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Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
knowledge_n	ghost_n	sin_n	sin_v	2,468	5	10.3762	5	true

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A49801	Theo-politica, or, A body of divinity containing the rules of the special government of God, according to which, he orders the immortal and intellectual creatures, angels, and men, to their final and eternal estate : being a method of those saving truths, which are contained in the Canon of the Holy Scripture, and abridged in those words of our Saviour Jesus Christ, which were the ground and foundation of those apostolical creeds and forms of confessions, related by the ancients, and, in particular, by Irenæus, and Tertullian / by George Lawson ...	Lawson, George, d. 1678.	1659 (1659)	Wing L712; ESTC R17886	441,775	362

and secured in his blessed estate as the holy Angels are and the Saints shall be in glory What his happinesse should have been and when consummate if he had Persevered we do not certainly and distinctly know The hour of Temptation seems to have been the hour of Triall and it 's very Probable that if in that conflict he had proved stedfast and Victorious he and his might have been blessed for ever But Man being in honor abode not § III and being tempted sin'd and aspiring higher and seeking by doing that which God had forbidden to attain the higher pitch of glory was deves●ed of his Honour and depriv'd of his happy estate And here Divines take occasion to speak of sin in generall And though I might have entered upon this subject when I spake of the fall and condemnation of many of the Angels yet because the Scripture speaks most of the sin of man therefore I will follow their example and practise and 1. Speak of sin in generall 2. Of the particular Sin of Adam The generall nature of sin is disobedience to the just command of a Superiour and because disobedience is opposed to obedience therefore it will not be amisse to enquire a little into the nature of obedience Obedience is not of Physicall but morall and politicall consideration For it presupposeth an intelligent and free agent and the same subject to the Power and bound by the Laws of a Superiour for where there is no Superiour Power there can be no Law and where there is no Law there can be no obedience or disobedience Whether the immediate subject of obedience be acts or habits was formerly determined in some manner but here you must observe that intelligent and free acts inclinations habits especially Acts are the subject immediat and proper of obedience and the proper and first subject of it is the will and heart the acts whereof are intelligent and free and no other acts else This is the reason why God so much requires the heart and will not accept any the greatest offerings and services if performed without the heart To this obedience 't is necessarily required that the will freely subject it self to the power of the superiour and exactly conforme unto his will and command in all inclinations and motions so far as it is bound in which respect the will must be no will in it self In this particular whereof we speak the subject is man who is an intelligent and free agent The superiour is God according to the power acquired in Creation The rule of obedience is the Law both Positive and morall and his obedience is a conformity both in subjection and acting according to the will and command of God The Principal subject of this obedience as an adjunct and cause of it as an effect is the Will and heart of man which is the proper seat of Integrity and Perversnesse For other Acts are so far good or bad as they depend on the Will and are so called extrinseca dominatione and by Participating their qualification from the Will As it is in this particular obedience required of Adam at the first so it is in all the other acts of obedience performed to God Sin in generall is opposed to this obedience § IV and is a disobedience to the Laws of God not of Man or any other superiour in strict sense Otherwise in a large sense the Laws of men may be the lawes of God and their power his Power and it 's Gods law and will that they should obey their Laws and submit to their Power For as the Wisdome of God is the first rule so the will of God expressed in his law is the first binding law That sin is a disobedience unto a Law and the Law of God the Apostle informs us in these words Sin is the transgression or rather disobedience to the Law of God 1 John 3. 4. For so the Apostle is to be understood as appeares by the context This Sin is so unbeseeming that nature and place of men and Angels wherein God created them as nothing more and so staines them that when they see themselves they loath and abhor themselves so as they cannot endure to look upon themselves It 's the basest thing in the world and most pernicious unto him that is once guilty of it It 's a Deviation from the best rule of divine Wisdom and a disagreement with the most just and holy God It 's a contempt or at least a neglect of the eternall power of this glorious King It makes our own imaginations and the suggestions of the Devil our rules and our own lusts our Masters as though we were not subject unto God It deprives us of eternall light and is the perpetuall fuel of Hell-fire and the desert thereof is very dreadfull For these reasons God hates it forbids it threatens it gave both men and Angels at the first power against it and for it not repented of pardoned he casts both men and Angels out of his presence into utter darknesse and torments them with eternall fire Yet all Sinnes are not equall § V as the punishments deserved are some lesse some greater And here I might enlarge and discover the severall sorts the aggravations the Consequents of Sin in generall 1. For the kinds and distinctions they are many For we hold that some sins are against the Law some against the Gospel some against God some against man Some of omission some of Commission c. And these distinctions may be tolerable in some sense 2. The degrees and aggravations are very many and might be observed out of Scripture and reduced into method as is done by the Learned and most judicious Doctor Chappel in his Method of Preaching The Crucifying of Christ the Lord of glory was an heynous crime yet some who had an hand in it were ignorant For so our Saviour prayes Father forgive them for they know not what they do Luke 23. 34. Yet others did it maliciously and contrary to the clear light of their Conscience and concerning these the supreme Judge is sollicited and desired to add iniquity unto their iniquity Psal. 69. 27. And there is a sin against the holy-Holy-Ghost which according to the rules of Gods eternall justice renders the partyes sinning incapable of remission Such is the Blaspemy against the holy-Holy-Ghost Math. 12. 31. and the Apostacy of Christians having once received the knowledge of the truth Heb. 10. 26 27. Paul was a Blasphemer a Persecutour and injurious yet he sinned ignorantly and in unbelief and upon his repentance obtayned mercy 1 Tim. 1. 13 16. The knowing Servant neglects to do his Masters will so doth the ignorant Servant too yet the sin of the former is greater then the sin of the latter and their punishment must be commensurable to their sin Luke 12. 47 48. These places I observe to let you understand and put you in mind 1. That sin is not in the outward act properly and immediately for

differs in many things from all other Books especially in respect of the Authority thereof which is primarily Divine in the Original Copies secundarily in the Transcripts and Translations These sacred Writings are learned and known several ways and by several means of men that are not infallibly directed further then they follow the Scriptures rightly understood And by these especially Ministers by whom God speaks to men another way they are taught several ways in a certain order How these must be heard understood applyed so as the Hearer may attain to a Divine Faith and a Saving Knowledge Where something of the Tradition of the Church CHAP. III. The Doctrine of this Kingdom is contracted by Christ and His Apostles as such is the ground of all the Apostolical Creeds and Confessions all agreeing in method and matter The manner of the handling of the subject in this Treatise is different from that of ordinary Systems Catechisms and common places where something is said of Faith in general and of Divine Faith A Confession taken out of Tertullian CHAP. IV. Of the Divine Essence and Attributes How God's Essence is intelligible and how represented to us by certain Attributes What Attributes are and certain Rules concerning them The imperfect definition of God including all the Attributes CHAP. V. The Attributes in particular The distribution of them into Greatness Goodness In the Greatness unity infiniteness Infiniteness in Immensity from which ariseth His Incomprehensibility Vbiquity and in Eternity CHAP. VI. God's goodness being one and infinite is known by his excellent and most eminent Acts and Vertues of his Vnderstanding Will Power as His most excellent Knowledge and Wisdom the integrity of his Will and the perfection of his power CHAP. VII The Father Son and Holy Ghost their unity order distinction They are not Three Persons in that sense as Men or Angels are called persons The vanity of the Socinian Argument against the Trinity grounded upon the word person strictly taken How the Soul may be said to be an Image and imperfect resemblance of the Father Son and Holy Ghost CHAP. VIII God considered in his Regal Capacity in respect of his power acquired by Creation and continued by preservation How God is a cause of all things by his Counsel contriving Will decreeing Power actually producing The knowledge of GOD in respect of things out of Himself His Decrees free wise unchangeable The cooperation of the Persons their distinct manner of working The Creation in general the special Creation of Man The Conclusions deducible from this Principle God created Heaven and Earth and all things therein By this Work God hath a propriety in all things and may dispose of them and order them to the ends whereunto He hath made them ordinable Hence his supream universal absolute power How all things created are preserved and ordered Ordination in general the first act of God's Power acquired and continued CHAP. IX The Exercise of God's Power in general CHAP. X. The special Ordination and Government of the Intellectual and Immortall Creatures Angels Men. The government of Angels constituted administred according to certain Laws Judgment whereby some being obedient were confirmed rewarded Others disobeying rebelling and forsaking their station were punished and cast out of God's presence reserved for greater punishments in the end of the World CHAP. XI The special Government of Man which is two-fold 1. Of Justice without Christ. 2. Of Mercy in Christ. The constitution of the first Model The administrations Laws Moral Positive considered as a rule of Man's obedience God's Judgment CHAP. XII The Judgment of God-Creatour passed upon Man according to the Laws of Creation and strict Justice The Object of this Judgment 1. Man obedient rewarded with the continuance of a comfortable condition in Paradise 2. Sinning Sin in general is a disobedience to God's Laws The degrees and the consequents thereof The first sin of our first Parents in particular The causes of it The effects thereof before Judgment CHAP. XIII God's judicial proceeding against Adam Eve the Serpent Satan Their Convention Conviction Sentence Execution More particularly God's Sentence passed upon the old Serpent the Devil In which God new models his Kingdom of mercy in Christ promised and gives Man hope of Pardon and everlasting comfort CHAP. XIV The Penalties more particular both Bodily and Spiritual publike private Temporal Eternal all signified by Death to which Sin made man liable yet all by Christ removable CHAP. XV. Original sin what it is Whether it be properly so Whether Concupiscence in persons baptized be such in proper sense The derivation of Original sin Whether it be derived by Propagation or the just Judgment of God or both CHAP. XVI The principal Attributes of God manifested in this Judgment as Holinesse Justice especially Mercy in the manifestation whereof he exercised his transcendent power above the former Constitution and Laws LIB II. CHAP. I. THe Coherence of this Book with the former The difference of the two Models both the former and latter The acquisition of a New Power by the Word made Flesh and annointed taking upon him the form of a servant and being obedient to the Death of the Cross. A Description of the Redeemer His Person Nature Offices The union and distinction of the two Natures His particular Offices CHAP. II. The Humiliation of the Son of God 1. In taking upon Him the Form of a servant 2. In suffering Death A brief Historical Narration of His Sufferings 1. Before Judgment 2. His Judgment The Preparations of His Tryal His Tryal 1. Before the Ecclesiastical 2. The Civil Judge His Condemnation Execution with the Prodigies which hapned about that time CHAP. III. A more large Discourse concerning the Suffering and Death of Christ. It was an Act of Obedience to His Heavenly Father commanding Him to suffer for the sins of Man whereby He was offended To this Death He became obnoxious not onely by His Fathers Command but His own voluntary submission to be an Hostage and Surety for Man as guilty It was a Sacrifice offered freely to God as Law-giver offended and as supream Judge The effects of this sacrifice accepted are immediate mediate Immediate Satisfaction of Divine Justice and Merit What He merited for Himself what for Man How the benefit of this Sacrifi●● became communicate from Christ as a Representator General and the Will of God the great Soveraign Of the extent of this benefit Whether Propitiation is to be ascribed to His active or passive Obedience severally or to both joyntly Whether this Death prevents all punishments or onely the Eternal And if not what punishments it removes The Attributes manifested in this great Work of Humiliation of the Word made Flesh by which a new Power was acquired CHAP. IV. The exercise of the new Power of God-Redeemer in the Constitution of His New Monarchy The Soveraign and Monarch The Subjects the Officers the Administrator-General the Enemies The manner of reducing Man to subjection the nature

gives him Laws both Moral and Positive and whilest man is obedient his estate is comfortable But this not continuing long he is tempted sinneth and so is judged yet so that the Sentence in part might be reversed the Eternal Punishment deserved was made upon certain conditions avoidable and might be prevented And least man should perish everlastingly this Government is altered and God acquires a new power by the work of Redemption and doth exercise it by the Redeemer The Redeemer is the Word who was God and the Son of God made flesh and anointed with the Holy Ghost by whom he was conceived to be a Prophet Priest and King As Priest he offers himself a Sacrifice upon the Cross satisfies God's justice merits mans salvation and his own eternal glory and upon his Resurrection he is invested with that glory and power which he had merited and God by him begins to exercise his new acquired power 1. By constituting a new Kingdom whereof the Head must be his Son at his right hand and the Church his body Politick 2. By the administration of this kingdom with victorious power unto the end For Christ must reign till his enemies be made his footstool In this Administration he 1. Appoints officers who must Publish the Laws of his Kingdom and endues them with the Holy Ghost from Heaven Their doctrine to●ether with the Power of the Spirit is made known and effectuall in all Nations and some believe some love darknesse rather then light The Believers make up the Body of the Church Unbelievers constitute the body both of Rebels and Enemies and both are the subject of the judgment of God Redeemer by Christ. This judgment is executed in Rewards and Punishments in this life upon particular persons severally and successively considered and is fully consummate upon the Resurrection at the Universall or generall Assizes when the Wicked with the Angels shall be cast into everlasting fire and the Righteous shall be rewarded with eternall glory The punishments determined by this Judgment as also the rewards shall be perpetuall And in all this there is in the matter or the method no difference or variation from the Ancient Creeds or in the expressions from the holy Scriptures Before I conclude this Chapter § VIII I will say something though briefly 1. Of the name of Creed and Confession 2. Of knowledge and Obedience 3. Of faith in Particular 1. These Sums and Methods are called Creeds because the matter of them is Credenda things or rather truths concerning things to be believed And Confessions because the Truths believed in the heart must be Confessed with the mouth For with the heart man believeth unto Righteousnesse and with the mouth Confession is made to Salvation Rom. 10. 10. 2. If we consider the Doctrine of the Holy Scriptures contracted in these Confessions in respect of mans duty all things therein are proposed 1. As Truths 2. Some things as Commands or Laws As Truths mans duty is to believe them as Commands to obey them Thence that distribution of Divine and Saving Doctrine into Faith or Obedience The truths and so the knowledge and unbelief of them are first in order And because the matter of some truths are commands therefore Commands and Obedience follow as the second in order Both are contained in the Scriptures expresly In the Creeds the Commands and Obedience are implied Yet lest we mistake we must distinguish between the knowledge and obedience of Angels and the knowledge and obedience of man And both these may be considered in respect of man innocent man fallen man under the Law man under the Gospell For in all these respects they are different as will appear hereafter 3. Mans knowledge especially since the fall is imperfect and is not so evident as demonstrative and intuitive knowledge is and therefore called Faith which cannot perceive the things known cleerly or immediately but by vertue of a Testimony To define which faith in general it must needs be proper unto Logick which is the rule of mans understanding whereof faith is an act and in general that which we call assent allowing the connexion of the termes of a proposition and yeilds unto it as true Yet this Assent though firm and certain is not so perfect as that which is grounded upon immediate Evidence of the things represented by the Termes Therefore Lincolniensis makes the Genus of it to be Opinion and saith that fides est opinio And that faith which is grounded onely upon probable reasons can be no more then Opinion which alwayes is an Assent yet not firm and certain as this Faith we speak of must be For it is divine and immediately grounded on the testimony or word of God certainly known to be such It 's not the word of God immediately to me as spoken by man either fallible or infallible but either as attested outwardly by miracles or gifts of the Holy Ghost or some other way or inwardly by some real effects of the Spirit writing this word in mans heart powerfully to affect it and incline it to obedience A Speculative and general assent without any Saving effects the Devils may have The Tradition of the Church or testimony of any man cannot possibly represent the word of God as the word of God immediately to the Soul The Practical divine assent is a great part of our Regeneration and the Principle of all divine and noble actions as it is of all Spiritual Solid Comfort CHAP. IV. Of the Divine Essence and Attributes in General IN the Kingdom of God § I the Scriptures represent unto us 1. The King 2. His Government The King must be considered 1. In himself 2. In his Legal Capacity or as King As in himself he is God the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost The term or word GOD puts us in mind of the Essence and being of this King and the terms Father Son and Holy Ghost of his acting in himself and those Wonderful and hidden productions Whence arise severall Relations and Relative properties But before I proceed to speak of these deepest Mysteries I must say something of our knowledge of God and the way how he doth represent himself unto us so that we may understand some little of him in the darknesse of the World till we see him face to face and more fully and clearly in Eternal Glory Such is the excellency of this King and such the brightnesse of his Glory that it denies any near accesse to Silly mortal man who must not curiously Pry into these Secrets but humbly adore and at a great distance That God is most intelligible in himself is certain For the perfect Being is the most perfect object of understanding But it 's one thing to be so clearly visible in himself another to be so to us An Infinite and Eternall Being must needs be far above a finite and limited understanding Such especially ours now is For our Capacity is Shallow and Narrow

new life and that seriously and we know nothing to the contrary we must judge them to have a right and we must give it them If a Simon Magus who is still in the gall of bitternesse do thus we must baptize him we have warrant for it and if we refuse then we offend Though all those things be true yet it 's certain God requires of such parties sincere faith sincere profession and sincere promise and such as shall afterwards be followed with sincere practise and if they be not such he will not Baptize them with the holy-Holy-Ghost and though he allow them to be members of the visible Church till they shew themselves worthy to be cast out yet he doth not ingraft them into Christ and give them an immediate title to the heavenly inheritance But man having not the knowledge of God cannot passe the judgment of God neither must we presume to do so Yet if the Church or any that hath commission shall upon certain evidence bind or loose either in foro interiori or exteriori their judgment shall be made good and ratified in Heaven so far as it shall agree with the infallible judgment of God It 's doubted by many Whether the Children of ignorant or scandalous parents or such as are both ignorant and scandalous may be Baptized What to determine in this point is difficult because it may admit many different circumstances and cases If we consider these Children as born in a visible Church where there is a faithfull ministery and a good discipline setled there is hope of good education and the Children may be considered as members of that Church as a body Politick and so admitted to Baptism For the greatest danger is when there is little or no hope of Christian education The defects or crimes of the immediate parents in the Church of Israel did not deprive their Children of the right and priviledge of circumcision But except we know the particular case and the circumstances thereof with such parents of such Children in particular we cannot exactly define what is to be done They who affirm that onely the Children of Parents really regenerate have right to Baptism presuppose 1. That these Children derive their right to that Sacrament from their immediate Parents onely 2. That they derive it from them as they are regenerate and neither from any other nor from them any other ways considered But when they can prove clearly these things out of Scripture I may believe them For outward Priviledges such Circumcision and Baptism be they may be granted to the Seed according to the flesh if the Parents be not justly cast out of the Church and so of Christians if they be made no Christians before the Children be born Upon this account both Ismael and Esau were circumcised And if they be cast out before it 's a Question whether upon Adoption or some other Grant they may not be baptized But I leave this Controversie to be debated and determined by such as are so busie about it as though they had nothing else to do CHAP. XVIII Of Prayer BEcause Prayer is a principal and eminent part of God's Worship § I an effectual and excellent means both to avert God's Judgments threatned and obtain the Blessings promised a great Duty required in these Laws of God Redeemer as they are the Rule of our Obedience containeth in it many Divine Virtues as so many Ingredients whereof it 's compounded acknowledgeth the Supream Dominion of this Eternal King is the onely way of pleading before His Throne giveth all glory unto him confesseth man's wants and miseries and ascribeth all mercies to His Free-Will and abundant Grace in Christ I therefore thought good though I mention'd it in the Exposition of the Moral Law for it belongs and is reducible to the first four Commandements severally in several respects yet to speak something of it more at large and more distinctly and so take occasion to speak of that excellent Pattern of Prayer given by our Saviour Chirst unto his Disciples and left upon Record unto us and all Generations unto the Worlds end Of the necessity efficacy and excellency of Prayer many have excellently discoursed to whom I refer the Reader As for the order which it challengeth in the Body of Divinity we must find it in those 4 first Commandements which speak of the Worship of God for it 's a part of God's Worship required and prescribed more especially in the first and second Commandement of the Moral Law It 's sometimes used to signifie the whole Worship of God as a principal part virtually containing many of the rest It 's sometimes taken more strictly for Praise Thanksgiving Petition because all those are sometimes contained in one speech directed unto God Sometimes and that most usually it signifies Petition And as Thanksgiving is an acknowledgment of God's mercies we have received and praise of his perfections manifested in His glorious Works so Prayer is a presenting our Petitions for mercies promised unto God as All-mighty and All-merciful in the Name of Christ. And it 's then effectual when by Faith in Christ it's persumed with his Merits There is this more general Definition Prayer is a Presentation of our Petitions unto God And this is either directed to the true God or to a false suppose God Such the Prayers of Heathens and Idolaters be There is Prayer to the true God 1. According to the Light of Nature 2. According to the Scriptures of the Old Testament 3. According to the Gospel And such is the first and more particular Definition formerly given And we must distinguish between a Prayer and an effectual Prayer To an effectual Prayer is required not onely the right qualification of the person praying but of the Prayer it self And the efficacy depends upon neither but upon Christ's Merit and God's Promise It 's an excellent part of God's Worship and therefore some make it to be the Genus For it 's the general nature of it It 's the good pleasure of this Eternal King that all his Subjects should have access unto his Throne with all Humility and Reverence bow before him adore his glorious Majesty seek all mercies by way of Petition And in the Gospel we must approach in the Name of Christ For He is our High-Priest who in his Golden Censer must offer all our Prayers sweetned with his Merits who by his blood hath made the Throne of God the Throne of Grace and accessible by sinful man And for his merits fore-seen and fore-accepted the Prayers of the Saints from the times of Adam till his Incarnation and Ascension into Heaven were accepted This Worship of Prayer doth acknowledge his Supream Majesty his Almighty Power and his endless and infinite Mercy his Omniscience and Omnipresence and gives the glory of all Deliverances and Blessings unto him By it we confess our selves needy Suppliants and wholly dependent upon him who is the ever-living Fountain of all Mercies He is of that

know many things clearly and fully yet many things they know not at all much lesse know them and all things clearly and fully There are many other distinctions of this knowledge § IV For it may be considered either as Speculative of things Possible or practicall of things ordinable and both Antecedently unto the will and decree of this great King And consequently to his decree he knows all things because he knows the decree it self perfectly Therefore he knows all things according to their future entities or their ordination He knows all things in their present existence and all things and every thing after they cease to be and exist He knows all things which upon supposition would come to pass if he did concur and not determine otherwise This Knowledge is not acquired by Observation Experience Discourse or any other way of imperfection For because he knows himself most perfectly therefore he must needs perfectly know all as they use to speak intuitiv●ly and at once This Knowledge doth contrive and order all things in an excellent and wonderful manner and this appears most in the ordering of future free contingent acts The perfection of God's Will is that § V whereby he necessarily loveth Righteousness and hateth Iniquity As the perfection of his understanding eminently includes all intellectual Vertues so the perfection of his Will all Moral Vertues which are purely such And there can be no vertuous act of the Will either of Men or Angels which doth not agree to God in a far more excellent manner and measure Moral Vertues presuppose intellectual and they arise and have their Spring from the Will rightly informed and disposed It 's then rightly disposed when it 's firmly inclin'd unto and fixed upon that which is just and hates that which is unjust This may be called integrity rectitude righteousness as it includeth all Vertues But this Rectitude in Men and Angels is accidental and separable There●ore both men and Angels may sin and have sinned The Rule of their Acts may be in them but not essentially nor necessarily That the glorified Saints shall never sin is not ab intrinseco not from their Being or any thing in themselves but from without even from God who will certainly and infallibly support them so as to prevent all Errour and all Sin But the integrity of God's Will is essential and as his Essence is necessary so his Integrity must needs be And he is necessarily just and holy because he necessarily loves himself who is righteousness it self and hates every thing contrary to himself In this respect some School-men have determined that God could not make Man or Angel impeccable For then he should have made them Gods Some Creatures never sinned nor shall sin yet they are subject to sin as they are in themselves This Integrity of the Divine Will is manifested very much in the Government of Men and Angels yet God doth not necessarily love the Righteousness and hate the iniquity of these intellectual Creatures as necessarily to reward or punish them He doth freely and not necessarily will their Being therefore he doth not necessarily will any thing belonging or added to their Being If they be just he loves their Justice because he loves himself If they be unjust he hates their injustice because contrary to himself He lovs sinful man shews him mercy pardons him rewards him delivers him makes him happy yet not necessarily but out of his free goodness which he might deny and would deny if it were unjust If he gives Laws execute them in rendring punishments or rewards he doth all justly and that necessarily yet he neither gives Laws or executes judgments necessarily but freely The Judge of all the World must needs do right yet there is no necessity he should be a Judge because there is no necessity that there should be a World All his ways are Ju●gment A God of truth without iniquity just and right is he Deut. 32 4. He hates evil and is of purer eyes then to behold evil he cannot look upon iniquity Hab. 1. 13. Unto this Rectitude of Gods Will many refer Mercy Bounty Clemency and distributive Justice But these are not his essential justice and integrity but emanations or acts of it being exercised ad extra out of Himself And it 's to be observed that to love to shew kindness to pardon to relieve to deliver are not absolutely vertuous acts and perfections but as they agree with this rectitude and integrity yet as they are agreeable to it so they are excellent and such as God delights in To punish oppress vex torment destroy make miserable are not evil except unjust and inconsistent with this integrity otherwise God would never punish and that with Eternal Punishments his most excellent Creatures And as it is impossible for God to cease to be 〈◊〉 and to be defective in his integrity either in himself or out of himself 〈◊〉 impossible for him to cease to be happy or defective in his happiness The perfection of his power § VI is that whereby he produceth and acteth most fully according to the per●ection of his Vnderstanding and Will This Power being the Essence must needs be pure Act and therefore not properly called Power but as we take Power for strength And as this is in God it 's difficult for us to conceive of it as distinct from his Understanding and his Will And some have affirmed that his Will is his Power which is true ad intra not ad extra By this Power as by an eternal and infinite strength he standeth fixed irresistibly and eternally in his own Being It 's that whereby he acts Eternally and necessarily upon himself And this strength and Power is exercised and doth manifest it self in all his glorious Works in some more in some less Yet all that is exercised out of himself is nothing to that power and strength which is infinite in Himself and is Himself The School-men dispute much of this Power but always understand it as exercised out of Himself And they distinguish of Producibile and Factibile The Application of this distinction is That God's power is Almighty in respect of Factibile that which may be produced made done out of Himself but not in respect of Producibile within Himself For the Father produceth the Son and the Father and Son produce the Holy Ghost And in this respect the Father may be said to be Almighty but not the Son nor the Holy Ghost But the reason of this Curious Speculation an needless Conceit is the misunderstanding of this Power as referring to the Essence And as it is too curious so it may occasion Errour CHAP. VII Of the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost GOD doth know Himself § I and must needs love Himself and not onely the Principal but the first Coadequate Object of his Understanding and that from everlasting to everlasting is his own Being The clear and full contemplation of this most glorious Being

produceth an infinite and Eternal Knowledge of himself as most perfect and most excellent Thus he cannot know himself and be known of himself But he must love himself and be infinitely and eternally enamoured with his own Beauty which is sufficient sully and perpetually to satiate and content himself within himself And hence ariseth his full happiness For he is fully happy to all Eternity without any Man Angel without Heaven Earth the World or any Creature by acting thus upon himself Therefore perfect and full happiness is accounted one of the Attributes of God And if he were not happy he could not make the intellectual Beings for ever happy by a more full communion with him and enjoyment of him From these immanent acts of the Deity upon himself some conceive arise the Relations of Father Son and Holy Ghost and that stupendious and profound mystery of the glorious Trinity The Doctrine whereof is so far above Natural Reason improved to the highest pitch that the greatest Wits in the World have been confounded in the search thereof and many have denied and are offended with the Terms of Trinity and Persons as not found in the Holy Scriptures But first let us hear what the Scripture saith of this great mystery The Apostles Commission and Charge from Christ was To teach or Disciple all Nations baptizing them in the Name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost Math. 28. 18. And there are Three which bear Record in Heaven the Father the Word and the Holy Ghost 1 Joh. 5. 7. In the former place we may observe § II 1. One Name of three the Father Son and Holy Ghost And whether we take the Name for the Eternal Deity as the word in the Hebrew sometimes signifies or for Worship or for Power yet there is but one Name one Worship one Power of the Father Son and Holy Ghost 2. The Father Son and Holy Ghost are three 3. That the Father is the first the Son the second the Holy Ghost the third in order 4. That the Father as the Father is not the Son nor the Holy Ghost nor the Son as Son either the Father or the Holy Ghost nor the Holy Ghost as the Holy Ghost either of them 5. The Father hath relation to the Son as the Father of the Son the Son as the Son of the Father to the Father and the Holy Ghost being the Breath and Spirit of the Father and the Son hath relation to both and both to Him 6. Here are three distinct Relatives and three distinct Relative Properties 7. The Father as God hath no relation to the Son but as the Father no● the Son as God to the Father but as the Son And so the Holy Ghost not as God but as the Holy Ghost to them bo●h as breathed by and proceeding from both In the latter place 1 Joh. 5. 7. we may observe 1. That there be three the Father Son and Holy Ghost 2. That the Father is first the Son is second the Holy Ghost is third in order as before 3. He that in the former place was called the Son is here called the Word 4. That the Word was in the beginning was with God was God and by it all things were made And by the Son it 's said All things were created and all things consist by him Col. 1. 15 16. From whence it follows That the Father and the Son are but one Creatour and so but one God together with the Holy Ghost to whom the incommunicable Perfections and Works of the Deity are attributed For as the Spirit of Man is the same Substance and Being with man and knows the things of man so the Spirit which searcheth and knoweth the deep things of God must needs be one and the same Substance and Being with God The Father was the Father before he created the World or sent his Son The Word and Son of God was the Word and Son be●ore the Word was made Flesh And the Holy Spirit was the Spirit before he sanctified either Man or Angel Yet the Father was more clearly manifested to be the Father by sending his Son into the World and the Son to be the Son by the incarnation and work of Redemption And the Holy Ghost to be the Holy Ghost by the Work of Sanctification The Word which was made flesh was coeternal and coequal with the Father though the Humane Nature assumed by the Word was neither coequal nor co-eternal These Three are called Persons § III by some of the Greek Fathers and most of the later Latine Christian Writers A Person was defined long ago by Occam to be Suppositum intellectuale an individual intellectual Substance subsisting by it self And in this strict Sense three Persons as three Angels three men are three distinct individual Substances But thus the Father Son and Holy Ghost are not Three Persons for then there should be three Gods whereas they are but one God and one Divine Substance though they be considered as they are represented according to these three distinct Relations and Relative Properties These three are so intimately united that they are but one individual substance And this Unity of three is called by the Greeks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by the Latines Circumincession So that there can be no inequality amongst them in respect of Time Power Dignity or any other ways One may be considered before another in respect of order or origination as some of the School-men speak The Generation of the Son and the Spiration of the Holy Ghost which are wonderful and to us unsearchable had no beginning of Time nor can have end of Duration for they are Eternal In these high and glorious Productions the Essence cannot properly be said to be communicated Some of the Ancients § IV and many of the Modern Writers have denyed the Trinity of Persons and the Deity of the Son and Holy Ghost The Socinians argue against both 1. Against the Trinity of Persons alleaging that three Persons are three individual distinct Substances and thence they infer that if there be three distinct Persons in the Deity then there are three distinct Gods In this Argument they take for granted that in this great mystery the word Person is taken properly and strictly which no understanding Christian ever thought And this is gross and intolerable especially in men otherwise learned and judicious 2. Against the second they argue That because the Father in some places is said to be the onely true God therefore neither the Son nor Spirit can be properly Summus ille Deus that Supream God For example Crellius one of the most learned and judicious of them from those words of our Saviour This is life Eternal to know thee the onely true God argues to this purpose That if the Father be the onely true God then the Son and the Holy Ghost cannot be God This is so unworthy that it deserves no answer In that place the Son is considered as Man and flesh