no Christians and that Quakerism is no Christianity However retaining still the Words wherein the Christian Faith is exprest though in an equivocal Sense and having some among them as George Keith and others who still believ'd the Gospel in the proper Sense they made a shift to be reputed generally Christians And indeed this Conduct of theirs deceived even many of their own Party which is manifest in William Rogers of Bristol Francis Bugg Thomas Crispe John Pennyman and especially in George Keith who having been a Quaker about 30 Years yet did not till within these three or four Years discover the Infidelity of the Primitive and true Quakers who are deservedly call'd Foxonians because holding the Principles of George Fox their Author But G. Keith living in Pensylvania where the Quakers were Governours and might be free to open their Minds plainly did then perceive they did not believe the Doctrine of the Apostles Creed the summary of Christian Faith which made him preach it and contend for it more earnestly This provok'd the Foxonians so far that it came to a Breach and Separation and at length to Impeachment Fines and Imprisonment Then G. Keich returns to London where the matters in Contest between him and the Foxonians of Pensylvania was taken into Consideration and had divers Hearings by the general Annual Meeting of Quakers 1694 who gave a kind of a Judgment in the Case but no clearer Determination of the principal Matter concerning Christ within and Christ without and the other Articles of Christian Faith than their former equivocal Expressions The next Year 1695 at the like General Meeting they absolutely excommunicate G. Keith and make this the Ground of it viz. that he had not given due observance to their former Order and was troublesome to them in his Declarations c. For he had still continued to preach frequently Christianity as before See a late Book titled Gross Error and Hypocrisy detected c. The Reader I hope will excuse it that I have detain'd him in this long Story because it was necessary for me first to prove the Quakers are Deists and then to proceed and shew Secondly That the Obscurity Ambiguity and Numerousness of Systematical Fundamentals is that which is the chief Cause of their being so For not being able to satisfy themselves in understanding and determining the Truth and Certainty of those Fundamentals for the proof of which Scriptures were alledg'd but those of so doubtful a sense and variously interpreted by opposite Parties that they readily embrac'd George Fox's only Fundamental of the Light in every Man that is in reality the natural Light whereby we distinguish between Good and Evil in ordinary whence it is that as saith the Apostle Paul We as the Gentiles are a Law to our selves and our Thoughts accuse or excuse Rom. 2. 14 15. Which is in Truth an excellent Doctrine and has great certainty and clearness in it But G. Fox preaches this not as a natural Principle but 1. As a supernatural Revelation And 2. Christ being call'd in Scripture the Light that lighteth every Man and the Light of the World because be brought the Light of the Gospel into the World George Fox applies these Terms and Phrases and almost every thing that is spoken of Christ to the Light in every Man and so turns the plain sense of the Gospel into a Parabolical or Mystical Sense and makes the Christian Scripture to speak nothing but Deism 3. G. Fox adds certain Observances of giving no respect in Word or Gesture or Title nor speaking as others speak nor saluting as others salute nor paying Tithes nor using the Sword nor swearing in common Form c. and all as inspired Dictates that so the only People of God might be separated from all the World and they serve admirably for that purpose Now if you consider the experimented certainty of their Principle the Light within that accuses and excuses and their Perswasion that it was a Divine Inspiration which also was confirm'd to them by their giving obedience to those Ceremonies which were so contrary and offensive to the World and expos'd them to much Suffering All suffering for Religion especially for a clear Revelation from God confirming the Sufferers in their Perswasion You may clearly perceive it was the Uncertainty Obscurity and Intricacy of their former Principles which induced them to embrace G. Fox's Religion which is all dictated by the Spirit of God in every Man Whence it is they upbraid other Professors with Doubtfulness and Fallibility and every one of them counts himself as infallible as the Papists do the Pope How can ye but delude People says G. Fox that are not infallible Myst p. 33. Lastly The Obscurity Uncertainty and Multiplicity of Fundamentals is that which has given an Argument to Popish Priests and Jesuits wherewith to seduce Protestants to Popery For evidence of this I shall mind you of a Paper written by a Jesuit in the late King James's time titled An Address presented to the Reverend and Learned Ministers of the Church of England c. The purport of which is That all things necessary to Salvation are not clearly contained in Scripture as Protestants hold because the Belief of a Trinity one God and three Persons is necessary to Salvation but not clearly contain'd in Scripture Then he goes about to shew that the Scriptures commonly alledged for the Trinity admit of another sense He goes the same way in the Article of the Incarnation Thus supposing these Articles to be necessary to Salvation as Protestants hold and not clearly contain'd in Scripture it follows that the undoubted Certainty of them must be found in the Determinations of the Church and then that Church which professes Infallibility is the only Refuge and I believe as the Church believes supplies all other Articles No Certainty any where else but Certainty must be had in these Points Here the making of those Articles Fundamental which cannot be clearly prov'd from Scripture subverts the Sufficiency and Clearness of Scripture and sends poor Protestants to Rome for the Certainty and Infallibility of the Christian Faith They did so glory in the strength of this Argument that the Jesuit-Preacher in Limestreet read their Paper and made the same Challenge in his Pulpit where he had a great number of Protestants that went out of Curiosity to hear him Having thus as I presume vindicated our Author and shewn the Mischiefs of Mr. Edw's Fundamentals I may now take my leave of my Reader Only I am first willing to let Mr. Edw. know that I have not undertaken this Defence out of any ambitious Humour of contending with so Learned a Man as he is nor would I have made opposition to him in any other Point of Learning or Divinity but Fundamentals every Man is concern'd in and ought to know and to be assured that he holds them all Eternal Salvation is a greater thing by far than any Empire and will therefore justify and exact our utmost Care and Endeavour for the obtaining it So that in these Considerations of Mr. Edw's Exceptions I have done my Duty to my self and that I have publish'd them I am perswaded I have therein done a great Charity to my Neighbours the Poor and Bulk of Mankind for whose Salvation I hope I should not think it too much to lay down my Life however Mr. Edw. speaks so scoffingly of them even where their eternal Happiness or Misery is deeply concern'd THE END ERRATA Pag. 9. Col. 2 l. 0. for a read or P. 11. col 2. l. 14. r. perfect Man P. 14. col 2. l. 8. f. mine r. nine l. 14. r. palliate the.
which are generally form'd not in Scripture-Terms and about which there is such endless Contentions when they be explain'd to them as well as our Author's Article Jesus is the Messiah Nay he is confident that there is no more Difficulty in understanding this Proposition The Father Son and Holy Ghost are one God or Divine Nature than in that other of our Author see pag. 120. when yet the World knows to its Cost that this Article has exercis'd all the greatest Wits of the Church these fourteen or fifteen hundred Years to understand the Terms and take away the Contradictions and at this Day the English Trinitarians have most fierce Contentions among themselves about the meaning of it The nominal Trinitarians agree with the Unitarians that the Realists that hold three real Persons are Tritheists and the Realists agree with the Unitarians that the Nominals or Modalists destroy the Reality of the Eternal Son and Holy Ghost and are Patripassians or Sabellians Besides Mr. Edw. knows that each of these Parties are at vast difference among themselves they easily find Inconsistences or Contradictions in one anothers Explications so that supposing there be but ten different Trinitarian Hypotheses I think there are more every one has mine against him all which he looks upon as faulty and they on the other Hand do all reject his They reject them I say not as the Bishop of Sarum in his Letter to D. W. pag. 56. would paliate Matter as having the same Acts of Piety and Adoration though different ways of Explaining either the Vnity of the Essence or the Trinity of the Persons but as having different Acts except we can have the same Idea's when we worship three Gods as when we worship one only or when we worship one all-perfect Person as when we worship three such or when we worship one real Person and two nominal Ones as when we worship three Equals or when we worship one self-existent God and two dependent Gods not self-existent as when we worship three Self-existents and the like Again Mr. Edw's Proposition is never once found in Holy Writ but our Author 's often expresly He uses Terms in such a Sense as they are never us'd in Scripture for Divine Nature is never put there for God nor does the word GOD or one God ever signify Father Son and H. Ghost but always one singular Person and throughout the Holy Scriptures from the Beginning to the End God is spoken of and spoken to as one only Person and by Terms and Pronouns that signify singularly and never otherwise God indeed does twice or thrice speak of himself Plurally as Persons of Dignity and Dominion do often But our Author both his Words in Form and his Explications are all taken out of Scripture and in the Days of our Saviour and his Apostles there was no difficulty in understanding them The most illiterate Fishermen and Shepherds and Women knew what was meant by JESVs and what by Messiah The only Question was whether the Proposition Jesus is the Messiah was to be affirm'd or denied But notwithstanding all this Mr. Edw. says Truly if there be any Difficulty it is in our Author's Proposition why pray For here is an Hebrew word first to be explain'd before the Mob can understand the Proposition But by his favour the word Messiah is by our Translators adopted into the English Tongue and the common People the Rabble as Mr. Edw. is pleas'd to call them understand it as well as they do the Christ or the Anointed and also the Explications of those Terms provided they use to read either themselves or hear others read the Holy Scriptures But the word Messiah was in our Saviour and the Apostles Time most common among the Jews therefore our Author designing to represent the Preaching and Faith of that Time chose to use it more frequently than any other Term see pag. 30. But I presume Mr. Edw. brought in this Objection only as a Diversion If he really think as he says it 's a sharp Reflection upon all the Learned Trinitarian Controvertists upon this Point except they take it more candidly for an Invitation to their Reverences and right Reverences to come to the most Learned Mr. Edw. to inform their Understandings and solve all the Difficulties that make them at so great Odds one with another And it 's to be hoped he will give such a clear Explication of the Trinity as will satisfy the Mystery-men or Ignoramus-Trinitarians that at length they may understand what they now profess to believe without Understanding But to return for all this will seem a Digression except the Reader please to remember it is for a Vindication of our Author from Mr. Edw's hard charge of purposely omitting the Epistolary Writings because fraught with other Fundamental Doctrines besides that one which he mentions Among those Mr. Edw. reckons chiefly and more especially The Doctrine of the ever to be adored Trinity eminently attested in those Epistles This Doctrine he has given us in his Proposition above discoursed and has attempted to show against Matter of Fact in all Ages and especially in this present Time that this Fundamental ought not to have been omitted because of its Difficulty or Unintelligibleness for it is he saith less difficult than that of our Author Jesus is the Messiah but how successfully I leave to consideration But if it be Unintelligible or Contradictious at least to the Bulk of Mankind then it 's impossible it should be a Fundamental Article and therefore our Author needed not purposely to omit the Epistolary Writings of the Apostles for fear of finding it there since Mr. Edw. himself cannot find it there nor in the Bible But what says he to our Author 's full Answer to the Question about the Usefulness of the Epistles though the Belief of many Doctrines contained in them be not necessary to Salvation Our Author answers 1. That he that will read the Epistles as he ought must observe what 't is in them is principally aim'd at for that is the Truth which is to be receiv'd and believ'd and not scatter'd Sentences in Scripture-Language accommodated to our Notions and Prejudices What says Mr. Edw. to that 2. for I abridg There be many Truths in the Bible which a good Christian may be wholly ignorant of and so not believe which perhaps some lay great stress on and call Fundamental Articles because they are the distinguishing Points of their Communion What says Mr. Edw. to this 3. The Epistles were writ to those who were in the Faith and true Christians already and so could not be design'd to teach them the Fundamental Articles and Points necessary to Salvation This he shows from the Address of all the Epistles or something noted in them 4. Their resolving Doubts and reforming Mistakes are of great Advantage to our Knowledg and Practice 5. The great Doctrines of the Christian Faith are dropt here and there He has cited some such Passages in the Proof
him a good Subject though he understands not all the grounds of his Title much less all his Power and Prerogatives that belong to him as King So he that believes upon good Grounds that Jesus is the Messiah and understands so much of this Proposition as makes him or may make him a good Subject of Christ's Kingdom though he be ignorant of many things included in that Proposition he has all the Faith necessary to Salvation as our Author has abundantly proved But Mr. Edwards says This Gentleman forgot or rather wilfully omitted a plain and obvious Passage in one of the Evangelists GO TEACH ALL NATIONS c. Mat. 28. 19. From which it is plain says he that all that are adult Members of the Christian Church must be Taught as well as Baptiz'd into the Faith of the Holy Trinity Father Son and Holy Ghost and then they must believe it and consequently more is required to be believed by Christian Men than that Jesus is the Messiah He infers from this You see it is part of the Evangelical Faith and such as is necessary absolutely necessary to make one a Member of the Christian Church to believe a TRINITY in Vnity in the God-head or in plainer Terms that though God is one as to his Essence and Nature yet there are three Persons in that Divine Essence and that these three are really the one God I must confess that if Mr. Edwards's reasoning be good the Author is totally confuted three quarters of his Book at least are writ in vain and the old Systems must stand good and the Bulk of Mankind will certainly be damned or it will be a wonder if any of them be faved But give me leave to tell him I do not see what he says we do see that Text will well enough consist with our Author's Proposition For I would ask him whether the Apostles follow'd this Commission or not If they obey'd it then in Baptizing in the Name of Jesus the Messiah and exhorting those to whom they preached to be baptiz'd in the Name of the Messiah after their preaching the Messiah to them they did in effect baptize in the Name of the Father Son and Holy Ghost otherwise they did not pursue their Commission for we never find them baptizing in those express Terms but always in the Name of Jesus the Messiah or the Lord Jesus or the Lord and the like So that Mr. Edwards must either charge the Holy Apostles with Ignorance of or Disobedience to their Lord's Command or acknowledg that they did really baptize in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost when they did but expresly baptize in the Name of the Son or Messiah forasmuch as all that were so baptiz'd did believe in the Father of that Son of God as implied in the Son and in the Holy Ghost as the Anointing of the Son and which also was given to those that were so baptiz'd But as for his Inference viz. That it 's absolutely necessary to believe a Trinity in Vnity in the Godhead or that God is one as to his Essence and Nature yet there are three Persons in that Divine Essence and that these three Persons are really the one God This will condemn not only the Unitarians and the Bulk of Mankind but the greater part of Trinitarians the Learned as well as the Vulgar For all the real Trinitarians do not believe one Essence but three Numerical Essences Here Dr. Sherlock Dr. Cudworth the Bishop of Gl. the late Arch-bishop Mr. H w and all that hold as the Council of Nice did with that Council it self and the whole Church except some Hereticks for many Centuries are by Mr. Edwards expung'd out of the Catalogue of Christian Believers and consequently condemn'd to the horrible Portion of Infidels or Hereticks The Mystery-men or Ignoramus Trinitarians they are condemn'd too for they admit not any Explication and therefore not Mr. Edwards's There remains only Dr. South and Dr. Wallis and the Philosopher Hobbs who Mr. Edwards says is the great Master and Lawgiver of the profess'd Atheists pag. 129. and that Party which have the absolutely necessary Faith of three Persons in one Essence But if you ask these Men what they mean by three Persons Do they mean according to the common sense of Mankind and especially of the English Nation three singular intellectual Beings No by no means that is Tritheism they mean three Modes in the one God which may be resembled to three Postures in one Man or three external Relations as Creator Redeemer Sanctifier as one Man may be three Persons a Husband a Father and a Master This is that Opinion of Faith which the Antients made Heresy and Sabellius the Head of it Thus it is absolutely necessary to make a Man a Christian that he be a Sabellian Heretick But perhaps Mr. Edwards may be of Mr. H w's Mind for he says These three Persons are really the one God but then no one of them singly is so but every one a Third of God If so Mr. Edwards is indeed a Unitarian for he gives us one God only but then he is no Trinitarian for he has put down the Father himself from being God singly and so the Son and Holy Ghost As to what he says of being Baptized into the Faith and Worship of none but the only true God that has been answer'd a hundred times He cannot look into any of the Unitarian Books but he will find a sufficient Answer to that Inference Were the Israelites baptiz'd into the Worship of Moses but they were baptized into Moses 1 Cor. 10. 2. Or when the Apostle Paul supposes he might have baptized in his own Name Did he mean that he should have baptized into the Worship of himself as the most high God Then Mr. Edwards minds his Reader that the Author had left out also that famous Testimony in Joh. 1. 1. In the beginning was the Word Jesus Christ and the Word was with God and the Word was God Whence saith he we are obliged to yield assent to this Article That Christ the Word is God Here Mr. Edwards must mean that this is a Fundamental Article and necessary to Salvation otherwise he says nothing against his Author who has prevented his urging any other Text not containing a Fundamental in his Answer to the Objection from the Epistles and other Scriptures For saith he pag. 299. They are Objects of Faith They are Truths whereof none that is once known to be such may be disbelieved But yet a great many of them every one does and must confess a Man may be ignorant of nay disbelieve without Danger to his Salvation As is evident in those who allowing the Authority differ in the Interpretation and Meaning of several Texts Vnless Divine Revelation can mean contrary to it self The whole Paragraph ought to be read which I have abridged And if this Text of John 1. 1. be not one of those that by reason of
3. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ 1 Tim. 1. 2. Grace Mercy and Peace from God our Father and Jesus Christ our Lord. Eph. 1. 17. That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ the Father of Glory may give unto you the Spirit c. Col. 1. 2. Grace be unto you and Peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ 1 Pet. 1. 3. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ 2 Thess 2. 16. Now the Lord Jesus himself and God even our Father c. John 20. 17. Jesus saith to Mary I ascend to my Father and your Father and to my God and to your God Gal. 1. 4. Who gave himself for our Sins according to the will of God and our Father Mat. 27. 46. Jesus cried saying My God my God why hast thou forsaken me Philem. 3. Grace be to you and Peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ Rev. 3. 12. Him that overcometh will I make a Pillar in the Temple of my God and write upon him the Name of my God c. 2 Thess 1. 1. Unto the Church of the Thessalonians in God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ John 17. 1. Jesus lift up his Eyes to Heaven and said Father Glorify thy Son Mat. 23. 9. One is your Father which is in Heaven Psal 115. 3. Our God is in the Heavens Thus we see there is one God and Father of all Ephes 4. 6. both of Christ and Believers the Children of God the same Person is the God and Father of both It 's absurd to say that Christ the Son is his own Father or his own God so it 's plainly contrary to Scripture to say that any other Person is our God or our Father in the highest Sense but the same who is Christ's God and Father That it is so I appeal to the serious Thoughts of every Man and Woman that reads the Scriptures attentively without the prejudice of Scholastick and confus'd Distinctions Now I shall further produce you many couples of Scriptures which prove expresly that the Name of GOD when taken by way of Excellency and the Name of FATHER in Christ's Gospel do signify the same singular Person So that no one is or can be God who is not also the Father which Term is acknowledged to signify but one Person This appears from the Scripture attributing the sending of Christ or the Son sometimes to God sometimes to the Father and both frequently John 3. 34. He whom God hath sent speaketh the Words of God for God giveth not the Spirit by measure unto him Chap. 14. 24. The Word which ye hear is not mine but the Father's who sent me Acts 10. 36. The Word which God sent to the Children of Israel preaching Peace by Jesus Christ John 5. 30. I seek not mine own Will but the Will of the Father which hath sent me Acts 3. 26. God having raised up his Son Jesus sent him to bless you John 12. 49. The Father which sent me he gave me a Commandment what I should say and what I should speak 1 John 4. 10. Not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the Propitiation for our Sins Chap. 4. 14. And we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Saviour of the World Gal. 4. 4. God sent forth his Son made of a Woman John 6. 39. And this is the Father's Will that hath sent me See ver 44. 1 John 4. 9. In this was manifested the Love of God toward us because God sent his only begotten Son into the World c. John 5. 24. He that heareth my Word and believeth on the Father that hath sent me Rom. 8. 3. God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful Flesh John 20. 21. Then said Jesus As my Father sent me even so send I you Joh. 3. 17. God sent not his Son to condemn the World Chap. 5. 23. He that honoureth not the Son honoureth not the Father which sent him Joh. 6. 29. Jesus answered This is the Work of God that ye believe on him whom he hath sent Chap. 17. 25. O Father these have known that thou hast sent me John 17. 3. This is Life Eternal that they might know thee Father the only true God and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent Chap. 10. 36. Say ye of him whom the Father hath sanctified and sent into the World Thou blasphemest because I said I am the Son of God John 16. 27. The Father himself loveth you because ye have believed that I came out from God Ver. 28. I came forth from the Father and am come into the World again I leave the World and go to the Father Ver. 30. By this we believe that thou camest forth from God John 3. 16. God so loved the World that he gave his only begotten Son Chap. 8. 18. I am one that bear witness of my self and the Father that sent me beareth witness of me John 8. 42. For I proceeded forth and came from God neither came I of my self but he sent me Chap. 5. 36. The Works that I do bear witness that the Father hath sent me Hence it appears most evidently not only that God and the Father are the same Person and that the same is as plainly distinguisht from our Lord Christ as the Sender is distinct from him that is sent but that the Son is no more the same God that sent him than he is the same Father that sent him If Christians will still suffer themselves to be impos'd upon under the Notion of MYSTERY to believe that the Son of God is the same numerical God as his Father who sent him to do his Will not his own and to be the Propitiation or Mercy-seat Heb. 9. 5. for our Sins that the only begotten or well-beloved Son whom the Father first sanctified and then sent into the World is the same God who sanctified and sent him that the miraculous Works which the Son did did bear witness not that the Father even God had sent him but that the Son was that God c. they should no longer pretend that their Faith concerning God and his Son Christ Jesus in what is necessary to eternal Life is clearly and plainly reveal'd in Holy Scripture but that they have learnt it by Tradition from their Teachers which yet they can no more conceive the meaning of without contradiction to Scripture and Reason than the Papists can their Transubstantiation which they also believe under the Notion of Mystery Let none say there is a wide Difference between the Faith of Protestants and Papists in these Cases because Transubstantiation is contradicted by Sense the Trinity only by Reason for I appeal to any Man of Sense whether we may not be as certain that one Person is not three Persons nor three Persons one Person as that Bread is not Flesh If Protestants think themselves excusable in that let
of his Proposition We shall find those necessary Points best in the Preaching of our Saviour and the Apostles 6. The Epistles besides the main Argument of each of them do in many places explain the Fundamentals and that wisely by proper Accommodations to the apprehensions of those they were writ to Which he shows particularly in the Epistle to the Romans and that to the Hebrews also in the general Epistles At length These Holy Writers saith he inspir'd from above writ nothing but Truth and in most places very weighty Truths to us now But yet every Sentence of theirs must not be taken up and look'd upon as a Fundamental necessary to Salvation without an explicite Belief whereof no Body could be a Member of Christ's Church c. For saith he pag. 299. 't is plain the contending Parties on one side or t'other are ignorant of nay disbelieve the Truths deliver'd in Holy Writ as I noted before This little I have transcribed out of our Author for the sake of those who perhaps have not his Book but have Mr. Edwards's and that it may appear how unfairly to say no worse Mr. Edw. deals with our Author saying pag. 111. He passes by these inspired Writings with some contempt also he suggests his insincerity to the Reader But I have seen a Letter from a Gentleman of no ordinary Judgment who says Mr. Edwards has not only mistook Mr. Lock but abus'd and belied him for he says Mr. Lock cites only the Gospels and Acts but declares or insinuates his contempt of the Epistles as if they were not of like Authority with the Acts or Gospels but Mr. Lock has no where intimated any such Opinion His Book saith he shows He has read the Scriptures with very great Observation as well as Judgment he suffers nothing to escape him that belongs to the Subject he manages He names our Author Mr. Lock which I am assured he does by common Fame and Conjecture he has no other Grounds for it as neither have I no more than Mr. Edwards Whether we are mistaken or not in his Name I know not but I think I have proved that Mr. Edw. is much mistaken in his Judgment concerning his Book or has perversly censur'd him and it He is so far from contemning the Epistles as Mr. Edw. accuses him that whoever will take the Pains to reckon he will find he has quoted them and refer'd to them near FOURSCORE times And Mr. Edw. is no less Injurious in his Censures upon other Writers In the very Socinian Doctrine it self saith he there seems to be an Atheistical Tang. For proof he cites the Considerations on the Explications of Doct. of Trin. pag. 5. Where saith he the Self-existence of God which is the Primary Fundamental and Essential Property of the Deity is peremptorily pronounc'd by them to be a CONTRADICTION It 's strange a Man of Mr. Edwards's Undertaking should give forth such a Calumny His Ldp. of Worcester says If God was from Eternity he must be from himself That Author answers that that is an Espousing the Cause of the Atheists and he gives this Reason If God is from Eternity he must be of none neither of or from himself nor from any other not from himself for then he must be before he was and neither from himself nor from any other because all Origination of what kind soever is inconsistent with an Eternal Being Is this now peremptorily to pronounce that the Self-existence of God is a Contradiction or is it not to vindicate the Self-existence of God from a false Notion of it occasion'd by the Bishop's words But what will Mr. Edw. say to the Author of the XXVIII Propositions c. who they say is the Bishop of Glouc. who peremptorily denies nay says It is a flat Contradiction to say that the second and third Persons of the Trinity are Self-existent Prop. 8. Consequently neither of them is God because as Mr. Edw. says Self-existence is the Primary Fundamental and Essential Property of God which yet neither the Son nor the H. Ghost have I wish Mr. Edw. would either reconcile himself to the Bishop or the Bishop to him before he charges an Atheistical Tang upon the Socinian Doctrine upon account of the denial of God's Self-existence which he may see strongly affirm'd in the Reflections on the said Propositions c. As for Socinus's denying the Praescience of Contingencies I am not nor is our Author concern'd in it but which is more dishonourable to God to be the Author of all the Sin and Wickedness that ever was or ever will be in the World or to deny his Fore-knowledge of the certainty of that which is not certain Socinus and Crellius have denied such an Immensity of God which makes him to be essentially and wholly in every point of Space because such Immensity would take away all Distinction between God and Creature and has indeed an Atheistical Tang for the greater part of Atheists hold the Universe to be God hence Lucan Jupiter est quodcunque vides quocunque moveris Which opinion some of the Antient Fathers have wrote against as Clemens Alexandrinus and others Mr. Edw. may charge them all with a Tang of Atheism if he please As for God's Spirituality modest Divines confess it easier to say What it is not than what it is Mr. Edw. perhaps has attain'd to such a perfection of Knowledg in that Matter as may make him able to teach them what they are now ignorant of But Socinus nor Crellius nor any other of them ever denied contrary to most express and often repeated Scriptures and common Reason the most glorious Attribute of God's Vnity which gives Excellency to all his other Attributes for were Self-existence Omniscience Immensity and Spirituality and all other Attributes common to more than One where would the Excellency and Majesty of God's Name be How should we love and adore him with all our Hearts and Strength when there are others that require it and have as equal right to it as he But Mr. Edw. will count himself highly injur'd if I charge him with denying God's Unity but hold a little be not angry If you be Take heed it be not more for your own sake than for God's sake Do you not say that the infinite Nature of God is communicable to three distinct Persons pag. 79. and pag. 120. That the Father Son and Holy Ghost are one God or Divine Nature Are not these Terms convertible namely That one God is Father Son and H. Ghost that is three Persons and what are three Almighty and only wise Persons but three Gods The Father is one God the Son is one God distinct from the Father and the Holy Ghost is one God distinct from the Father and Son Thus your Proposition amounts to this That one God is three Gods that the Unity of God is a Trinity of Gods That Vnity or Oneness is no longer an Attribute of God but Trinity or Threeness But we cannot be