that they will all unite against a Pestilent and Insolent Heresy which now promises it self glorious Successes only from their private Quarrels CHAP. II. An Examination of Some Considerations concerning the Trinity SECT I. Concerning the Ways of managing this Controversy BEfore I put an end to this Discourse it will contribute very much to the better understanding of what I have said and give a clearer Notion of the Use of it to apply these Principles to the Examination of a late Treatise entituled Some Considerations concerning the Trinity The Author I know not he writes with Temper and though he takes the liberty to find fault he does it Civilly and therefore he ought to meet with Civil Usage and so he shall from me as far as the bare Censure of his Principles will admit I was I confess startled at the first entrance to find him own the Vncertainty of our Faith in these Points concerning the Trinity for if after the most perfect Revelation of the Gospel that we must ever expect and the Universal Tradition of the Catholick Church for above Sixteen Hundred years this Faith is still uncertain it is time to leave off all Enquiries about it As for the many absurd and blasphemous Expositions that have been made of this Doctrine if by them he means the Ancient Heresies which infested the Church they are so far from rendring our Faith uncertain that as I shall shew him anon the very Condemnation of those Heresies by the Catholick Church gives us a more certain account what the true Catholick Faith was I agree with him that the warm and indiscreet Management of contrary Parties has been to the Prejudice of Religion among unthinking people who hence conclude the uncertainty of our Faith and it concerns good men to remove this Prejudice by distinguishing the Catholick Faith from the Disputes about Ecclesiastical Words and the Catholick Sense of them and I hope I have made it appear this may be done and then the Faith is secure notwithstanding these Disputes and as for any other Offence or Scandal let those look to it who either give or take it This Considerer dislikes all the Ways and Methods which have hitherto been taken to compose these Disputes 1. He
Socinians and I was glad to find them censured and rejected but wonder'd how they came to be numbred among those men who have laboured in this good design of explaining the Trinity and reconciling the Disputes about it Well All these Methods have proved ineffectual let us then to omit other matters enquire what Course our Considerer took to make himself a fit and competent Judge of this Controversy Take the account of it in his own words I have endeavoured to deliver my self from Prejudice and Confusion of Terms and to speak justly and intelligibly And not being yet prepossess'd in favour of any particular Explication the better to preserve my freedom of examining the Subject in hand I have purposely forborn to search the Fathers Schoolmen or Fratres Poloni or read over any later Treatises concerning this Controversy while I was composing the present Essay resolving to consult nothing but Scripture and my own Natural Sentiments and draw all my Reflections from thence taking only such which easily and without constraint offered themselves Thus Des Cartes made a New Philosophy and this is the best way that can be thought of to make a New Faith This has an appearance of great Indifferency and Impartiality but it is a great mistake when men boast in this as a virtue and attainment and an excellent disposition of mind for the Examination of Matters of Faith I never in my life yet saw any one example to the contrary but that when men who had been educated in the Christian Faith and tolerably instructed in the meaning and the reasons of it could persuade themselves to be thus perfectly indifferent whether it were true or false but this indifference was owing to a secret byass and inclination to Infidelity or Heresy It is in vain to pretend such an absolute freedom of Judgment without being perfectly indifferent which side is true or false For if we wish and desire to find one side of the question true and the other false this is a Byass and our Judgment is not equally poiz'd And certainly in matters of such vast consequence as the Christian Faith and especially that great Fundamental Article of the Holy Trinity such an Indifferency as this is can never recommend either an Author or his Writings to sober Christians Will this Considerer then own that it was indifferent to him when he undertook this design whether the Doctrine of the Trinity should upon Examination appear true or false If it were not the Socinians will tell him that he had not preserved a Freedom of Judgment and then he did well in not consulting the Fratres Poloni for he had condemn'd them without hearing or if he were persuaded concerning the Doctrine of the Trinity Was it indifferent to him whether the Sabellian or Arian or True Catholick Notion of a Trinity contained in the Nicene and Athanasian Creeds were the True Faith That is Was it indifferent to him whether the Ancient Heresies condemn'd by the Catholick Church or that Faith which the Catholick Church has always own'd and professed be the True Faith For my part I confess I am not thus indifferent I will never shut my eyes against plain Conviction which is all the Freedom of judging which is allowable but my Prejudices are and I hope always will be on the side of the Catholick Faith No wise man can be thus indifferent And we shall find this Considerer was not so very indifferent for the main Principles he reasons on are some Popular Mistakes and Prejudices which he seems to have espoused without due Consideration But let us allow him to be as free and unprejudic'd as he pleases I cannot think that he took a good method to understand this Sacred Mystery He laid aside Fathers Schoolmen and other later Treatises concerning this Controversy and consulted nothing but Scripture and his own natural Sentiments To consult Scripture is indeed a very good way and absolutely necessary in matters of pure Revelation which can be certainly known no other way but the Fathers at least are very good Guides and have very great Authority in expounding Scripture and our Natural Sentiments otherwise called Natural Reason is a very bad a very dangerous Expositor of Scripture in such Supernatural Mysteries and has no Authority in these mattters and how our Considerer has been misled by his Natural Sentiments will soon appear A few words might serve for an Answer to the Considerer but since this is the great Pretence of Socinians and other Hereticks to set up Scripture and Natural Reason against Scripture and the Traditionary Faith of the Catholick Church and our Considerer and some other unwary Writers chime in with them it will be very necessary to shew how this betrays the Catholick Faith and makes Reason and Criticism the Supreme Judge of Controversy and then men may dispute on without end and believe at last as they please The Considerer tells us I take it for granted in a Protestant Countrey that Scripture is the only Standard of all necessâ—ry Revealed Truths Neither in the present Case is there any room for a Traditionary Faith For besides that all the Fathers and Ancient Writers ground their Exposition of the Trinity wholly upon Scripture I cannot conceive that the Subject is capable of a plainer Revelation as I shall endeavour to shew more fully in the following Discourse What this last Clause means we shall understand better hereafter but his denying a Traditionary Faith is very extraordinary for if we can prove from the most Authentick Records what the constant belief of the Catholick Chuâ—ch has been especially in the first and purest Ages of it This I take to be a Traditionary Faith nor is it the less Traditionary because the Fathers and Ancient Writers sound their Expositions of the Trinity wholly upon Scripture For if this be true then we have a Traditionary Faith of the Trinity and a Traditionary Exposition of the Scripture for the Reason and Proof of that Faith both in one which I take to be a greater Authority and safer Guide than mere Scripture and our Natural Sentiments And though Protestants allow Scripture to be the only Standard of Faith yet he might have remembred that the Church of England requires us to expound Scripture as the Ancient Fathers expound it But this Wholly is a Mistake for the Primitive Fathers pleaded Tradition as well as Scripture against the Ancient Hereticks as two distinct but agreeing Testimonies as this Author might have known would he have been pleased to have consulted Irenaeus and Tertullian de praescriptionibus with divers others What he means by a plainer Revelation I cannot tell it makes it somewhat plainer to know what the Catholick Faith has always been and what the Catholick Interpretation of Scripture has always been which is the plainest and strongest Answer to Wit and Criticism and Natural Sentiments when they contradict this Traditionary Faith But to discourse this matter more particularly I shall
the Apostles to be the only Infallible Rule of Faith This is the Argument from Prescription which Tertullian insists so largely on and is frequently urged by Irenaeus and other Catholick Writers which is not as some mistake it an Argument merely from Antiquity for though the true Faith was ancienter than any Heresies yet some Heresies had Antiquity enough to make them venerable if that alone would do it but the Argument was from the Tradition of the Apostolick Churches which were planted by the Apostles and had preserved an uninterrupted Succession from them and all the world over taught the same Faith without any material change or variation Whereas none of these Heresies how Ancient soever they might be could pretend to such an Original were never taught by the Apostles or any Apostolical men nor were received or owned by any Churches planted by them And this is an unanswerable Argument as long as we can reasonably suppose the Tradition of the Catholick Faith and the Communion of the Church was preserved entire which it visibly was at least till the first Nicene Council and during all this Period had we no other ways to know it we might learn the Faith of the Catholick Church by its opposition to those Heresies which it condemned 2 dly And this is the only Evidence which I shall at present insist on for the Catholick Tradition of the Faith of the Holy and Ever blessed Trinity for we may see the plain Footsteps of the Ancient Catholick Tradition concerning Father Son and Holy Ghost in those Ancient Heresies Simon Magus was the first Heretick we read of and may be very justly accounted the Father of many of the Ancient Heresies having led the way and sown the Seeds and Principles of them Now if we believe that Account which Epiphanius gives of him this wicked Impostor pretended himself to be God both Father and Son and affirmed that his Lewd Woman who was called sometimes Helena sometimes Selene was the Holy Ghost These Names and Distinctions of Father Son and Holy Ghost he could not possibly learn from any persons but only from the Christian Church in which he was baptized in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost And therefore we may observe that before his Baptism he only pretended to be some Great One and the deluded people thought him to be the great power of God 8. Acts 9 10. But when he was baptized and soon aâ—ter apostatized from the Christian Faith the Devil whose great Power he was set him up for the God of the Christians both Father and Son And though he blasphemously attributed these Titles of God the Father and Son to himself and wickedly corrupted this Faith by making the Father and Son but one Person under different appearances that he appeared to his Countreymen the Samaritans as God the Father and to the Iews as the Son yet there had been no pretence for this had not the Christian Church owned Jesus Christ the Son of God to be true and perfect God For had the Father been God and the Son a mere Man it is certain Father and Son could never be the same Person And besides the Wickedness and Impudence of the Impostor in pretending himself to be Father and Son it had been ridiculous to pretend this to Christians had he not known that the Catholick Faith taught the Son to be True and Real God as well as the Father and then if he could persuade them that he was God the Father he might with the same ease persuade them that he was God the Son too under a different appearance Thus when he pretends that his wicked Strumpet was the Holy Ghost by whom he created the Angels which created the World the very Prophanation of this Holy Mystery shews what the Faith of the Church in that Age was concerning the Divinity of the Holy Ghost for he could have no other Inducement to make his Woman whom he calls the Holy Ghost such a Divine Power but because he knew the Christian Church believed the Holy Ghost to be God and the Spirit of God as he made her to be his Divine Creating Intelligence Another Heresy concerning the Person of Christ attributed Divinity to him owned him to be the Son of God though not of the Maker of the world who they said was but an Inferior Angel but of the Unknown and Incomprehensible Father and that he appeared indeed in the world like a Man but was no true and real Man Now what should put such a wild Conceit as this into their heads had they not known this to be the Catholick Faith That Jesus Christ was the Son of God Their eyes could not see him to be God but they saw him to be a Man and yet they deny him to be a Man and teach that he was the Son of God in the form and apparition of a Man Which is a plain indication what the Catholick Faith was That Christ was both God and Man This they could not believe that the Son of God would so unite himself to Human Nature as to become true and real man and yet they thought it so evident that he was the Son of God or at least saw that this Faith was accounted so sacred that they would not venture to deny that and therefore chose to deny his Humanity and make a mere Apparition of him But then on the other hand Cerinthus and Ebion thought it too evident to be denied That he was a true and real Man and therefore they taught That Iesus was a Man and no more than a Man born as other Men are of Ioseph and Mary But then it is worth considering how they came to make this the distinguishing Doctrine of their Sect That Christ was but a mere Man if the Apostolick Churches whom they opposed and from whom they separated had not taught That he was more than a Man That he was God as well as Man Was there ever any Dispute either before or since concerning any other Man in the world who was owned to be a Man Whether he were a mere Man or not When one sort of Hereticks deny Christ to be a Man and another deny him to be God and both of them in contradiction to the Apostolick Faith it is a very strong presumption at least what the True Catholick Apostolick Faith was That Christ was both God and Man And yet Cerinthus himself though he makes Jesus to be a mere Man owns Christ to be a Divine Person and that this Christ descended on Jesus at his Baptism in the form of a Dove and rested on him or dwelt in him and wrought Miracles by him but left him at his Crucifixion and flew up again to Heaven So that according to Cerinthus from the time that Jesus was baptized till he was crucified the Divinity was very nearly and intimately united to him not that he was God and Man in one Person as the Catholick Faith teaches
the Son to be a distinct Substantial Person this Dispute we hear nothing of but the only Dispute was concerning the Consubstantiality of the Son with the Father and that proves that they did own the Son to be a Substantial Person for were he not in a true proper sense a Person and a Substantial Person he could not be Consubstantial with the Father Nay St Austin expresly tells us That Arius agreed with the Catholicks against the Sabellians in making the Son a distinct Person from the Father and if so the Catholicks taught That the Son was as distinct a Person as Arius did though not a Separate and Created Person as he did Now when Arius would have reduced Christ into the number of Creatures though he made him the first and most excellent Creature created before the World and God's Minister in making the World as like to God as a Creature can possibly be but not of the same Nature with God the Catholick Church would not bear this but in a most Venerable Synod collected from most parts of the Christian World condemn this as contrary to the Faith always received and owned in their several Churches Thus far at least the Tradition of the Church was Sacred and Venerable and the concurrent Testimony of all these several Churches was a more certain Proof of the Apostolick Faith than all the Wit and Subtilty of Arius For Wit may patronize New Errors but cannot prove That to be the Ancient Apostolick Faith which the Church had never received from the Apostles nor ever heard of before This I take to be a very sensible Proof what the Faith of the Christian Church was from the Times of the Apostles till the Council of Nice and consequently what that Faith was which the Church received from the Apostles And this abundantly satisfies me That whatever loose Expressions we may meet with in some of the Fathers before the Arian Controversy was started and managed with great Art and Subtilty though I know of none but what are capable of a very Orthodox Sense it is certain that they were not Arians nor intended any such thing in what they said For had Arianism been the Traditionary Faith of the Church it must have been known to be so and then how came the Church to be so strangely alarm'd at the first news of it Or what shall we think of those Venerable Fathers and Confessors in that Great Council who either did not know the Faith of the Church or did so horribly prevaricate in the Condemnation of Arius when they had no other apparent Interest or Temptation to do so but a Warm and Hearty Zeal for the Truly Ancient and Apostolick Faith It is certain Arius never pretended Catholick Tradition for his Opinion but undertook to reform the Catholick Faith by the Principles of Philosophy and to reconcile it to Scripture by new-coin'd Interpretations though in this he fail'd and found the Great Athanasius an over-match for him It is not with Faith as it is with Arts and Sciences of Human Invention which may be improved in every Age by greater Wits or new Observations but Faith depends upon Revelation not Invention and we can no more make a New Catholick Faith by the power of Wit and Reason than we can write a True History of what the Apostles did and taught out of our own Invention without the Authority of any Ancient Records Men may do such things if they please but one will be Heresy and the other a Romance And yet this is the bold and brave Attempt of Secinus and his Disciples They are so modest indeed as not to pretend Antiquity to be on their side they can find no other Antiquity for themselves but in Cerinthus and Ebion who separated from the Catholick Church and were rejected by them and it does not seem very modest to set up such men as these against the Universal Consent of the first and purest Ages of the Church The Socinians who know very well what the Charge of Novelty signifies in matters of Religion That a New Faith is but another Name for New Heresies Though they reject the Doctrine of the Fathers and the Catholick Tradition of the Faith from the Apostolick Age yet they appeal to Scripture and Natural Sentiments as the greatest and best Antiquity in opposition to Apostolick Tradition This is our Considerer's way which he prefers before a Traditionary Faith and by the same reason the Socinians may oppose it to a Traditionary Faith And if we must always expound Scripture by our Natural Sentiments this Author had best consider whether he can prove a Trinity by Natural Reason or fairly reconcile the Natural Notion of One God with the Catholick Faith of the Trinity or of Three each of whom is True and Pâ—rfect God from the mere Principles of Natural Reason for if he can't he must not in his way find a Trinity in Scripture But of this more hereafter 3. Let us now in opposition to this pretence consider of what Authority the Traditionary Faith of the Catholick Church ought to be in expounding Scripture The Holy Scripture at least in pretence is allowed on all hands to be a Compleat and Authentick Rule of Faith but the question is since men differ so much in expounding Scripture What is the safest Rule to expound Scripture by whether the Traditionary Faith of the Church or our Natural Sentiments or Natural Reason I do not mean that we must learn the Critical Sense of every Text from Catholick Tradition for we have not in all points such a Traditionary Exposition of Scripture though even in this respect we shall find that the Catholick Fathers have unanimously agreed in the Interpretation of the most material Texts relating to the Doctrine of the Holy Trinity and the Divinity and Incarnation of Christ. They sometimes indeed alledge such Texts especially out of the Old Testament as our Modern Criticks will not allow to be proper and apposite but even this shews what their Faith was and yet these very Expositions which have been so anciently and unanimously received though they may appear at this distance of time too forc'd and mystical have too Sacred and Venerable an Authority to be wantonly rejected We may learn from Christ and his Apostles what mysterious and hidden Senses were contain'd in the Writings of the Old Testament such as it is very probable we should never have found in them had not Christ and his Apostles explained their meaning And the nearer any Writers were to the Apostolick Age the more they were addicted to these Mystical Interpretations which is a good reason to believe that they learnt it from the Apostles themselves But this is not what I now intend my present Argument reaches no farther than this That if we can learn what the Doctrine of the Catholick Church concerning the Holy Trinity and the Divinity and Incarnation of Christ has always been Then 1. It is very reasonable to conclude That they
found a Trinity but it is not a Trinity in the Unity of the Divine Nature but a Trinity of extrinsecal accessory Ideas But since he has used some Art in palliating this Heresy it will be necessary to take off the Disguise The first step he makes to it is by seeming to own That there may be some greater Mystery and Obscurity in the Doctrine of the Trinity than that Account which he has given of it But if this Account says he of the Trinity be too easy and falls far short of those high expressions of distinction found in Scripture as I think it does and no other grounded upon any Notions our Souls have framed of Vnity and Distinction can be true or consistent as I have before particularly proved then it necessarily follows That God must be One and Three in some way or manner not conceivable by human Vnderstanding Here he thinks he has found a safe Retreat He asserts and proves as he would have us believe from all the Notions of Distinction and Unity which our minds can frame That God is and can be One in no other Notion than of One single Person in the first and proper sense of a Person for an Intelligent Person and that God neither is nor can be Three in the sense of Three Proper Distinct Persons If you charge him with Sabellianism for this then he retreats to an obscure confused knowledge to such a way and manner of God's being One and Three as is not conceivable by human Understanding Well But will he allow us with this obscure and confused knowledge to believe the Holy Trinity to be Three Divine Proper Distinct Persons and One God in a way and manner unconceivable by Human Vnderstanding By no means This he has proved by all the Notions of Unity and Distinction cannot be true or consistent nor is it possible for us to believe what we do not understand the terms of or what contradicts our former knowledge and we are not bound to believe what is not possible to be believed nor can God in Justice or Goodness require such a Faith of us as we have already heard So that Sabellianism we may believe and must not believe any thing contrary to it and then we may believe that there is something more in it than we understand if we please And therefore we may observe That he is not concerned about any difficulties in the Notion of the Divine Unity which all Catholick Writers have been most concerned for how to reconcile the Unity of God with a Trinity of Divine Persons but that which troubles him most is the Distinction which the Catholick Fathers never disputed about but positively asserted in the most proper and real sense against the Sabellian Hereticks But he seems sensible as well he may be that the Sabellian Notion of Persons falls very short of those high Expressions of Distinction which are found in Scripture And here it is that he allows of an obscure and confused Knowledge When he has rejected a True Personal distinction all other kinds of distinction he can think of will not answer those high expressions of distinction found in Scripture and therefore provided you do not believe them distinct Persons you may believe if you please that there is some other unknown and unconceivable distinction between them This is plainly what he means by his obscure confused Knowledge by his general confused Faith by his general confused Notion of the Trinity and therefore he religiously keeps to that form of words That One and the same God is Three which must be understood in his Notion of One and the same God that is One single Person for all his Notions of Vnity and Distinction are on purpose designed to prove That One God can't be Three in a true and proper Notion of a Person and therefore he never so much as names that question How Three Divine Persons are One God Which can never be reconciled to a Sabellian Unity of a Single Person SECT VI. What it is the Scripture requires us to believe concerning the Trinity THE Considerer having laid the Foundations of Sabellianism in his Natural Sentiments proceeds to examine what the Doctrine of the Scripture is concerning this matter and to reconcile the Scripture to his Natural Sentiments though the more reasonable and safer way had been first to have learnt the Faith from Scripture and then to have corrected the Mistakes of his Natural Sentiments by Scripture I do not intend to enter into a long dispute with him here but shall only let the Reader see what it is he would prove and what he asserts for his whole business in short is to prove That the Sabellian Notion of the Unity of God or of One single Person and of Three Names Titles Characters extrinsecal Respects and Relations is the True Scriture Doctrine of the Trinity This he very freely tells us That the Sum of all that the Scriptures plainly and expresly teach concerning a Trinity is this That there is but One only God and what he means by One only God we have often heard the Author and Maker of all things But that One God ought to be acknowledge and adored by us under those Three different Titles or Characters of Father Son and Holy Ghost Which Words are very remarkable He does not say That this One God is to be acknowledged and adored in Three who have the same One Divinity subsisting whole and perfect and distinctly in each of them which is the Catholick Faith But this One God is to be acknowledged and adored by us under these Three different Titles and Characters of Father Son and Holy Ghost So that Father Son and Holy Ghost are not the One God for neither of them is God but they are only the different Titles and Characters of the One God And though God when represented by different Characters is God still under each Character yet neither of the Characters is God no more than the Titles and Characters of a Man is the Man Now one might have expected that the Considerer should have proved That the Scripture-Notion of One God is That there is but One single Divine Person in the true and proper Notion of the word Person who is God and that these Names of Father Son and Holy Ghost do not in Scripture signify Three Distinct Real Persons but are only Three Different Titles and Characters of the same One Divine Person This indeed had effectually proved what he pretends to but he was too wise to attempt either The first he says nothing at all of but takes it for granted that he has demonstrated That by his Natural Notions of Unity and Distinction but had he not first demonstrated that nothing could be true and consistent and that God can require us to believe nothing which contradicts his Natural Notions he should have a little enquired what the Notion of Scripture is about this matter But taking it for granted that he
Father Son and Holy Ghost are but Three Names of that One single Person who is God But as he proceeds if we allow that these terms Father Son and Holy Ghost are all applied to God in Scripture 't is not thought sufficient to say That these are Three several Names which signify God but we are further required to believe That God is One and Three the same God not the same single Person but Three different Hypostases or Persons and that one of these Three Hypostases or Persons is both God and Man These are the Hard Sayings which puzzle some mens understandings This is the Faith of the Catholick Church and will always be Hard Sayings to Sabellian Understandings which they will never be able to reconcile with their Hypothesis of One single Person in the Godhead But let us hear how he clears himself of these difficulties He observes in the first place That these Names Father Son and Holy Ghost are applied to God in Scripture in a different way from what any of his other Names are So far he is in the right but what is this different way In short it is this That the other Names of God signify only partial Conceptions of the Divine Nature such as Self-existence Power c. and are all contained within the same Idea of God and therefore cannot be the foundation of any distinction in the Godhead Let this pass But each of these Names Father Son and Holy Ghost includes the whole Idea we have of God and something more as being extrinsecal and accessory to the Divine Nature and the whole Idea of God full and compleat before the application of these terms Let us examine this first He says Each of these Names includes the whole Idea of God I beseech you how can that be when they signify something extrinsecal and accessory to the Divine Nature and the whole Idea of God may be conceived full and compleat without them For if these Names are not included in the Idea of God which is full and compleat without them which Assertion by the way overthrows the whole Christian Faith of the Trinity how can they include the Idea of God in them which they are not so much as any part of much less the whole and something more I grant the Names of Father Son and Holy Ghost may connote the Idea of God as the Name of a King and a Father connote the Idea of a Man who is King and Father which I suppose is all he intends by it but then the King must be a Man and the Father must be a Man to connote the Idea of Man And thus in the Blessed Trinity if these Names Father Son and Holy Ghost connote the Idea of God the Father must be True and Perfect God and the Son must be True and Perfect God and the Holy Ghost must be True and Perfect God for neither Father Son or Holy Ghost connote the Idea of God upon any other account than as the Whole and Perfect Divine Nature subsists in each of them and that makes the whole Idea of God belong to each of them To proceed He tells us That though all these Names are separately and together affirmed of God yet each of them in so peculiar a manner that there are several occasions where when one of these terms is used with relation to God 't would be improper to use either of the other That is when it is proper to call God Father it is improper to call him Son or Holy Ghost and so on the contrary But the reason of this in his Hypothesis is not that their Persons are distinct and incommunicable but that there are several occasions which make such change of Names improper As a Man who is a King a Husband and a Father all these Names do separately and together belong to him but you must have a care of speaking improperly by applying these Names to improper Relations Well however From hence he says it follows that these Three Names of God Father Son and Holy Ghost must denote a Threefold difference of distinction belonging to God I grant it makes a distinction of Names and external Offices and Relations in God but no distinction of Hypostases and Persons which was the distinction to be shewn but this he absolutely rejects for it must be no other difference or distinction but such as is consistent with the Vnity and Simplicity of the Divine Nature This we would all subscribe to did he mean honestly but his Vnity and Simplicity of the Divine Nature is nothing else but the Unity and Simplicity of One single Person and all the distinction he will allow these different Names to make is no more than what One single Person is capable of For each of these Names includes the whole Idea we have of God and something more Very right if we allow these Names Father Son and Holy Ghost to be the Names of true and proper Divine Persons for then each of them is true and perfect God and the whole Idea of God is included in each of them because the whole Divine Nature is in each of them otherwise neither of these Names include the Idea of God but only connote it as I have already observed And what he adds That as far as these Names express the Nature of God they all adequately and exactly signify the same is very true also if by the same he means the same Nature not the same One single Person And then what he adds 'T is the additional signification which makes all the distinction between them is very true also but he ought to have told us what this additional signification this something more than the whole Idea of God is which is included in these Names Father Son and Holy Ghost and then we might have known what this distinction is All the additional signification that I know of is this That Father signifies God includes the whole Idea of God but besides this Father when it signifies God signifies a Self-originated Unbegotten God who is God of himself and begets a Son of his own Nature and Coeternal with himself Son signifies God but begotten God God of God the living and perfect Image of his Father Holy Ghost signifies God but God proceeding eternally from Father and Son in the Unity and Perfection of the same Divine Nature And this is all the difference between them not a difference of Nature but a distinction of True Real Proper Persons The Considerer seems to allow this That Person is a proper Name for this distinction For Father Son and Holy Ghost have plainly a Personal significatiâ—n each of them without any figure of speech being determined to signify some Intelligent Being acting in such a manner as is there related These Words would betray an Unwary Reader to believe the Considerer as Orthodox as the Nicene Fathers and that he did acknowledge Father Son and Holy Ghost to be Three Persons without a Figure as a
as he represents it but the Personal Union of the Divine Nature of Christ to Human Nature He was not only as conscious of all the Divine Perfections in himself as a man is conscious of his own thoughts which yet by the way is absolutely impossible without being True and Perfect God in his own Person but he knew himself to be God the Eternal Son of God not the same Person with his Father but One with him Were a man thus regularly and constantly Inspired he would know that he was thus Inspired and he would also know that these Divine Perfections are not in himself not seated in his own Human Person nor under the Conduct of his own Will as his own Natural Powers are and therefore must know himself to be a mere Man still not God-Man So that this constant and regular Inspiration this uninterrupted Presence and Concurrence of the Deity which is all he allows in this matter cannot make any Person God-Man This Inspiration is not a subsisting Person is not the Person of the Son of God is not Incarnate by its Union to Man no more than it is Incarnate in other Prophets The Man is the Person and therefore a mere Creature still tho never so Divinely Inspired This is such an Incarnation as Socinians themselves own in as high expressions as the Considerer can invent Cerinthus owned something more That Christ who descended on Iesus at his Baptism was a Divine Person not a mere Inspiration and rested on him and was most intimately united to him till his Crucifixion That Sect of the Noetians and Sabellians who were called Patripassians for they do not seem by the accounts we have of them to have been all of that mind did acknowledge the Incarnation of God in a true and proper sense as the Catholick Church did the Incarnation of Christ But then their Trinity being but One proper single Divine Person distinguished by Three Names or Personal Characters which is the express Doctrine of the Considerer their whole Trinity was Incarnate suffered and died in the Incarnation and Sufferings of Christ the Father as well as the Son as it must of necessity be if there be but One Divine Person who is Father Son and Holy Ghost and if this One Person is in a true and proper sense Incarnate But this the Catholick Church abhorred and condemned under the name of the Patripassian Heresy Others of them were Sabellians in the Doctrine of the Trinity but Photinians or Samosatenians that is Socinians as to the Doctrine of the Incarnation as Athanasius often intimates And if I understand him this is the Considerer's way who believes a Trinity in One single Person and an Inspired Man for a God Incarnate And thus we have lost the Trinity and Incarnation and must part with every thing which is peculiar and essential to Christianity with them And now one would wonder after all this what he has to say more about the Faith of the Trinity and Incarnation and yet this is his next Enquiry What the Scriptures necessarily oblige us to believe in this Point that is concerning the Trinity and Incarnation Though he has been careful all along never to use this term Incarnation as being sensible that all he said about God-Man would not reach the Catholick Notion of Incarnation When I met with this Enquiry I was in hope that there was something behind to unsay all that he had hitherto said for if what he has already said be true it is certain the Scripture requires us to believe nothing about them But upon Examination I found that the Question was fallaciously stated and the true meaning of it was What the Scriptures oblige us to believe instead of what has hitherto passed for the true Catholick Faith of the Trinity and Incarnation I shall not dispute this Point with him now to shew what he means will be Confutation enough We must not he says look upon the Doctrine of the Trinity as a nice abstracted Speculation designed for the exercise of our Vnderstandings but as a plainer Revelation of God's Love and Good Will towards men and a greater Motive and Incitement to Piety than ever we had before this Doctrine was delivered This we grant That the Christian Faith is not designed merely for Speculation but for Practice but yet all the Doctrines of Faith are matters of Speculation and the Doctrine it self must be believed in order to Practice or else the Revelation of it is of no use at all The Question then is Whether we must not believe the Doctrines of the Trinity and Incarnation Or how much we must believe of them Must we not believe That God has in a true and proper sense an Eternal and Only-begotten Son begotten from Eternity of his own Substance his True Perfect Living Subsisting Image Must we not believe That this Eternal Son of God did in a true proper Notion become Man by uniting Human Nature to his own Person and that in Human Nature he suffered and died for the Redemption of Mankind Truly No if I understand him All this is a nice abstracted Speculation and a very perplexing exercise of our Vnderstandings and we are bound to understand no more by God's giving his own Son to dye for us but his Love and Gâ—od Will to Mankind as it is a great Motive and Excitement to Piety But how can we learn God's Love and Good Will to Mankind from this Doctrine if it be not true if God have no Eternal Son and therefore did not give his Eternal Son to become Man and to suffer and dye for us The Gospel proves the great Love of God to Sinners by the Incarnation Death and Sufferings of his Son that if we do not believe this Doctrine strictly and literally true we lose the Gospel Proof of God's Love to Sinners and of the Virtue and Efficacy of Christ's Death and Sacrifice to expiate our sins and of the Power of his Intercession as the Eternal Only-begotten and Well-beloved Son of God But our Considerer will not allow this These Titles and Relations must be chiefly câ—nsidered with reference to the great Work of Man's Salvation But must they not be considered as Three distinct proper Persons in the Unity of the Godhead who have their distinct Parts and Offices in the Redemption of Mankind No but distinct Relations and Offices of One and the same single Divine Person who is the One Supreme God and is All in One Father Son and Holy Ghâ—st Saviour Mediator Comforter But how then can these Titles and Relations signify an Eternal Distinction in the Godhead an Eternal Fâ—tâ—â—r an Eternal Son and an Eâ—ernal Spirit when thâ—se Offices relating only to Man's Salvation were not Eternal This he resolves into the Eternal Purpose and Decree of God to redeem Mankind by the Death and constant Mediation of a Man chosen and enabled for this work by the Fulness of the Godhead dwelling in him And in consideration of
his Passion and Intercession to impart such Gifts Graces and Spiritual Assistances as would be sufficient to render this Redemption effectual to the saving of much people So that God decreed from Eternity upon his Foreknowledge of Man's Fall that in order to redeem Man he would take upon himself the Distinctions and Offices of Father Son and Holy Ghost Saviour Mediator and Comforter in time and this is all the Eternal Distinction in the Godhead Well But it seems God did not decree from Eternity to redeem Man by his own Son but by a Man chosen and enabled for this Work by the Fulness of the Godhead dwelling in him that is as we have already heard by an Inspired and Deified Man not by a God Incarnate It is the Man who is the Saviour and Redeemer though he be enabled to this work by the Fulness of the Godhead or a constant regular Inspiration This is downright Socinianism the Catholick Faith is That it is the Son of God who redeems us though he redeems us in Human Nature But if God redeems us by a Man however he be enabled by a Divine Power Why is he said to give his Son for us For this Divine Power is not a Person and therefore no Son nor is the Man his own and only begotten Son Now this would be a difficulty indeed were we to understand God's giving his own Son for us in a proper literal sense but this is nothing but Figure and Representation if we believe the Considerer His words are these Thus when God is pleased to represent his Love to Mankind in the highest Image of Nature that of a Father sacrificing an only-begotten Son the exact Transcript and Resemblance of himself perfectly innocent and obedient to his Will in all things we are to believe that God did thus sacrifice his Son as he assures us he did No but that by the Sufferings and Death of Christ God has given greater Proof of his Love towards us than any man is capable of doing to another and that such an action of an Earthly Parent suggests the nearest and likest Conception we can possibly frame of what our Heavenly Father hath done for us though at the same time we must acknowledge it comes infinitely short of expressing the Riches and Fulness of his Mercy and Loving kindness It does so indeed To believe that God has actually given his own Eternal and Only-begotten Son for us as the Scripture assures us he has is a much nearer and truer Conception of what God has done for us and infinitely exceeds all earthly comparisons Abraham's offering his Son Isaac at God's Command was an Image and Figure but a Typical Figure of it but it was a Type without an Antitype if Christ was not as truly and properly the Son of God as Isaac was the Son of Abraham But if we will believe the Considerer the Scripture does not oblige us to believe this if we do but believe That God is as good to us as if he had sacrificed his only Son for us we need not believe That he did sacrifice his Son I have no Patience to proceed any further if this be true there is an end of the Faith and Hope of Christians CHAP. III. A Brief Account of the Sabellian Heresy and by what Arguments the Catholick Fathers opposed it THE Considerer has given us the most Compleat and Artificial Scheme of Sabellianism that I have yet met with aâ—d has very fairly and openly confessed his Design to prove That One God must signify that there is but One who is God but One single Divine Person in the proper Notion of a Person as it signifies an Intelligent Being I have endeavoured to shew him his Mistake and what it is that has mis-led him and how hopeless an Attempt it is to reconcile his Hypothesis with the Catholick Faith of the Trinity and Incarnation This is so bold an Attempt openly to assert and defend a Heresy which has been constantly condemned by the Catholick Church since its first appearance that I am apt to hope he does not believe his Hypothesis to be Sabellianism or that Heresy which now is best known by that name though Sabellius was not the first Author of it And therefore I will shew him what Sabellianism is and how the Fathers opposed it There were Two Points in dispute between them and the Catholick Christians First Concerning the Personality of the Son and of the Holy Spirit Secondly Concerning the Unity of God Whether it were the Unity of One Person as they pretended That we may rightly understand this matter we must distinguish between the several kinds of Sabellianism because the Arguments and Answers of the Fathers are sometimes adapted to one and sometimes to another Notion of it That Father Son and Holy Ghost were but One Person was asserted by them all but explained very differently and that altered the state of the Question and required different Answers 1. As first They made Father Son and Holy Ghost to be only Three Names Appearances or Offices of the same Person as I observed before And then the state of the Question was not Whether the Son was a Person and the Holy Ghost a Person in as true and proper a sense as the Father was a Person For this they owned by making Father Son and Holy Ghost Three Names of the same Person whereas it is impossible they should be the same Person if the Son were not a Person nor the Holy Ghost a Person If the Son be the same Person with the Father the Son must be a Person for no Person can't be the same Person Which is the same Argument to prove that these Hereticks owned Christ to be a True and Real Person that Novatianus used as I observed before to prove that they owned Christ to be true and perfect God because they made him the same with the Father who is true and perfect God and a true and real and substantial Person And if he be the very same with the Father he must be the same we acknowledge the Father to be viz. a true and real Person and perfect God The Dispute then which the Catholick Fathers had with these Hereticks with respect to this Notion That Father Son and Holy Ghost were the very same Person was not Whether the Son was a Person and the Holy Ghost a Person but Whether the Son and Holy Ghost were truly and really distinct Persons from the Father as the Catholick Church always believed or Whether they were the same Person distinguished only by Three Names Now when the Fathers asserted not only the Personality of the Son and of the Holy Ghost which this Notion did not oppose but the real distinction of Persons That the Son was a Person but not the same Person with the Father they must ascribe the same kind of Personality to the Son which they do to the Father That the Son is as truly and really a Person as the
have distinct Understandings Wills and Powers of Action for no other Beings are capable of sending or being sent and Three such distinct Persons each of which is complete and perfect God is the Trinity asserted by the Catholick Fathers in contradiction to the Heresy of Sabellius But there is one very good Rule of Athanasius which is worth observing in this Controversy That we must not imagine to find the Unity of the Godhead by denying Three but we must find this Unity or Monade in Three The Sabellians took the first way to secure the Catholick Faith of One God they denied Three real distinct substantial Persons in the Godhead but the Catholick Faith owns Three real distinct substantial divine Persons and teaches that these Three are One God not with such an Unity as belongs to One Person but as Three Persons are One God which should be a warning to some late Writers who think they cannot sufficiently defend the Unity of God without opposing a real and substantial Trinity which is to oppose the ancient Catholick Faith To conclude this Chapter the result of the whole in short is this That in opposition to the Noetians who made Father Son and Holy Ghost to be only Three Names of the same One Divine Person whom we call God the Catholick Fathers asserted that they were Three distinct Persons not the same Person under Three Names or Three Appearances in opposition to those Sabellians who denied the Substantiality of the Son and of the Holy Ghost but made the Son like the Word in the mind or heart of man which had no substantial permanent Subsistence of its own and the Holy Ghost in like manner to be a transient efflux of Power from God so that God the Father was the only subsisting Person and the One God but the Son and the Holy Ghost the insubstantial transient Word and Power of God These ancient Fathers in like manner asserted the Substantiality of the Son and of the Holy Ghost that they were real distinct subsisting Persons as true and perfect Persons as the Father himself is in opposition to those Sabellians who asserted a compound Deity and made a Trinity of Parts instead of a Trinity of Persons in the Unity of the Godhead they unanimously rejected all composition in the Deity and asserted each Person distinctly by himself not to be a part of God but true and perfect God Now had these Fathers asserted nothing positively concerning the Three Divine Persons but only rejected these Noetian and Sabellian Heresies it had been evidence enough what their Faith was concerning the Ever-blessed Trinity for remove these Heresies and all such as are manifestly the same however they may differ in words and there is nothing left for any man to believe concerning a Divine Trinity but the true Catholick Faith of Three real distinct substantial Divine Persons each of which is distinctly and by himself complete entire perfect God For if Father Son and Holy Ghost are not one and the same Person distinguisht only by Three Names according to their different Appearances and Operations nor one single Person with two personal Vertues and Powers called the Son and the Spirit like the word and emotion in a man's heart which is no person and has no subsistence of its own nor three parts of one compounded Deity as a man is compounded of Body Soul and Spirit then of necessity Father Son and Holy Ghost must be Three complete substantial subsisting Persons Thrâ—â— such Persons as the Sabellians would allow but One fâ—â—â—f they â—e not the same nor affections and motions of the â—ame nor parts of the same there is nothing left but to own them Three completely and perfectly subsisting Person If God be One not in the Sabellian â—otion of Singularity as One God signifies One single Person but Oâ—e in Three without parts or composition as the Father asserted against Sabellius then each Person must be by himself complete and perfect God for God cannot be One in Three Persons unless each Person be perfect God for unless this One God be perfect God in each Person he cannot be perfectly One in Three If the Unity of God be not the Unity of a Person it must be the Unity and Sameness of Nature and the inseparable Union of Persons and this is the Unity in Trinity and Trinity in Unity which the Catholick Fathers taught and which is the only thing they could reasonably teach when they had rejected the Sabellian Unity There is no medium that I know of in this Controversy concerning the Unity of God between the Unity of One single Person and that Oneness which results from the Unity and the Consubstantiality of Nature and inseparable Union of Persons and therefore if the first be Heresy the second must be the Catholick Faith and whatever Notions men advance against this is Sabellianism in its Principle and last result for if the Unity of God be not the Union of Three complete Divine Persons each of which is distinctly by himself perfect God it must be the Unity of One Divine Person which is the Sabellian Unity CHAP. IV. Concerning the Homoousion or One Substance of Father Son and Holy Ghost IN the last Chapter I have plainly shewn what Sabellianism is and by what Arguments the Catholick Fathers opposed and confuted it which is proof enough what they meant by Person when in opposition to Sabellius they taught that there were Three Persons in the Unity of the Godhead not Three personal Characters and Relations which Sabellius owned but Three true and proper Persons each of whom is by himself true and perfect God But yet the Nicene Faith of the Homocusion or One Substance of Father and Son is so expounded by some as to countenance the Sabellian Heresy which all the Nicene Fathers condemned though one would think that should be an unanswerable Objection against it this has made it so absolutely necessary to the Vindication of the Catholick Faith and to compose some warm Disputes rightly to understand this matter that I shall carefully inquire what the Nicene Fathers meant by these terms of the Homoousion and One Substance which they have put into their Creed as the most express opposition to the Arian Heresy And we cannot long doubt of this if we consider the true state of the Arian Controversy There was no Dispute between the Arians and Catholicks concerning the Personality of the Son they both condemned Sabellius and therefore One Substance when opposed to the Arians can't signify a Sabellian Unity The Arians and Sabellians both agreed in this That One God is but One Divine Person who is truly and properly God and that to assert Three Persons each of which is true and perfect God is to make Three Gods The Sabellians to avoid this Tritheism make Father Son and Holy Ghost but One Divine Person and in that sense but One God The Arians on the other hand allow Father and Son to be two real distinct
and this I readily grant and he might if he had pleased have transcribed half St. Hilary de Trinitate de Synodis to the same purpose And this is so universally the Doctrine of all the Greek and Latin Fathers that there was no difficulty in multiplying Authorities to this purpose And I dare appeal to any man who is competently skill'd in these Matters and will impartially examine the Testimonies Petavius has produced for the Singularity of the Divine Essence Whether the most pertinent of them all prove any more than this That the Nature of the Father without the least alteration or diversity is communicated whole and perfect without any division or separation of Substance to the Son of which more presently not that the same singular Nature and Substance which is the Person of the Father is also the Person of the Son which makes the Father and Son to be but One Person as well as One Nature and Substance but so One that the One Nature Substance and Divinity which is the Father is wholly and perfectly the same in the Son excepting this That one is the Father and the other the Son Which is not the Unity of Singularity which is properly the Unity of a Person but the Unity of Identity and Sameness which is the Unity of One Individual Nature which is common to more than one I don't intend to transcribe all the Quotations of Petavius which he has alledged to this purpose but yet I will give such a general View of them as may satisfy any impartial Reader as to this Point not to confute Petavius who as I have already observed rejects the Sabellian Singularity but to undeceive those who mistake Petavius and the Schools too as will appear more hereafter I shall only premise That it had become the Learning and Acuteness of Petavius to have reconciled the Fathers with themselves for they were Wise Men and true Reasoners and knew very well what a Contradiction meant and therefore we ought not easily to believe that they perpetually contradicted themselves He acknowledges and proves That the Catholick Fathers did teach a Specifick Unity of the Divine Nature That Father Son and Holy Ghost have One Divinity as Peter Iames and Iohn have one Human Nature and he alledges the Authorities of the same Fathers to prove the Singularity of the Divine Nature That it is an exact perfect indivisible Monad And this also they do plainly teach But then he should have considered how to have reconciled these two for it is certain that if the Divine Nature be an indivisible Monad it can't be a Species in the common Notion of a Species and if it have any thing anolagous to a Species it can't be a singular Monad because it must be a common Nature which subsists in more than one and Singularity is properly the Unity of a Person not of a common Nature Petavius was very sensible how inconsistent these two kinds of Unity are and yet that the Fathers did most commonly explain the Unity of the Divine Nature by a Specifick Unity and did more cautiously mention the Unity of Singularity he might have said did absolutely reject it as St. Hilary does in a hundred places And was not this a much better reason so to qualify the Notions of a Specifick Unity and Singularity of Nature as to reconcile them to each other than to make the Fathers contradict themselves which destroys three parts of their Reasoning about the Unity of the Godhead and very much weakens the Authoity of all the rest The Apology which Petavius makes for the Fathers will by no means salve this matter He tells us That if we speak of God according to the exact Rules of Philosophy the Three Divine Persons are not so of One Substance or Homoousion as Peter Paul and Iohn and so far he is in the Right as I have already shewn But then what he adds is a very heavy Charge upon the Catholick Fathers That they taught this almost in every Dispute they had with the Arians Now if this be true what Apology can be made for them for it seems they confuted the Arians upon false and dangerous Principles and were either ignorant themselves of the true Catholick Faith or did prevaricate in it But let us hear what Excuse he makes for them He says They are not to be blamed for this nor accused of Ignorance as if they understood nothing of the Numerical Unity of the Divine Essence and owned no other Unity but what is like the Unity of Human Nature for they did know the first but very prudently used the Specifick Unity as an Example whereby to represent the Divine Unity But if there be nothing in the Divine Nature which is analogous to this Specifick Unity and may be truly and properly represented by it as the best Image we have in Nature I cannot understand either the Prudence or Honesty of this Yes he says they were to take Care so to oppose Arianism as to avoid Sabellianism which otherwise they might easily slip into And therefore so tempered their Style as to speak more sparingly of that highest Unity and Conjunction which Gregory Nyssen calls a Perfect Monad lest they should seem to favour a Sabellian Solitude and Singularity but did more freely use the Examples of a Specifick Unity which was sufficient to confute the Arians who asserted the Diversity and Dissimilitude of Nature between Father and Son which cannot be between those of the same Kind and Species and yet at the same time shewed how far they were from Sabellianism That this is a very false account of the matter appears from the former Sections of this Chapter and will appear more fully from what is to follow but if it were true it would be a very scandalous account for the sum of it is this That to oppose Sabellianism and Arianism the ancient Fathers advanced a false Notion of the Divine Unity and dissembled the true one Which is no great commendation of the Catholick Faith that it needs such Arts nor of the Catholick Fathers to use them when both these sorts of Hereticks as I have often observed charged the Catholick Faith with Tritheism and made that the very Reason of their Heresies Can any man think it prudent in these Fathers to conceal or very cautiously mention the true Notion of the Divine Unity and to insist on a Specifick Unity which if we believe Petavius is no better than Tritheism which would rather have confirmed them in their Heresies than have confuted them These two Heresies being in two extreams the Catholick Faith must be in the middle and the only true Medium between them is a real distinction of Persons without the least diversity of Nature and this is what they meant both by their Monad and Specifick Unity the perfect Sameness and Identity of Essence actually indivisibly inseparably subsisting in Three a thrice subsisting Monad or Individual Essence or Substance but not
God and Creatures so there can be no words in the same sense common to them but then this only requires an accommodation of words to Divine Mysteries by way of analogy and resemblance but not to change the Language and Philosophy of Created Nature which after all our Attempts and all our Art of Expression will fall infinitely short of the Divine Nature and give us but a very imperfect Image of it And if by such Attempts we confound our Notions and Ideas of Nature too we shall so much the more confound and perplex our Ideas of God It may help to ease mens Minds of some Notions which lie cross and uneven Briefly to state this matter I confess I am not satisfied of that absolute necessity which some pretend of stating nicely and Philosophically this distinction between Nature and Person in order to understand the Doctrine of the Trinity This was the Catholick Faith long before this Distinction was universally received and Men who understand little of this Distinction may believe very orthodoxly in Father Son and Holy Ghost without it Nay the best the safest and easiest way to understand these and all other Philosophical Terms applied to the Explication of this Faith is to fit them to those Scripture Ideas we have of Father Son and Holy Ghost each of them True and Perfect God and all Three but One God as I have shewn at large in the First Chapter But since there is a very warm Dispute about Nature and â—erson and has been for many Ages and this Distinction is become necessary to secure the Catholick Faith against the Attempts of Hereticks on both sides as the Church has found by long Experience it will be necessary to set this matter in as clear a light as possible we can And the best way I can think of to do this is 1. To consider this distinction of Nature and Person in Creatures As for instance in a Man What the distinction between Nature and Person is in Man and to shew which way soever we state this matter how improper all these Notions are to represent this distinction between Nature and Person in the Blessed Trinity And 2. To shew how the Catholick Fathers accommodated these Names of Essence and Person to the Explication of this Mystery and what Unity and what Distinction they intended to represent by them 1. As for the first If the Infinite distance between God and Creatures will allow us to Philosophize freely about Created Nature without incurring the Suspicion of Heresy I must confess I never could form a distinct notion of the difference between a subsisting Nature and Hypostasis or Person in Man but do what I can I can conceive no otherwise of an Individual Subsisting Human Nature but as of an Individual Subsisting Human Hypostasis or Person nor of an Individual Human Person than as of an Individual Subsisting Human Nature And I have some reason to think that this is not peculiarly my Case for besides that I find other thinking Men blundered in this matter and could never yet meet with a clear and sensible Explication of it I observe that there is no word which in its original institution signifies this difference and it is reasonable to think as to Created Nature that Mankind have no notion of that which they have no word for It is sufficiently known that Hypostasis originally signifies Essence and Substance not Person as distinguisht from Nature which is a later and a mere Ecclesiastical use of it and it is confessed that Persona and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 were taken from the Stage and when they were applied to signify a true and real Man they signified only the Man himself not the Personality of a Man as distinguished from an Individual Subsisting Nature And which is much more considerable some of the Fathers as I observed before confess that Aristotle knew no such distinction but in his Philosophy Essence and Hypostasis signified the same thing for Nature and Essence which is his first Substance is an Individuum which subsists not as part of another but as whole and compleat which the Fathers call Hypostasis and therefore Aristotle's first Substance and what these Fathers call Hypostasis is in Creatures one and the same thing and yet all confess That no man ever more nicely distinguisht all the distinguishable Notions in Nature than Aristotle did that what escaped his observation must be very nice indeed And though St. Basil and St. Gregory Nyssen and the other Catholick Writers of that Age do distinguish between Essence and Hypostasis that they differ as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 what is common to all the Individuals of the same kind which is a common Nature and what is proper and peculiar to each Individual and distinguishes one man from another yet I do not remember that they quarrelled with the Greek Philosophers or apprehended that they themselves taught any new Philosophy in this Point as afterwards Theorianus and others did nor can I see any other difference there is between them if candidly interpreted but only in words The short account of the matter is this Aristotle's first Substance which subsists by it self these Fathers as they themselves own call Hypostasis not Nature Essence and Substance that is every subsisting Individuum is Aristotle's Nature Essence and Substance the Fathers Hypostasis now when they mean the same thing and own that they do so so far they are agreed in the thing and differ only in words But then these Fathers in every Hypostasis distinguished between the common Nature and such Personal Properties which distinguished common Nature into Individuals or were Characteristical Marks whereby to know one Person from another Now Aristotle indeed never made such a distinction as this but yet all that is material in it is included in his Notion and Definition of Substance For when these Fathers distinguish in every Hypostasis what is common to the whole Kind and what is proper and peculiar to each Individuum they mean no more by it but that Peter for instance considered as a Man is perfectly the same that Iames and Iohn are considered also as Men though there is something so peculiar to Peter as to make him a particular Human Person and to distinguish him from Iames and Iohn and all other Men in the World Now it is certain neither Aristotle nor any Man of sense would ever have denied any thing of all this for it is evident that there is something wherein all Men agree and something proper to every particular Man That which is the same in all Men the Fathers call a common Nature and so does Aristotle a common Specifick Nature but here is some appearance of difference between them which I think if rightly stated is none at all Aristotle makes Nature as actually subsisting by it self as suppose Human Nature in Peter or Iames to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Individuum a particular Singular
and thus a Man begets a Man in his own Nature and Likeness and the Son which is begotten is upon all accounts as much a Man as he who begets and Father and Son are two Men And to beget and to be begotten tho they prove their Persons to be distinct yet are but External Relations not different manners of subsistence in the same Nature And thus God does not beget a Son which would be to beget a Second God For to beget and to be begotten when he who begets begets in an absolute sense all the same that he is himself makes two of the same kind And therefore we must observe That 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is the Personal Character and Property of the Father does not only signify that he has no cause of his Being and Nature but that what he is he is absolutely in himself has an Absolute not a Relative Nature and Subsistence and so consequently the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is the Personal Property of the Son signifies that his Being and Nature is Relative not only that he receives his Being and Nature from his Father but that he so receives it as to be a Relative Subsistence in his Father's Nature and the like may be said of the Procession of the Holy Ghost As to shew this more particularly God begets a Son his own perfect Image and Likeness but he does not beget his own Absolute Nature in his Son as Man does though he begets his Son of his own Nature and Substance as for instance God is Perfect Absolute Original Mind not only as Original is opposed to what has a Cause and a Beginning but as opposed to an Image but God does not beget an Absolute Original Mind in his Son but only his own Eternal Essential Word which is the Perfect Living Image of Eternal Self-originated Mind and is it self Eternal Infinite Mind in the Eternal Word but is in its own proper Character the Eternal Word of the Eternal Mind not originally an Eternal Mind it self It has all the Perfections of an Eternal Mind as a Perfect Word must of necessity have which is the perfect Sameness and Identity of Nature but it has all these Perfections not as Original Mind but as a Begotten Word which is a different Mode of Subsistence and a sensible distinction between the Eternal Mind and its Word in the perfect Identity of Nature This I take to be a True and Intelligible Account of these different manners of Subsistence which distinguish the Divine Persons in the perfect Unity of Nature that they have all the same Nature and same Perfections but after a different manner which can never be understood in Absolute Natures and Persons for three Men though Father Son and Grandson have all of them Human Nature after the very same manner but in an Absolute Nature and Relative Essential Processions this is to be understood and proves a real distinction and perfect Unity It is evident to all Men that the Mind and its Word are Two and it is as evident that Life Wisdom Knowledge are in Absolute Original Mind after another manner than they are in its Word and yet the very Notion of a Mind and its Word and that Essential Relation that is between them makes it a contradiction to say that any other Life Wisdom Knowledge can be in the Word than what is in the Mind which would be to say That the Word is not the Word of the Mind if it have any thing that is not in the Mind For a Natural Word can have nothing but what is in the Mind and is no farther a Word than it is the Natural Image of the Mind And the like may be said concerning the Holy Spirit which hath all the same Divine Perfections but in a different manner from Original Mind and its Word as eternally proceeding from both This is the Account which the Catholick Fathers give of the Unity of Nature and Distinction of Persons in the Ever Blessed Trinity which answers the Objections of our Sabellian Arian and Socinian Adversaries and vindicates those Catholick Forms of Speech which they charge with Tritheism Contradiction and Nonsense As to shew this briefly in one view for each part of it has been sufficiently confirmed already The Catholick Faith teaches us That there is but One God and this is demonstrable from the Doctrine of these Fathers For in this Account I have now given there is but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 One Absolute Divinity One Divine Nature and therefore but One God But say our Adversaries One God in Natural Religion and according to the general Sense of Mankind signifies One Person who is God And this also in some sense has always been owned by the Catholick Church That as there is but One Absolute Divinity so the Person of the Father who is this One Absolute Divinity is this One God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 there is but One Person who is God in this Absolute Sense because there is but One Father who as they often speak is the Fountain of the Deity that is of the Divine Processions of the Son and Holy Spirit He is the Whole Absolute Divinity himself and whatever is Divine Eternally and Essentially proceeds from him in the Unity of his own Nature But at this rate what Divinity do we leave for the Son and the Holy Spirit Truly the very same by Eternal Generation and Procession which is originally and absolutely in the Father For it is the Nature of the Father and the Divinity of the Father which is in the Son and Holy Spirit as the Fathers constantly own and as of necessity it must be because there is no other This Eternal Generation and Procession has always been owned as an ineffable Mystery which we must believe upon the Authority of the Scriptures without pretending to know how God begets an Eternal Son or how the Eternal Spirit proceeds from Father and Son which we confess we have no Notion of but we know likewise That this is no reason to reject this Faith no more than it is a reason to reject the belief of an Eternal Self-originated Being because though it be demonstrable That there must be an Eternal First Cause of all things which has no Cause of its own Being but an Eternal necessary Nature yet we can no more conceive this than we can an Eternal Generation and Procession Supposing therefore without disputing that matter at present that God has an Eternal Son that Eternal Self-originated Mind has an Eternal Subsisting Word and an Eternal Spirit it is evident that this Eternal Word and Eternal Spirit must have all the same Perfections of the Eternal Mind must be all that the Eternal Mind is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 excepting its being an Absolute Self-originated Mind Now if he be God who has the whole Divine Nature and Perfections then the Son is God and the Holy Ghost is God who by Eternal Generation and Procession have that same