and Institution as far as relates to this Mystery These words Person and Hypostasis were very anciently used without any Definition to determine their Signification till they became matter of dispute Boetius has given us a definition of Person which has been generally allowed of ever since that a Person is an individual Substance of a rational Nature Let us then examine whether this definition can belong to a Divine Person to one who is True and Perfect God As for Substance Boetius tells us That it is essential to the Notion of Person for a Person cannot subsist in Accidents much less in Modes which are less than Accidents and it is certain no other Notion of Person can belong to one who is God For a Person who is God must be Substance in the most Perfect and Absolute sense that is as I have already explained it Perfect Being and Essence As St. Austin expresly tells us That in God to Be and to be a Person is the same thing and that when we say the Person of the Father we mean nothing else but the Substance of the Father and thus it is with respect to the whole Trinity It is certain St. Austin never dream'd of defining a Person much less a Divine Person by a Mode For to make a Person who is God and therefore the most Perfect Being a Mode which if it be any thing is next to nothing no Substance but a meer Modification of Substance is both new Divinity and new Philosophy unknown either to Fathers or Schoolmen But meer Substance can't make a Person unless it be a Living Understanding Substance the Substance of a rational Nature And this must be the Notion of a Person when applied to God for God is Pure Infinite Mind and Intellect the First and Supreme Life and Intellect in whom to Live to Understand and to Be is the same thing as I observed before from St. Austin and if a Divine Person signifies One who is God every Person in the Godhead is Supreme Absolute Life and Intellect And this is what we must understand by a Person when we say That the Father is a Person the Son a Person and the Holy Ghost a Person for no other Notion of a Person can belong to any one who is True and Perfect God There is another Term of great consideration in this definition which still remains to be Explained and that is Individual That a Person is an Individual Substance of a Rational Nature which Boetius opposes to Vniversal Substances which are nothing else but the abstracted Notions of generical or specifick Substances which have no real and actual Subsistence and therefore are not properly Substances but only the Ideas of Substances and therefore are not Persons neither for Substance and Person are only in Singulars and Individuals which Subsist by themselves Thus Human Nature considered in general as common to all Mankind has no actual Subsistence and therefore is not a Human Person but it subsists only in particular Men and that makes every particular Man a Human Person for the Person of the Man is nothing but the Man himself And so St. Austin tells us it is in the Holy Trinity the Person of the Father is the Father himself and the Person of the Son is the Son himself and if Father Son and Holy Ghost are Three they must be Three Persons for each of them is himself and not the other and Three Selfs are Three Persons I and Thou and He are Personal Pronouns I my self Thou thy self He himself by which Argument the Catholick Fathers prove against the Sabellians that Father Son and Holy Ghost are Three Persons by these Personal Pronouns which the Scripture applies to them as our Sâ—viour speaks of himself in the first Person I and my Father of his Father in the Second Person I thank Thee O Father of the Holy Ghost in the Third Person when He the Spirit of truth shall come Now I and Thou and He must signifie Three distinct Persons or Three Selfs Person indeed as St. Austin observes is not a Relative Term but is spoken ad se of the thing it self For if Person were a Relative then as we say The Father is the Father of his Son so we must say The Person of the Father is the Person of the Son which is absurd but yet Person must be praedicated Plurally according to the number of Selfs for as many Selfs as there are so many Persons are there for Selfs make numbers because one self is not another Three singular intelligent Selfs singulares intelligentes as Melancton calls them is the proper Notion of Three Persons and in this sense Father Son and Holy Ghost are Three Persons if each of them be True and Perfect God For God is certainly himself If the Father be God the Father himself is God if the Son be God the Son himself is God if the Holy Ghost be God the Holy Ghost himself is God This is the plain express Doctrine of Scripture and what every man may understand and what every one who believes a Trinity must profess and no man needs believe more SECT IV. These Names Father Son and Holy Ghost prove the real Distinction of Persons in the Trinity II. THESE Names Father Son and Holy Ghost especially when the Name GOD is Attributed to each of them That the Father is God the Son God the Holy Ghost God proves a real and substantial distinction between them for these are opposite Relations which cannot meet in the same Subject For a Father cannot be Father to himself but to his Son nor can a Son be Son to himself but to his Father nor can the Holy Ghost Proceed from himself nor in this sense be his own Spirit but the Spirit of the Father and Son from whom he Proceeds And therefore the Father is not the Son nor the Holy Spirit nor the Son the Father or Holy Spirit nor the Holy Spirit either Father or Son And yet if each of them be God each of them Perfectly is or is Perfect Being and therefore are as Perfectly Distinct as three which perfectly are and are not one another To talk of Three Distinct Beings Substances Minds or Spirits may be Misrepresented by perverse Wits to the prejudice of the Divine Unity though the Catholick Fathers besides Hypostasis did not scruple to use the same or other equivalent Expressions concerning the Holy Trinity when they disputed against the Sabellians yet if we believe a Trinity whether we will or no we must acknowledge Three each of which Perfectly Is or is Perfect Being and no one is the other For if we deny this we must either deny that the Father Is or that the Son Is or that the Holy Ghost Is and to deny either of these is to deny a Trinity And if it be Objected against this That according to St. Austin's Notion though it was not peculiarly his but common to all the Greek and
Person signifies an Intelligent Being but he has secured himself against this Imputation by an artificial addition some Intelligent Being acting in such or such a manner He will not allow Person to signify absolutely an Intelligent Being but an Intelligent Being with respect to some peculiar manner of acting and thus One single Person in the proper Notion of Person for an Intelligent Being may sustain Three Persons or Personal Characters with reâ—pect to extrinsecal Relations and the different manner of acting The whole Mystery and Sophistry of this is That God who is One single Person is upon different accounts sometimes called the Father sometimes the Sâ—n and sometimes the Holy Ghost and therefore Father Son and Holy Ghost have a Personal signification each of these Names signify Person in a proper sense that is the Person of God but all of them separately and together signify but One and the same single Person for they are all of them attributed to God and God is but One or One Person though this One proper Person may sustain Three figurative Persons or Personal Characters This is plain dealing and this is his Answer to his first Hard Saying That God is One and Three the same God but Three different Hypostases or Persons That God is One and the same single Person under Three Personal Characters which may be called Three Persons because each of them signifies the True and Proper Person of God And here we see in what sense these Gentlemen allow That each Person is Substance is Mind and Spirit and yet that God is but One Substance One Mind and Spirit viz. in the very same sense that this Author affirms that God is but One single Person and yet that the Father is a Person the Son a Person and the Holy Ghost a Person and for the same reason that they decry and abhor Three Substances Three distinct Minds and Spirits in the Godhead though affirmed to be indivisibly and inseparably One Infinite Substance Mind and Spirit for the same reason they reject Three Intelligent Substantial Persons though our Modern Sabellians have been more cautious generally than this Considerer not to own it in express words Now as for these Terms of Three Substances and Three Minds there may be good reason to let them alone tho when rightly explained no reason to condemn them of Heresy but we must insist on Three Distinct Infinite Intelligent Substantial Persons Each of which is Mind and Substance and One is not the Other If they disown this as the Considerer does they are downright Sabellians if they own it we have no farther Dispute about this matter Let us now consider his other Hard Saying That One of these Three Hypâ—stases or Persâ—ns should be both God and Man Now the Hardness of this Saying is not That it is hard to prove from Scripture that so it is or that it is hard to conceive how God and Man can be united which is all that he touches on But it is and always will be a Hard Saying to the Considerer upon another account that is To reconcile it with a Trinity of One proper single Person and Three Personal Characters The Doctrine of the Incarnation is this That the Eternal Son of God became True and Perfect Man by taking the Human Nature into a Personal Union to himself That the Son only became Man not the Father nor the Holy Ghost That two perfect distinct Natures the Divine and Human Nature were without Confusion united in the One Person of Christ and that this One Person is the Eternal Word and Son of God Now if there be but One single Person in the Godhead and Father Son and Holy Ghost are but Three Names or Personal Characters of this One single Person How can the Son be Incarnate and not the Father nor the Holy Ghost It is only a Person that can be Incarnate for a Personal Character can't be Incarnate without the Person and if there be but One single Person and this same One Person is Father Son and Holy Ghost it is impossible that that Person who is the Son should be Incarnate but the Person who is the Father and the Holy Ghost must be Incarnate also because the same Person who is the Son is the Father and the Holy Ghost The short Question is this Whether a True Proper Divine Person was Incarnate in the Incarnation of Christ If not then Christ was not a Divine Person how Divine soever he might be upon other accounts the Divine Nature did not persâ—nally subsist in him he was not personally True and Perfect God and then the Person of Christ was no more than a Man whatever Divine Influences he might receive from God But if the Divine Nature were truly and properly Incarnate in the Person of Christ then if there be but One single Divine Person in the Godhead but One Divine Nature in the sense of One single Person then the whole Godhead Father Son and Holy Ghost which are but One True and Proper Person was Incarnate in Christ. This is the true difficulty and he is so wise as to take no notice of it It does not appear to me that he believes one word concerning the Incarnation of God or of a True Divine Person he says He that is in Scripture called the Son of God did appear in the likeness of men He certainly was a True Man but that is not our present dispute Was he in his own Person True and Perfect God Was he a Human Person or the Person of the Son of God appearing in Human Nature He was he says in the Form of God before he took the Nature of Man upon him This sounds well but why does he not speak out and tell us what this Form of God is Whether the True Divine Nature subsisting in him a True Divine Person Well But God did suffer himself to be worshipped and adored in and by the Man Christ Iesus the least that can be inferred from which is That God was more immediately and peculiarly present in Christ than ever he was said to have been any where else as in the Heavens the Jewish Temple between the Cherubims in Prophets and Holy Men who spake as they were moved by the Spirit Now all this might have been spared would he but have said That the Person Iesus Christ was worshipped with Divine Honours as being in his own Person True and Perfect God as well as Man and without saying this he says nothing to prove that Christ is the Son of God Incarnate To say That God did suffer himself to be worshipped in and by the Man Christ Iesus as he was worshipped in the Heavens in the Jewish Temple between the Cherubims for that must be the force of the Comparison does no more prove Christ to be God than it proves the Heavens the Iewish Temple and the Cherubims to be God It may prove a more perfect symbolical Presence of God in Christ which he calls the Fulness
must not think that God begets a Son as men do by corporeal passions or division of his substance or that he begets a Son without himself or separate from himself or that because a Creature-father is always older than his Son therefore God can't beget a Son coâ—ternal with himself for all these Circumstances do not belong to the essential Notion of a Father but of a Creature-father But then it is essential to the Notion both of Father and Son that the Father communicates his own Nature to the Son and that the Son receives his Nature and Being from his Father that Father and Son do truly and really subsist by themselves though they may be and when we speak of God the Father and his Son are inseparably united to each other that the Son with respect to his Nature is perfectly the same that his Father is the son of a man as true and perfect Man as his Father is and therefore the Son of God as true and perfect God By these Arguments the Catholick Fathers confuted both the Sabellians who made Father Son and Holy Ghost but Three Names and the Arians who denied the Consubstantiality of the Son or that he had the same Nature with his Father For both these Heresies destroy'd the essential Notion and Idea of Father and Son which includes in it both a real distinction and sameness of Nature that they are as really Two but infinitely more one and the same than any other Father and Son in Nature are Now I cannot see but that as these Names and Characters are better understood and liable to less dispute so they convey to our Minds a more distinct conception of God the Father and his Eternal Son than any other artificial Terms Were there no Controversy about Nature Essence Person Substance Hypostasis yet they immediately convey no Idea of God the Father and his Eternal Son to my mind much less give me a more distinct Conception than these Terms Father and Son do For they neither acquaint me what God is nor what Father and Son is and as the Schools themselves assert cannot be Univocally or in the same sense spoken of Creatures and of God who is Super-Essential above all Praedicaments and Terms of Art that is Nature Essence Substance Hypostasis Person do not and cannot signify the same thing when spoken of God as when applied to Creatures And this has occasioned all those Disputes concerning the Use and Signification of these words when applied to God which indeed is no reason for wholly discarding these Terms which the Perverseness and Importunity of Hereticks has forced the Church to use and which have now been so long used that the Ecclesiastical Sense of these Words is very well known to Learned men if they would be contented to use them in that Received Ecclesiastical Sense in which the Catholick Fathers have always used them but yet it is a reason not to clog the Faith of ordinary Christians with them who are not skilled in Metaphysical and Abstracted Notions and it is a reason to reduce the Controversy as much as possibly we can to Scripture Terms when these Artificial and Metaphysical Terms divide even the Professors of the Catholick Faith and give too just occasion to the vain Boasts and Triumphs of Hereticks To represent this matter plainly I observe That all all those Unscriptural Terms which the Catholick Fathers made use of for the Explication of this Adorable Mystery were intended for no other purpose but to give us some distinct Ideas and Conceptions of what the Scripture teaches concerning the Father the Son and the Holy Ghost by using such Terms as signify something in Creatures which bears some though a very imperfect anology and resemblance to what we are to conceive of God And therefore the Fathers justifie the use of such words by shewing That all they mean by them is contained in Scripture and reject any Words and any such Sense of Artificial Words as cannot be justified by Scripture Which by the way is a more infallible Rule than all Metaphysical Subtleties to find out in what sense the Fathers used such Words by observing to what Scripture-Notions they apply them and how they justifie their use from Scripture when they are Disputed If this be the truth of the Case as it certainly is then the Catholick Faith does not depend upon the use of these Terms for it was before them for they were intended only to explain and illustrate the Catholick Faith and to comprise Scripture-Notions in Terms of Art which must be acknowledged to be of great use and was by experience found to be so in the Disputes with ancient Hereticks while the Fathers agreed in the sense of these Terms But when these Terms themselves are become the great matter of Dispute and men who as is to be hoped agree in the Catholick Faith cannot agree about the Propriety and Signification of such Terms nor how they are to be applied and used whether in the singular or plural Number whether substantively or adjectively in recto or obliquo and our Adversaries abuse such Disputes to the Reproach of the Catholick Faith as a perplex'd uncertain contradictious Riddle and Mystery which men can know nothing of or can never agree in it becomes absolutely necessary at present to take this Controversy out of Terms of Art and to let our Adversaries see That our Controversy with them is not concerned in these Disputes That it is not about the Signification and Use of such words as Essence Nature Substance Person c. but Whether the Supreme Eternal Self-originated Father have not an Eternal Son eternally begotten of himself and an Eternal Spirit the Spirit of the Father and of the Son eternally proceeding from them And whether this Eternal Son and Eternal Spirit are not True and Perfect God In this all sincere Trinitarians do heartily agree with each other and are ready to join issue upon this State of the Controversy with all their Adversaries of what denomination soever And if we can prove from Scripture That God has an Eternal Son begotten of himself and that this Eternal Son is True and Perfect God as the Father is and that the Father and Son have an Eternal Spirit who is True and Perfect God as Father and Son is I hope this is a sufficient Confutation of Socinianism and yet all this may be proved without concerning our selves in any Metaphysical Disputes And therefore such Disputes as these though they give opportunity to our Adversaries to make some Flourishes and to cast Mists before peoples eyes are not of that moment as they would represent them they neither prove Socinianism to be true nor the Catholick Faith of the Trinity to be false or uncertain I do not intend at present to dispute this Point with the Socinians Whether the Son and the Holy Spirit for there is no dispute about the Father be not each of them True and Perfect God This has been proved
often enough already to the satisfaction of all sober Enquirers who pay a just Veneration to Scripture and shall be done again when a fair occasion offers But the Question under Debate now is Whether we cannot explain and defend the Doctrine of the Trinity without the use of Ecclesiastical or Scholastick Terms and whether the Disputes of Divines about the Use and Signification of such Terms proves any Dâ—sagreement in the Faith when they all consent to the Scripture Explications of it The great Dispute is about the Distinction and Unity of the Godhead and by what Terms to express this Wonderful Distinction and Wonderful Vnion as some of the Fathers call it All sincere Trinitarians do agree That God is Vnus Trinus One and Three but we having nothing in Nature like this we know not by what Names to call it Those who have most critically examined the force of words find them all upon some account or other defective or improper for this purpose That St. Austin well said That in these Sublime Mysteries we can no more express what we conceive of them in Words than we can conceive of them as they are When we profess to believe that there are Three in the Unity of the Godhead the next question is What Three they are That is By what common Name to call them which may be multiplied with them or spoken of them in the Plural Number which St. Austin thinks not easily found The Greeks called them Three Hypostases which signifies Three Individual Substances This seemed hard to the Latins who acknowledged but One Substance in the Godhead and therefore they called them Three Persons though this did not satisfy St. Austin who looked upon Person as an Absolute not a Relative Term and therefore the Plural Predications would not agree with his Rule quae ad se dicuntur that what is predicated absolutely must be predicated only in the Singular Number And in truth if this be a good Rule it is a demonstration that there can be no common Name for these Three for whatever is a common Name for them all must be absolutely predicated of each of them And therefore St. Austin could give no other reason why we say Three Persons and not Three Essences or Three Gods but only this That since we acknowledge there are Three it is fitting to agree upon some common Name to denote the Trinity by and Ecclesiastical Use had given this Signification to the word Person But then besides this the great Dispute is What is meant by a Person when applied to the Three in the Blessed Trinity Some adhere to the old approved Definition of a Person That it is the Individual Substance of a Rational Nature which is the very definition of the Greek Hypostasis as Boetius owns Others are afraid of this for if every Person be an Individual Substance and there are Three Persons they know not how to avoid the Consequence That then there are Three Individual Substances in the Trinity And consequently since we can have no other Notion of the Divine Substance but Infinite Mind and Spirit there must be Three Infinite Minds and Spirits in the Godhead which they think infers Three Gods And therefore they will not allow a Person to be a Substance at least not an Individual Substance but a Mode or at most a Mode of Subsistence or Relation or Property or a Person in the Tragedian or Comedian sense of a Person as one represents and personates another or to signify an Office or Magistracy and so one man may be as many several Persons as he has Offices I can't answer for all these different significations of the word Person as applied to this Sacred Mystery especially as they are used by some Modern Writers for I believe there is no such material difference between the Fathers and the Schools as some men imagine of which more hereafter But as to my present purpose I must profess I can see no necessity why we must find out a Common Name for the Three in the Blessed Trinity when the Scripture has given us no Common Name for them much less why we should dispute eternally about the propriety and use of such words to hazard the Catholick Faith at least the Honour and Reputation of it together with the Peace of the Church If I am asked not only Who but What the Three in the Ever-blessed Trinity are I know no better Answer to make than what the Scripture has taught me That they are God the Father God the Son and God the Holy Ghost which signifies all that can be express'd by any Artificial and Unscriptural words is an Answer liable to no Exceptions or Misrepresentations and in which all must agree who believe a Trinity and it shames and silences all those Disputes which are often occasioned by other words though never so wisely and reasonably chosen This Answer shews us what their Nature is what their Distinction is and what Relation they stand in to each other which is the most perfect knowledge we can have of the Ever-blessed Trinity in this world SECT III. That the Title of GOD attributed in Scripture distinctly to Father Son and Holy Ghost gives us the best Account of their Nature and must determine the Signification of Ecclesiastical Words 1. AS for the first the design of some common Name for these Three is to form some common Notion and Idea of them in which they all agree And is any thing else so common to them Is there any thing else which is common to them but the Name and Nature of God Can any thing else give us so true and perfect a Character and Idea of each of them as this does When we say the Father is God the Son is God the Holy Ghost is God we attribute every thing to each of them which signifies any Perfection for the Idea of God comprehends all possible Perfections And we reject every thing which has the least signification of Imperfection we abstract our minds from all Material and Creature-Images which Names common to Creatures are apt to impose upon us and when we are forced to apply any such Names to God we learn from hence in what Notion to understand such Words when applied to God Men may very subtilly distinguish between the formal Conceptions of Nature Essence Substance Hypostasis Existence Subsistence Person Personality Suppositality and the like and neither understand God nor Creatures much the better for it But let them but tell us what they mean by these Terms and then every Child can tell whether they belong to Father Son and Holy Ghost or not For as far as they are included in the Notion of God and signify true Divine Perfections so far they belong to all Three For if the Father be God the Son God and the Holy Ghost God then Father Son and Holy Ghost each of them by themselves are whatever is included in the Notion and Idea of
ask for or to conceive what is the Place of God of the Word or of the Holy Spirit And if a man will deny that the Son is or was begotten because he cannot conceive nor find out the place of his Essence or Substance for the same reason he may deny that there is a Father or that there is a God So that Athanasius acknowledges the Son to be as true and substantial a Son as the Father is a substantial Father and that he does as perfectly and compleatly subsist by himself as the Father does but denies that it hence follows as the Sabellians objected That the Son if he be a distinct substantial Person himself must be divided and parted from the Substance of his Father and that if he subsist distinctly by himself he must subsist in a separate place from his Father that this distinction of Persons and Subsistence cannot be conceived without a Local Separation For he tells them All these Mistakes are owing to Corporeal Imaginations that they conceive of God after the manner of Bodies that because Body cannot generate another without parting and dividing of Substance nor subsist without being in some place nor subsist distinctly without being in distinct and separate places therefore if God beget a Son and this Son subsist distinctly by himself this Son must go out of the Divine Substance and be locally separated from God the Father as a human Son is from his Father whereas the Divine Nature and Substance cannot be divided nor does God subsist in a place and therefore the Son may be substantially begotten of the Father and subsist distinctly by himself without any division of the Divine Substance or separation of place Let us now proceed to a Third sort of these Hereticks who did allow a real and substantial difference between Father Son and Holy Ghost but made God a compound Being but one Person as well as one God and that Father Son and Holy Ghost were the Three Parts of this One God This St. Austin calls Triformis Deus and tells us That these Hereticks did not allow the Father to be Perfect in himself nor the Son Perfect in himself nor the Holy Ghost Perfect in himself that neither of these considered by themselves were Perfect God but that all Three together made one Compleat and Perfect God This all the Catholick Fathers unanimously reject and for the same reasons because there can be no composition in the pure and simple Nature of God and it was the received Doctrine of the Catholick Church That each Person is by himself True and Perfect God not an incompleat Part of the Deity Thus Athanasius warns us against this Heresy which conceives the Trinity like Three Bodily Parts inseparably united to each other which he says is an ungodly reasoning contrary to the Nature of Perfect Unbodied Beings and therefore attributes the Perfection of the Godhead to each Person who are a real Trinity inseparably united in the same Form and Nature That the Father is Perfect Essence and Being without any defect the Root and Fountain of the Son and Spirit That the Son in the Fulness of the Deity is the Living Word and Perfect Offspring of the Father That the Spirit is the Fulness of the Son not Part of another Being but Whole and Entire in himself That we must conceive them inseparably united to each other but yet Three real subsisting Persons in the same Form and Species which is originally in the Father shines in the Son and is manifested by the Holy Spirit And therefore he adds That he did not compound the Trinity nor force it into a Monad or Unit that is One single Person to preserve the Unity of the Godhead nor conceive of God as of a Man who is compounded of Three Parts Spirit Soul and Body for such a composition cannot belong to a simple Nature This is the constant language of the ancient Writers That the Divine Nature is not compounded of Parts nor is God a compound Being that each Person in the Trinity is a complete and perfect Person and Three complete and perfect Persons cannot be One by Composition as Three incomplete Parts are that each Person by himself is perfect God and perfect Essence though when we unite them and number Three we acknowledge but One perfect God for the Deity is not compounded but in Three each of which is complete and perfect there is One perfect Being without Composition and without Parts that is the same One Divine Nature subsisting distinctly not by Parts or Composition but Whole and Entire in Three Let us now then consider the true state of the Question between these Sabellians and the Catholick Fathers These Hereticks owned at last Father Son and Holy Ghost to be Three distinct Substances but not Three substantial Wholes but Three substantial Parts which by their Union and Composition made up One whole intire God The Catholick Fathers join with them so far as to own these Divine Persons to be Three substantial subsisting Persons but reject their Notion of a compounded God or Three Parts of the Deity with the utmost abhorrence and affirm that each Person is by himself entire and perfect God perfect and complete Divine Essence or Substance 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Damascen speaks and that they are not One God by Composition or as One Person is One God but as Three complete and perfect Persons each of which is perfect God can be One God Now I think after this we need not dispute what the Metaphysical Notions of Person and Personality are for a Person in this Sacred Mystery signifies One who is true and perfect God and therefore is whatever God is for the true and perfect definition of God must belong to every Person who is true and perfect God If then we acknowledge God to be Infinite Substance Mind Life Knowledge Power every Person who is God must be all this and if each Person be true and perfect God and yet no One Person is the other nor the Motion Affection or personal Power nor part of the other then each Person is distinctly and by himself complete and perfect God and therefore has distinctly in himself all those Attributes and Perfections which belong to the perfect Notion and Idea of God and to make any Person less than what God is is to make him no God But Athanasius has another Argument against the Sabellian compounded Deity which must put all Compositions of the Deity for ever out of countenance The Scripture assures us that God sends his Son and that the Son sends the Holy Ghost whereas were the Father Son and Holy Ghost Three inseparable Parts of one compounded Deity how could this One God Father Son and Holy Ghost send part of himself and one part of the same One God send another To send and to be sent necessarily supposes Persons really and substantially distinct such as can give and receive and execute Commands who
He and the Father are One as he himself says The Word is always in the Father and the Father in the Word as it is with Light and its Splendor and this is what the Homoousion signifies and in like manner he resolves the Sameness Identity and Unity of Nature into this Internal Inseparable Union and Inbeing of Three essentially related to each other in One Individual Divinity 4 thly That Mutual Inbeing of the Divine Persons which is their Inseparable and Essential Union that the Father is in the Son and the Son in the Father which the Greeks call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the Latins Circumincessio can be understood only between the Relatives of the same Individual Essence and Substance The true compleat Notion of this Inbeing or Perichoresis is not merely a Mutual Presence or the same Vbi that where-ever one is there the other is or a kind of Immeation and Penetration of each other which is a Corporeal Notion and rejected as such by the Catholick Fathers when they speak of this Divine Inbeing as St. Hilary expressly does inesse autem non aliud in alio ut corpus in corpore that they are not in each other as one Body is in another Body And when the Arians objected against our Saviour's saying I am in the Father and the Father in me How can this be in that and that in this Or how can the Father who is greater be at all in the Son who is less Or what wonder is it that the Son should be in the Father when it is written of us all That in him we live and move and have our being Athanasius answers That this is all owing to Corporeal Conceits as if they apprehended God to be a Body not considering the Nature of the True Father and true Son the Invisible and Eternal Light and its Invisible Splendor an Invisible Substance and its unbodied Character and Image But the true Notion of this Inbeing and Pericharesis is the Perfect Unity of the same Individual Nature in Three That the Nature and Essence of the Father is in the Son that the Son is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Character Image Mind Divinity of the Father Here as Athanasius observes our Saviour himself lays the Reason and Foundation of this Mutual Inbeing He first tells us I and my Father are One and then adds I am in the Father and the Father in me that he might shew the Sameness and Identity of the Godhead and the Unity of Essence For they are One not One divided into two Parts and nothing more than One for they are Two the Father is the Father and not the Son and the Son is the Son and not the Father but there is but One Nature for he that is begotten is not unlike in Nature to him that begets but is his Image and all that the Father hath is the Sons There is no need to multiply Quotations to this purpose which may be met with every where The Father is in the Son and the Son in the Father as the Nature of the Father is lives and subsists in the Son not a Nature like the Fathers but the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Father 's own proper Nature and Essence they are in each other as being essentially One not One merely as being in each other as it is possible Three may be and yet not be essentially One but Three as Three compleat absolute Minds would be Three still though they should perfectly penetrate each other Or as Three Candles in the same Room are Three Lights though they are perfectly united in One But Original Mind its Word and Spirit are and must be in each other as being Three in One Individual Essence for the same undivided Essence can't be whole and entire in Three but those Three must be in each other If the Divinity of the Father is in the Son the Father is in the Son and the Son in the Father the Mind is in its Word and the Word in the Mind The Son is in the Father as eternally begotten in the Substance of the Father whole of whole and essentially one and the same as the Word is in the Mind not by such an Union and Penetration as we may suppose between two Minds but as conceived in the Mind and essentially one and the same with it Now according to this Representation which all the Catholick Fathers make of this Mystery we must of necessity acknowledge Number without Multiplication Distinction without Division or Separation a perfect Trinity in perfect Unity Three Persons each of which is by himself True and Perfect God but not Three Gods but One God A Mind and its Word are two and a living subsisting Word is true and perfect Mind Mind of Mind and yet not two Minds but one Mind for the Mind and its Word are essentially One as all Men must confess the Word is in the Mind and the Mind in the Word and therefore identically one and the same for which reason the Fathers acknowledge that the Father is Spirit the Son Spirit and the Holy Ghost Spirit and these are Three but not Three Spirits as essentially related to each other in the same individual Essence essentially the same and essentially in each other And thus Will of Will Wisdom of Wisdom Life of Life Power of Power though they multiply and distinguish Persons do not multiply Wills Wisdoms Lives Powers which are essentially One as the Mind its Word and Spirit are One They are not One Life One Will One Understanding One Power in the Sense of but One who Lives who Wills who Understands and has Power but as the same identically the same Life and Will c. is in each of them and indivisibly and inseparably in them all And this gives an account of the Unity of Operation wherein the Catholick Fathers unanimously place the Unity of God for One Almighty Agent is but One God and One Essential Will Wisdom and Power can be but One Agent and Infinite Original Mind and its Eternal subsisting Word can have but One Will and Wisdom and Power for the Will and Wisdom of the Mind is in its Word the same not merely specifically the same or the same by consent as it may be between Two Minds which Will perfectly the same thing but the same One Individual Will the Father Wills and the Son Wills and they both Will distinctly but with one Individual Will as it is impossible that the Word should Will with any other Will but the Will of that Mind whose Word it is And therefore Father Son and Holy Ghost though Three Eternal Infinite Living Intelligent Willing Persons which Subsist and Act distinctly yet being that to each other in a more perfect and excellent manner that Mind its Word and Spirit are in Men they must be as perfectly One Almighty Agent as a created Mind is which Wills and Acts in its Word and Spirit The Distinction and Unity of
he allows to be a good Argument against the Arians which he could not have done had he not allowed this Consciousness in the Trinity but then observes That the Arians did as effâ—ctually consute them as to the distinction of Persons and thus between them both the Catholick Faith of a real distinction of Persons in the Sameness and Conscious Unity of Nature was vindicated In short If the whole Divine Nature is conscious to it self as every Created Mind is conscious to all that is in it self and the Three Divine Persons subsist in the Individual Unity of the same Nature then these Divine Persons must be intimately and mutually conscious to each other as a Mind its Word and Spirit are and however Men please to philosophize about this as to the prius posterius whether they will make the Unity of Nature the cause of this mutual Consciousness and therefore in order of Nature prior to it or make mutual Consciousness not the cause of this Unity but the Essential Union of Three Distinct Subsisting Persons in the Unity of the same Individual Nature I will not contend with any Man which of these speak most properly Consciousness is the Unity of an Intelligent Nature and the mutual Consciousness of Persons in the same Nature and the Conscious Unity of Nature in Three Distinct Persons is the same thing We cannot conceive the Unity of a Mind without Consciousness nor any other kind of Unity of a Mind but a Conscious Unity nor can we conceive an Internal Essential Consciousness without an Essential Unity and if the mutual Consciousness of Persons in the same Nature is the Consciousness of Nature I cannot see why we may not say That it is at least One Notion of the Unity of Nature too But to return where I left off if this may be called a a Digression what I have now said is sufficient to shew how necessary this Doctrine of Relations is to give us a sensible notion of a Trinity in Unity To assert a Real Trinity we must assert Three Real Distinct Subsisting Substantial Intelligent Persons neither of which is each other and each of which is by himself in his own proper Person True and Perfect God But this say Sabellians Arians and Socinians is to assert Three Gods which the Catholick Church always abhorred the thoughts of Now how the Fathers answered this Charge and vindicated the Divine Unity in a Trinity of Real Subsisting Persons I have already particularly shown as by the Consubstantiality the perfect Sameness and Identity of Nature whole of whole their Inseparability and Unity of Operation but we can form no distinct Idea of all this but only among Personal Subsisting Relatives of the same Individual Nature Whatever is not this is a meer Specifick Consubstantiality and Identity of Nature and an External Union how inseparable soever it be which must make a number of Individuals in the Divine as well as Human Nature but now it is plain to a Demonstration That if God hath an Eternal Subsisting Word and an Eternal Subsisting Spirit they can be but One Individual Essence as a Man's Mind and Word and Spirit are One and therefore all Three but One God as a Man with his Mind and Word and Spirit iâ— but One Man which is an Intelligible Notion of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 One Individual Essence and Godhead For though the Word of God be a Person which a Mâ—n's Word is not yet if his true Nature and Character is the Word he is the same to the Eternal Mind which a Man's Word is to his Created Mind and therefore God and his Living Subsisting Word must be One Individual Essence as a Man's Mind and his Word are One a Word must be conceived and begotten of the Mind and can have no other Substance if it be a Living Substantial Word but that of the Mind and if it be a perfect Word the perfect Image of the Mind it must be whole of whole all that the Mind is for the whole Mind is in its perfect Word and Image and lives and subsists in it and the whole Word in the Mind So that the Câ—eternity the Coequality the Consubstantiality the Identity the Inseparability the Unity of Operation between God and his Word is so far from being Jargon Contradiction Unintelligible Nonsense that iâ— God have an Eternal Word it is self-evident that thus it must be When we contemplate the Consubstantiality of Father and Son under the notion of Substance we can form no Idea of a whole which is of a whole that the Father should communicate his whole Essence and Substance to the Son and be the whole himself and this is no great wonder since we can form no Idea at all of the Divine Substance but we can very well understand That the Whole Mind must be in its Word that the Eternal Mind and its Word must be Consubstantial Coeternal Coequal Two but perfectly the same inseparably in each other for all this is included in the very Relation and Notion of a Mind and its Word I 'm sure a Living Subsisting Word which is not Consubstantial Coeternal Coequal with that Eternal Mind whose Word it is that a Mind should be without its Word that an Infinite Eternal Mind which is perfect Life and Being should have a vanishing perishing Word as Man has not a living subsisting Word that a Mind and its Word should ever be parted that the Word should not be and subsist in the Mind and the Mind in the Word I say all this contradicts all the Notions we have of a Mind and its Word We cannot immediately and directly contemplate the Divine Nature and Essence which is so infinitely above us and therefore we must contemplate it in such Ideas and Representations as God himself makes of it and if they are such as we can form an intelligible notion of we have no reason to complain of unintelligible Mysteries and Contradictions though when we reduce it into Terms of Art we find our Minds confounded and perplext and unable to form any distinct and easy Ideas The Arians to avoid the Consubstantiality of the Son with the Father would not allow the Term Substance to be used of God the Catholick Fathers proved that Substance is in Scripture used concerning God and that the Arians could not reasonably reject it because they used it themselves for though they would not own the Son to be of the same Substance with the Father they taught that he was of another Substance which still is to own Substance in God But though God be in the most true and absolute sense perfect Essence and Being the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or according to St. Ambrose his derivation of the Word which shews what he meant by it whether it shews his skill in Greek or not that Essence and Substance is that which always is and that which always is is God and therefore God is Essence and Substance and a
and Son to the Eternal Spirit and all Three are Infinite in Wisdom Power and Goodness and all other Divine Perfections This is but One Divinity One Godhead for there is not a Second and Third Divinity in the Son and in the Holy Spirit but the One Divinity of the Father But yet we must confess that here is Number Father Son and Holy Ghost are Three and how can that Divinity which is perfectly and distinctly in Three be One Individual Nature One Numerically One as Human Nature in every particular Man is One Now this must be resolved into the second Notion of Essential for Essential Productions for all Essential Productions in the Unity of Nature though they may be distinguished and numbred among themselves are but One Individual Nature It will be in vain to seek for an Example of this in Created Nature and I believe the reason of it will be evident without it An Eternal Self-originated Mind is True and Perfect God the First Supreme Cause of all things and has all the Perfections of the Divinity wholly in it self is the One and only True God But if it be essential to an Eternal Mind to have an Eternal Living Subsisting Word and Spirit by an Eternal Generation and Procession then this Eternal Word and Spirit are essential to an Eternal Mind not as Essential Perfections or Essential Parts but as Essential Productions or Processions in the Unity and Identity of Nature Thus the Scripture represents this Mystery That there is One God who has an Eternal Word and an Eternal Spirit and the Catholick Fathers as I have already observed insist on this as a natural Demonstration of a Trinity That the Eternal Mind must have its Eternal Word and Eternal Spirit Now if the Eternal Word and Eternal Spirit are essential to the Eternal Mind it is certain that Father Son and Holy Ghost the Eternal Mind its Word and Spirit are but One Individual Divinity every thing that is essential is included in the Notion of an Individual Nature for that is not a Compleat and Perfect Nature nor an adequate notion of Nature that wants any thing that is essential Now though we may have a general Notion and Idea of a God That he is an Absolutely Perfect Being which Includes all the Divine Attributes and Perfections without knowing any thing of the Son or Holy Ghost yet if we consider this Absolutely Perfect Being as Eternal Self-originated Mind with its Eternal Word and Spirit as essential Productions or Processions we can consider them no otherwise but as One Individual Divinity this Eternal Word and Spirit being essential Processions of the Eternal Mind which can never be separated from it For such essential Processions are not only coeval and consubstantial with the Nature from whence they proceed as the Sun its Light and Heat by which Argument the Catholick Fathers proved the Coeternity and Consubstantiality of the Son and Holy Spirit with the Eternal Father but whatever distinction there is between them they are One Individual Nature if all that be One Individual Nature which is essential to such a Being and such all essential Processions are as well as essential Perfections These are two very different Questions and of a very different consideration What God is and Who this God is In an answer to the first we form the Idea and Notion of all Divine Perfections or of an absolutely Perfect Being which is the true notion of the Divinity and whoever has all these Divine Perfections is True and Perfect God and this is our natural notion of God as that signifies the Divinity which gives no notice of any distinction in the Divinity for there can be no diversity in Absolute Perfections and therefore no distinction or number according to the Philosophy of the Fathers But when we consider who God is or what is the Subject of all these Divine Perfections we can form no other Idea of it but an Eternal Infinite Self originated Mind this the Wisest Philosophers as well as Christians are agreed in That God is an Infinite Mind and this rightly explained may teach us some distinction in the Divinity for all Men must grant what they feel in themselves that every Mind has its Word and Spirit and cannot be conceived without them and therefore the Eternal Mind must have its Eternal word and Spirit too and the reason why this did not lead all Mankind into the natural belief of a Trinity of Persons Mind Word and Spirit in the Unity of the Godhead was plainly this Because they found that their own Word and Spirit were not permanent subsisting Persons but were the perishing Creatures of the Mind which were no sooner produced but died and vanished as our Thoughts do and thus they conceived it was with the Divine Mind which is one kind of Sabellianism as I observed above But yet the Catholick Fathers thought this natural belief That the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that the Divinity or Divine Mind is not without its Word a very proper Medium to prove a real subsisting Word in the Divinity for an Infinite Perfect Mind which is all Life Being Substance if it begets its own Word as every Mind does must beget a Living Substantial Subsisting Word the perfect Image and Character of its own Life and Infinite Being However thus much I think we must own That since every Mind must have its Word and Spirit in the Individual Unity of its own Nature and the Holy Scripture assures us that God who is the most perfect Mind has his Word and Spirit and that this Divine Word and Spirit is an Eternal Living Subsisting Word and Spirit this is a very good foundation for the belief of a Real Trinity both from Reason and Scripture The natural Notion and Idea of a Mind teaches us this distinction in the Divinity and Natural Reason strongly infers from the perfect Productions of an infinitely perfect Mind that the Divine Word and Spirit must be an Eternal Living Infinite Word and Spirit and the Holy Scripture confirms all this And therefore Scripture and Reason are so far from contradicting each other in this Article that the Belief of the Trinity though it be ultimately resolved into the Authority of Revelation yet has Reason on its side as far as it can judge of such matters Which proves a considerable Authority when the obscure and imperfect Conjectures of Reason are explained and confirmed by Revelation For though the Notion of an absolutely perfect Being which is the Natural Idea of the Divinity teaches no such distinction yet the Idea of an Infinitely Perfect and Self-originated Mind which is as natural a Notion of God does Thus Damascen teaches us to distinguish between the Divinity and in what the Divinity is or to speak more accurately what is the Divinity and that which proceeds eternally from this First Cause that is the Hypostases of the Son and Holy Spirit the first teaches us
that there is but One Divinity the second shews the distinction of Persons in the Unity of the Divine Nature But then which is what I intended in all this this very distinction proves one individual Divinity because it is in the individual Unity of the same Numerical not Specifick Nature for all essential Processions as the Eternal Word and Spirit are which cannot so much as in Thought be separated from Original Mind must continue in the Unity of the same individual Nature This is what the Fathers meant by the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the One common Divinity which is individually One in Three perfect Hypostases Father Son and Holy Ghost The Divinity of the Father of Eternal Self-originated Mind is the common Divinity communicated to the Eternal Word and Spirit in the individual Unity of Nature 2. Now this will give us some Notion of the distinction of Nature and Persons in the Eternal Godhead I say Persons not Person which I take to be the fundamental Mistake which has obscured and perplex'd this Mystery Men have rack'd their Inventions to find out some distinction between Nature and Person in every single Person in the Godhead which it is certain these Fathers never thought of though their Attempt to distinguish between Nature and Person in every Man gave some occasion to this Mistake But I have already proved both from Fathers and Schoolmen That when they spoke distinctly of each particular Person they made Person and Nature the same That the Person of the Father is the Nature of the Father and the Person of the Son the Nature of the Son Nor indeed had they any occasion to distinguish between Nature and Person in each single Person which could do no service in this Mystery For the true reason and occasion for this distinction was to reconcile the Individual Unity of the Divine Nature with a Trinity of real Hypostases or Persons how One Nature can subsist in Three distinct Hypostases and continue One Individual Nature Which had been no difficulty at all were not each Divine Person by himself the Divine Nature But how the Divine Nature should subsist whole and perfect in Three distinct Persons and not be Three distinct Natures but One Nature and One Divinity not specifically but individually and numerically One This was the difficulty they were concerned to answer which the distinction between Nature and Person in each single Person could not answer For let us suppose such a distinction as this whatever it be if the Divine Nature subsist whole and perfect in each distinct Person the difficulty still remains how the Persons are distinct and the Nature individually One As to put the Case in Human Nature whatever distinction we allow between Nature and Person in every particular Man if we allow that every Man has Human Nature as distinctly in himself as he is a distinct Person the distinction between Nature and Person can never prove the Individual Numerical Unity of Human Nature in Three Men. The Question then is Not how Nature and Person is distinguish'd in each single Person much less how Three Persons in One singular Nature are distinguished from that singular Nature which unavoidably reduces a Trinity of Persons to an unintelligible Trinity of Modes but How the Three Persons in the Ever-blessed Trinity which are Three in number and each of them the Divine Nature are distinguished from that One Individual Divinity which is in them all or rather which they all are Now what I have already said seems to me to give a very intelligible Notion of this viz. That the Divine Nature which is but One is the Eternal Self-originated Divinity with its Eternal Essential Processions or Productions which as I have already shewn are but One not Singular but Individual Nature and Individual Divinity But then this One Self-originated Divinity is most certainly an Infinite Eternal Self-originated Person if Infinite Eternal Self-originated Mind be a Person and these Eternal Essential Processions are Persons also if an Eternal Living Subsisting Word be a Person and an Eternal Living Subsisting Spirit be a Person and then it is evident that there are Three Eternal Subsisting Persons in the Individual Unity of Nature These Divine Processions do not multiply nor divide the Divine Nature because they are essential to an Infinite Mind and are Processions ad intra in the perfect Identity 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and Individual Unity of Nature but they are distinct Persons as being Eternal Subsisting Living Intelligent Processions which is all that we mean by Persons in this Mystery with reference to the Eternal Word and Spirit For these Three Divine Persons have their different Characters and Order whereby they are distinguished from each other which the Fathers call the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by which they meant their different manner of subsisting in the Individual Unity of the Divine Nature that though they have all the same Divinity as that signifies all Divine Perfections yet they have it after a different manner that is as they constantly explain it Vnbegotten Begotten and Proceeding as the Athanasian Creed teaches us to believe The Father is made of none neither created nor begotten The Son is of the Father alone not made nor created but begotten The Holy Ghost is of the Father and of the Son neither made nor created nor begotten but proceeding This is the only distinction which the Catholick Fathers allow between the Three Divine Persons and let us consider the nature of it Now 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies actual Existence and that which does actually exist and therefore the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signify that there are Three that do actually exist but after a different manner That is That the Father is Unbegotten Self-originated Divinity is God of himself without any other cause of his Being and this Self-originated Unbegotten Divinity is the Person of the Father and in the highest and most absolute sense the One God The Son is Eternally begotten of his Father's Substance and lives and subsists in him and so the Holy Ghost Eternally proceeds from Father and Son That is There is One Eternal Self-originated Divinity with its two Eternal Processions in the perfect Unity and Identity of the same Nature The Father's manner of subsistence is easily understood and secures to him the Prerogative of the One True God but we must shew this a little more plainly with reference to the Son and Holy Spirit each of which is by himself True and Perfect God but not a Second and Third God The right understanding of which depends upon the true stating of their different manners of subsistence And here I need only refer to what I have already discoursed concerning the difference between an Absolute Nature and Relative Subsistencies in the same Nature An Absolute Nature is a whole Compleat Nature with all that essentially belongs to such a Nature as every perfect Man has all that belongs essentially to the Nature of Man
them though Separate Vbi's may prove them Separate But still what is all this to the Unity of God Why he tells us It is plain at first sight that we cannot possibly conceive God under any difference of Position I add further That we cannot conceive God under any Position and therefore the Unity of Position can never belong to the Vnity of God But the reason he gives why we can't conceive God under any difference of Position is because we cannot exclude Omnipotence from any imaginable point of Space nor can we include it in it which proves that God has no Position but is present without Position as he is without Extension and without Parts God needs no place to subsist in but is Place to himself and Place to every thing else as the Hebrews called God Makâ—m or Place according to S. Paul's Notion of it That in him we live move and have our being that as all things receive Being by his Almighty Word so all things subsist in Infinite Mind as the Ideas and Notions of things do in Finite Minds God could not create any thing without himself because there is nothing extra without him and this is the Omnipresence of God not his Commensuration to Infinite Space which is a gross Corporeal Representation of Omnipresence by Infinite Extension or Commensuration to Infinite Extension and makes something else as Infinite as God viz. Infinite Space which must be commensurate to God if God be commensurate to Space but the Omnipresence of God is his Comprehension of all things in himself And yet his way of proving the Omnipresence of God from his Omnipotence That we cannot exclude Omnipotence from any imaginable Point of Space if by Omnipresence he means an Essential Omnipresence as he must do here is not so self-evident as he seems to think it The only foundation of it is this That nothing can act where it is not which holds true only where Contact is necessary to Action that is only in Bodies whose Power consists in Contact or touching each other but any Being which acts without Contact as God certainly does may be Omnipotent without being Omnipresent that is may act at an Infinite distance without any Local Presence with the thing on which it acts It is the first time to the best of my remembrance that ever I met with this Notion That 't is the limited Powers and Faculties of Created Beings which are the foundation of all local distinction Finite Creatures indeed have finite and limited Powers but it is not the limitation of their Powers and Faculties but of their Presence which makes a local or Vbi distinction If this were so Power must be proportioned to Presence which we know is false for the greatest things which fill the largest space are not the most powerful Spirits which fill no space at all have the greatest Power and most enlarged Faculties But it is time to see the Pinch of this Argument from the Vnity of Position and the Sum of it is this Whatever is One must be in some One Place or Vbi which distinguishes and separates it from other things That he cannot conceive the distinction of two or three Beings from each other without considering them in so many different Places or Localities That God is Omnipresent and he can no more conceive Three Omnipresent than he can conceive Three straight Lines drawn between the same Points That is in plain English There are not Three Distinct Infinite Spaces for Three Distinct Omnipresent Persons to be in and therefore there cannot be a Trinity of True and Proper Persons but as there is but One Omnipresent Divine Nature so there can be but One single Omnipresent Person and there is an end of the Trinity till we can find room in the world for Three Persons each of whom is Omnipresent I perceive our Considerer has not been so fair and equal as he pretended to be He would not consult the Fathers for fear of Prejudices and Prepossessions but either good Wits jump or he has taken care to consult the Ancient Hereticks for this was the old Sabellian Argument which was long since answered and scorned by Athanasius as he will find in the Chapter of Sabellianism to which I refer him and the Reader But in good earnest does any sober Christian want an Answer to this Argument Does God then fill a Space as Bodies do that Three Divine Omnipresent Persons must have Three separate Localities and be commensurate to Three Infinite Spaces Has God any Place does he subsist in any thing but himself If the Considerer can't conceive any Beings to be distinct without distinct Localities How does he distinguish God from Creatures when he owns that God is in every imaginable Point of Space that is in the very same Vbi's and Localities whereever any Creatures are But do not all Catholick Christians own That there is but One Infinite Inseparable Undivided Nature in Three Persons And must this One Undivided Monad be in Three separate Localities because it subsists in three distinct Persons especially when these distinct Persons are whole and entire in each other as our Saviour assures us I am in the Father and the Father in me And is not this a wonderful demonstration against Three Real and Proper Persons in the Trinity That there cannot be Three such Infinite Omnipresent Persons unless they subsist in Three Infinite and Separate Localities But enough of this in all reason These are the Premises from whence with so much open Assurance and Confidence he draws that Sabellian Conclusion That the Idea of God being really but One simple Idea can be applied but to One single Person in the first sense of the word Person as it signifies a particular Intelligent Being Nature or Principle From whence he says it follows that according to the Notions we are capable of framing of Vnity and Distinction all the Personal distinction we can conceive in the Deity must be founded on some accessory Ideas extrinsecal to the Divine Nature So that there is not a Trinity in the Divine Nature as the Catholick Church has always believed but the Divine Nature which really is but One single Person is a Trinity with respect to something which does not belong to the Divine Nature but is extrinsecal to it Whether these be not New Terms and New Doctrine too unknown to the Catholick Church or known only as condemned Heresies I appeal to all men who will consult any Catholick Historian or any Catholick Father without prejudice And here I might reasonably enough break off for I have followed the Considerer till we have heard him demonstrate against a Trinity of Real Proper Persons in the Unity of the Godhead which puts an end to the whole Dispute about a Trinity in Vnity because there is no such thing He has found out indeed a Unity for God but it is not a Unity in Trinity but the Unity of One single Person and he has
Homoousion which he afterwards readily received when the Council had declared in what sense they understood it and rejected all corporeal passions all division and partition change and diminution of the Divine Essence which pure simple unbodied eternal unchangeable Mind is not capable of Now all that I shall observe at present is That this very Objection which was thought so formidable necessarily supposes that both they who made it and they who were so much concerned to answer it did acknowledge a substantial generation of the Son for this whole Dispute is downright Nonsense without it If God the Father in begetting his Son does not so communicate his own Nature and Substance to him as to make him a true substantial Son of the same Substance indeed but yet as distinct in Substance from the Father as he is in Person How ridiculous is all this Dispute how the Father communicates his own Nature to his Son for according to these men he does not communicate or propagate his own Nature and Substance at all there being but one singular solitary Divine Nature and Substance with a Trinity of Names Modes or Offices and therefore no danger of any division or partition of the Divine Substance The Dispute between the Catholicks and the Arians about the generation of the Son was this They both owned against the Sabellians that the Son is a real substantial subsisting Person but the Question was whence he had his Nature whether he was created out of Nothing and consequently had a beginning of Being as the Arians affirmed or was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the Substance of his Father and so coeternal with his Father as the Nicene Council affirmed That the Substance of the Son was of the Substance of the Father God of God Light of Light Against this the Arians objected That the Son could not be of the Substance of the Father without the division of the Father's Substance which is impossible in an infinite uncreated Spirit as God is which Argument is only against a substantial generation The Nicene Fathers allow this Objection to be good as to corporeal generations but deny that it is thus as to the Eternal Generation of the Son of God for an Eternal Uncreated Immutable Mind if it can communicate its own Nature at all and we learn from Scripture that God has a Son must do it without division of parts for the Divine Nature and Substance has no parts and is capable of no division And it is very absurd to reason from corporeal Passions to the Affections and Operations of Spirits much more of an infinite eternal Spirit Had not the Arians understood the Catholick Fathers of the substantial Generation of the Son they had more wit than to urge an Argument to no purpose for where there is no communication of Substance it is certain there can be no division of it And had not the Catholick Fathers owned this substantial Generation they would have rejected the Argument with scorn as nothing to the purpose and not have distinguished between corporeal generations and the Generation of Eternal and Infinite Mind That though Bodies cannot communicate their own Nature and Substance without division yet an Eternal Mind can so that from these perverse Interpretations of the Homoousion which the Catholick Fathers rejected we may learn what they meant by it for if Father and Son are not Consubstantial in the sense of the Sabellians and Modalists that is that Father and Son are not One Person with Two Names nor One singular solitary Substance common to them both then the Father must be a substantial Father and the Son a substantial Son and these Two substantial Persons are Consubstantial as having the same One Divine Nature and Substance intirely perfectly and distinctly in themselves without any division diminution or separation of Substance by a complete and perfect Generation whereby the Father communicates his whole intire Nature to the Son without any change or alteration in himself SECT II. Some Rules for expounding the Homoousion and in what Sense the Fathers understood it SEcondly Let us now examine what account the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers give of the Homoousion and in what sense they understood it But before I tell you what they expresly say of this matter I shall observe by the way two or three Rules they give us for expounding the Homoousion which are of great use in this Enquiry 1. The first is To give the Homoousion the right place in our Creed as the Nicene Fathers have done They do not tell us abruptly in the first place That the Son is consubstantial or of one Substance with the Father They first tell us That Jesus Christ our Lord is the only-begotten Son of God begotten of his Father that is of the Substance of his Father before all Worlds God of God Light of Light Very God of Very God Begotten not made and then they add Of One Substance with the Father This St. Hilary lays great stress on and his Reason is very considerable because if in the first place we say Father and Son are consubstantial or of One Substance this is capable of an Heretical as well as Orthodox Sense as we have already heard for they may be One Substance in the Sabellian Notion as that signifies One Person or One by the Division or Partition of the same Substance of which each has a part for all these perverse Senses may be affix'd to it when this word Consubstantial or One Substance stands singly by it self or is put in the first place without any thing to limit or determine its signification And therefore a true Catholick Christian must not begin his Creed with saying That Father and Son are of One Substance but then he may safely say One Substance when he has first said The Father is unbegotten the Son is born and subsists of his Father like to his Father in all Perfections Honour and Nature not of nothing but born not unborn but coaeval not the Father but the Son of the Father not a Part of the Father but All that the Father is not the Author but the Image the Image of God begotten of God and born God not a Creature but God not Another God of a different Kind and Substance but One God as having the same Essence and Nature which differs in nothing from the Substance of the Father that God is One not in Person but Nature Father and Son having nothing unlike or of a different kind in them And after this we may safely add That Father and Son are One Substance and cannot deny it without Sin This is as plain as words can make it and needs no Comment but fixes and determines the Catholick Sense of the Homoousion For if we must acknowledge the Son to be consubstantial or of one Substance with the Father in no other sense than as a True and Real Son is consubstantial a Son not created out of Nothing but
Peter Iames and Iohn is the very same and therefore there is a specifick Sameness and Unity of Nature between them The Divine Nature in Father Son and Holy Ghost is the same not merely in Notion and Idea but Substantially the same and therefore all the names of a Specifick Sameness and Unity do in a more perfect and excellent manner belong to the Sameness and Unity of the Divine Nature as Subsisting Perfectly Indivisibly and yet Distinctly in Father Son and Holy Ghost And when we speak of the Sameness of the Divine Nature as subsisting distinctly in Three Divine Persons we have no other words to express it by but such as signify a Specifick Unity and we must use such words as we have and qualifie their sense as well as we can As for instance Those words whereby we signify a common specifick Nature which is One and the Same in all the Individuals of the same Species are the best we have to express the Unity of the Divine Nature as common to Three Persons and thus the Catholick Fathers use them without scruple and speak of the Unity of the Divine Nature and of its being common to all the Three Divine Persons in the same Words and Phrases as they use concâ—rning a common specifick Nature Which leads some into a great mistake as if they meant no more by it but a specifick Sameness and Unity of the Divine Nature that Father Son and Holy Ghost have one Substance no otherwise than as Peter Iames and Iohn have one and the same Humane Nature For the Divine Nature is not One merely 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not in mere Notion and Idea but actually indivisibly inseparably One nor is it a common Nature merely as it has a common Name and Definition but by an actual Inexistence in Three For the same reason it is very difficult what Three to call Father Son and Holy Ghost so as to avoid the Heresies of both Extreams for there is no Example of such Three in Nature They are certainly Three for the Father is not the Son nor the Holy Ghost nor the Son the Father or the Holy Ghost and each of the Three is perfect God and therefore an Infinite Mind an Infinite Spirit and the most Perfect Essence and Substance And that Substance which is the Person of the Son is not that Substance which is the Person of the Father no more than the Person of the Son is the Person of the Father or an unbegotten is a begotten Nature and Substance and therefore in opposition to Sabellius they asserted Three Substantial Persons 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Three Hypostases or Personal Substances as Hypostasis signifies tria in substantia tres substantias tres res 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and yet at the same time did assert That there is but One Divine Nature and Substance which indivisibly and inseparably though distinctly subsists in all Three For the understanding of which we must observe That as the Divine Nature which is common to Three is not a mere Species but is really and actually One and the same in all so these Three Divine Persons which have one and the same common Nature are not in a strict and proper notion Individuals of the same common Nature Though we have no Names for these Three but such as signify Individuals as Persons Hypostases Subsistences c. and there being no Created Person Hypostasis or Subsistence but what is an Individual To shew you the difference with respect to the notion of an Individual between the Three Divine Persons and three individual Humane Persons I observe That every Humane Person is such an Individual as has a particular Humane Nature of his own which is not the particular Nature of any other Person the notion and definition of Humane Nature is the same in all men but the same Numerical Humane Nature does not subsist in all but every particular individual man has one particular individual Humane Nature appropriated to himself that is which is his particular Person and as many particular Persons as there are so many particular Humane Natures and particular men there are But now the Divine Persons are not Three such Individuals as these because they have not three individual Divine Natures but the same One Divine Nature common to them all originally in the Father and communicated whole and entire to the Son by an Eternal Generation and from Father and Son to the Holy Spirit by an Eternal Procession How impossible soever it is for our finite Understandings to comprehend these Mysteries of the eternal Generation and Procession it is not so hard to conceive the difference between Three Persons who have One individual Nature common to them all but subsisting so distinctly in each of them as to make them Three distinct Persons and Three Persons who have Three Individual Natures of the same Kind and Species As for Instance Three Human Persons which have Three individual Human Natures are by the confession of all Mankind Three Men But could we conceive One individual Human Nature which originally constitutes but One Person to Communicate it self Whole and Entire without Division or Separation to Two other Persons we must acknowledge Three Human Persons each of which Persons is distinctly and by himself True and Perfect Man but not Three Men for Man is a name of Nature and if Persons can be multiplied without multiplying the Nature as we at present suppose there must be Three Human Persons in One individual Human Nature that is Three Persons and One Man but not Three Men no more than Three Human Natures Thus it is with respect to the Divine Nature Were there Three individual Divine Natures Self-originated and Independent on each other though perfectly the same in their Notion and Definition Three such Persons would be as Perfectly Three Gods as Three Human Persons that have Three individual Human Natures are Three Men. But whereas the Scripture teaches and the Catholick Church has always believed there is but One Infinite Self-originated Divine Nature Originally in the Father and by Communication in the Son and Holy Spirit these Three Divine Persons are each of them True and Perfect God but not Three Gods because they have not Three Individual Divine Natures but One Divine Nature subsisting distinctly but Whole and Perfect in them all This I think may give us some Notion of One Numerical Common Nature which is no Species and of Persons which are no Individuals St. Austin shews particularly how improper it is to call the One Divine Essence a Genus and the Three Divine Persons Species or to call the Divine Essence a Species and the Divine Persons Individuals for in both these cases we must multiply the name of Essence with the Species and Individuals as we not only say three Horses but three Animals and as Abraham Isaac and Iacob are three Individuals so they are three Men in consequence of which we must
make Three Gods because there is but one and the same Divinity in Three And this is what they mean by the Numerical Unity of the Divine Nature not that Unity or Unit which is the beginning of Number but the Unity of Sameness and Identity which Tho. Aquinas calls unum non numero sed re numerata One not in the numbring Number but in the thing mumbred or as the Fathers speak not in Number but Nature The better to understand this matter we must consider what St. Basil discourses about the Unity of God in answer to those who charged the Doctrine of the Trinity with Tritheism viz. That they acknowledged One God but not in Number the numbring Number but in Nature For that which is One in Number is not truly One nor perfectly Simple in Nature but all men acknowledge God to be the most Simple Uncompounded Being and therefore he is not One in the Notion of this numbring Number This he proves by an induction of particulars we say the World is one in number but not one in nature for it is compounded of great variety of Creatures and we say one Man but Man is compounded of Body and Soul and even any Angel is not perfectly pure and simple but is compounded of Essence and Qualities such as Holiness which is not pure and simple Nature for it may be separated He adds that Number is a Species of quantity and answers to the Question How many which properly belongs to a Corporeal Nature And indeed all Number denotes such things as have a material or at least a circumscribed and limited Nature but Monad and Vnity denote the Simple Uncompounded Uncircumscribed Infinite Essence And when he says That Number must belong to things of a Circumscribed Nature thereby he tells us he means not merely such things as are circumscribed by Place which properly belongs to Bodies but all such Natures as have a limited and confined Idea as all Created Natures whether Body or Spirit have whose Natures are limited circumscribed fixt and determined by that Infinite Mind which gives being to them The meaning of all which is this That to make a Number there must be Alterity and Diversity in Nature or a separate Existence But a Perfect Simple Uncompounded Nature can admit of no possible alteration and diversity for the same Nature can never differ from it self without some kind of composition and where there is no difference and diversity there can be no number and an Infinite Uncircumscribed Nature can never be divided and separated or subsist a-part and therefore can't be numbred So that Number can belong only to Created Natures which are compounded and finite and therefore by some diversifying Qualities or Affections and a separate Exâ—istence may be distinguished into Individuals which may be numbred but the Unity of the Divine Nature which is a Perfect Indivisible Uncompounded Infinite Monad is not the Unity of Number but a Perfect Invariable Sameness and Identity and an Indivisible inseparable Union Now some Men who do not duly attend to the nature and design of these Reasonings apply all this to prove the Perfect Singularity of the Divine Essence in the most strict and proper notion of Singularity as that signifies One in Number which contradicts the whole Intention of this Hypothesis which is to prove that the Unity of God does not consist in the Unity of Number but of Nature and that the Unity of the Divine Nature is not a Unity of Number but a Unity of Sameness Identity and Inseparability This is a Matter of great consequence and therefore let us consider it over again This distinction between the Unity of Number and the Unity of Nature was alledged by the Catholick Fathers to avoid the Charge of Tritheism The Sabellians and Arians asserted the Unity of God to be a Unity of Number that One Divinity is not One unless it be One in Number One Single Solitary Divine Nature And this say they is inconsistent with the Trinity of Divine Persons each of which is in his own Person True and Perfect God For Three such Divine Persons must be Three Gods Three Divinities if each Divine Person have the True Perfect Divine Nature in himself and it is impossible to understand what a Divine Person is without the Divine Nature So that if the Father be God the Son God the Holy Ghost God if Father Son and Holy Ghost be Three they must be Three Gods This was the great Difficulty and it is the only material Difficulty to this day To have asserted but One Singular Divine Nature which is but One in Number had given up the Cause to the Sabellians or Arians For then either Father Son and Holy Ghost are but Three Names or Offices of the same One Divine Person who is the One God as the Sabellians taught Or Father Son and Holy Ghost are not a Consubstantial Trinity but the Father alone is God and the Son and Holy Ghost but mere Creatures how Excellent Creatures soever they are On the other hand should they have denied that Three Ones make Three this had been false counting as the Socinians tell us now and therefore to avoid both these Extremes they distinguish between the Number by which we reckon and the thing which is numbred and thus they find a Real Trinity in Perfect Unity As Greg. Nyssen tells us That 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the very same thing the same Divinity is both numbred and not subject to Number It may so far be numbred with the Persons as each Divine Person has the whole and perfect Divinity in himself but yet the Divinity can't be numbred not because it is One Single Solitary Divinity for it really subsists in Three but by reason of that perfect Sameness and Identity which admits of no Number for that which is perfectly one and the same in Three can't be numbred Had they thought of such a Singularity of the Divine Nature as is but One in Number they must have disputed at another rate against Sabellians and Arians Would they have taught That the Divinity may be numbred and yet is without Number Which is impossible to be true of the same singular Divinity which is but One in Number and therefore can never be more than One in Number that is in that Father's sense cannot be numbred much less can the same Singular Nature be numbred and incapable of Number that is be One and More than One. Would they have taken so much pains to prove That Sameness and Identity of Nature excludes all Number if by this they had meant the Sameness and Identity of Singularity as the same thing is one and the same thing with it self which is no great Mystery And is it not evident that this whole Dispute is concerning the Unity of the Divine Nature in Three distinct Persons and consequently concerning that Sameness and Identity of Nature which is between Three who have the same Nature and therefore not One
Identity of Nature Nestorius who owned Two Natures in Christ asserted also Two Persons and Eutyches made Christ but One Nature as well as One Person and in consequence of this Philoponus if he was not mistaken taught Three Individual Natures as well as Three Persons in the Godhead So that to make Nature and Person in the true and proper notion of Person commensurate and convertible Terms that a Nature is a Person and a Person an Individual Nature that One Nature is but One Person and One Person but One Nature and that Individual Natures and Persons must always be multiplied with each other is the fundamental Principle of all the Heresies relating to the Trinity and Incarnation and then one would think that those Doctrines which expresly contradict this Principle and all these Heresies which result from it should be the true Catholick Faith And then Three Real Substantial Subsisting Persons or Three Relative Personal Subsistencies or Substances in the Unity of the same Individual Essence or one Godhead is the True Catholick Faith and to reject it upon pretence that this must multiply Natures with Persons and so make Three Divinities and Three Gods is to return to that condemned Heretical Principle That One Nature can be but One True and Proper Person which if Men understand the true Consequences of what they say must inevitably betray them to Sabellianism Arianism or Tritheism And thus much for the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which I hope we shall hear no more of The Doctrine of Relations demonstrates the Individual Unity of the Divine Essence for if Father Son and Holy Ghost though each of them in his own Person be True and Perfect God yet are not Three Absolute Divinities but Three Eternal Subsisting Relations in the same One Divinity they must be One Individual Essence and Substance for else they cannot be the Relations of the same One Essence and Substance 2. As these Divine Relations prove the Individual Unity of Nature and Essence so they prove the Sameness and Identity of Nature wherein as I have shewn at large the Catholick Fathers place the Unity of the Godhead That 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 One Divinity is One God A few words will serve to explain this after what I have already discoursed on this Argument The 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as I have already shewn does not signify the Singularity but the perfect invariable Sameness and Identity of Nature not such a Sameness as every single Person is the same with himself but such a Sameness as is between distinct Persons of the same Nature Now the Doctrine of Relations necessarily infers this perfect Sameness and Identity and this Relative Sameness and Identy proves a perfect Unity As for the first there needs no other proof but barely to represent it for it is self-evident For is it possible that a Perfect Living Subsisting Word should not be perfectly the same with that Infinite Mind whose Word it is and from whom it proceeds That a Perfect Living Subsisting Image should not be perfectly the same with its Prototype from whom it receives its Being and Nature For if the Word be not perfectly the same with the Mind nor the Image with its Prototype it is not a true and perfect Word not a perfect Image By these Relations of Father and Son of a Mind and its Word a Prototype and its Image the Catholick Fathers as I have already shewn prove the perfect invariable Sameness and Identity of Nature for the thing proves it self The Relation indeed of Father and Son considered in general proves no more than a specifick Sameness of Nature which may admit of great changes and variety within the same Species but when God is the Father and begets a Son of his own Substance his Nature being absolutely and immutably perfect he must communicate the same perfect invariable Nature to his Son especially when this Son is his own perfect living Word and his perfect Image But this is not all A perfect Sameness between Two Absolute Natures without the least conceivable difference or variation would not be a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Sameness of Identity for though they could subsist as perfectly the same as their Idea is yet they would be Two Absolute Natures not One Nature But a perfect Sameness in Essential Relations or Relative Subsistencies proves a perfect Identity of Nature that they are perfectly the same in the same One Individual Nature As a living substantial Word must receive its substance and being whole of whole from that Mind whose Word it is for if it be not the same Substance it can't be the substantial Word of that Mind whose Substance it is not nor can a living substantial Image be any other Substance than that of the Prototype for if it were it might be its likeness but not its natural Image And thus this Sameness and Identity of Nature proves each Person by himself to be true and perfect God and all Three but One God for each Person according to this Doctrine has and must have the whole perfect Divinity in himself and all Three but one and the same Divinity 3. These Subsisting Relations in the Unity of Nature give us an intelligible Notion of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the inseparable Union of the Divine Persons and their mutual 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Inexistence Inbeing in each other That all the Catholick Fathers asserted the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or inseparable Union of the Divine Persons as essential to the Unity of the Godhead is so well known that I need not multiply Quotations to prove it after what I have already observed to that purpose But the Question is What they mean by this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 wherein the Essential Unity of the Godhead consists Now it is certain this relates to the inseparable Union of the Persons for it is opposed to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 divided and separate Hypostases and Persons which the Fathers charge with Tritheism The Son is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 inseparable from the Essence and Substance of the Father and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is inseparably in the Father that he is begotten of the Father without any division of Substance within the Father and inseparable from him so that this does not relate immediately to the Unity of Nature but the Union of Persons and therefore cannot signify the Singularity of the Divine Nature but the Inseparable Union of real distinct Persons in the Unity of Nature That the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 this Inseparable Union and Inbeing of Persons does as necessarily prove the real Distinction of Persons as the Unity of Nature as St. Hilary and Athanasius and the other Fathers frequently observe and that proves that the Unity of the Divine Nature which is the Inseparable Union of Three proper subsisting Persons is not the Unity of Singularity Which shews by the way how improperly the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is made use of to prove the
Singularity of the Divine Essence for it proves quite the contrary it is the Unity of Three which is a Trinity in Unity not the Unity of One which is Singularity and Solitude In the next place I observe That by the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 all the Catholick Fathers understand in this Mystery the inseparable Union of Relatives in the same Individual Nature not the Union of compleat absolute Natures how close and inseparable soever it may be There is by Nature no Inseparable Union but in the same Individual Nature Three compleat Individuals though of the same Kind and Species how closely and intimately soever they be united are not by Nature inseparable nor essentially One for they may be parted by that Power which united them and when they are parted can subsist apart as Three compleat Minds how intimately soever they should be united by God yet can never be essentially and inseparably One for they are not essential to each other they might have subsisted apart and may be parted again and an External Union cannot so make them One as to be naturally inseparable Which I think is a Demonstration that a Natural Inseparability which is an Essential Unity can be only in One Individual Nature between such Relatives as are Essential to each other and can neither be nor be conceived divided or separated And therefore the Catholick Fathers represented the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by Examples of Natural Unions between things Essentially related to each other in One Individual Nature which either cannot be conceived or at least cannot subsist apart Of this last Kind are a Fountain and its Streams a Tree and its Branches whereby they not only represent the Homoousion but the Inseparable Union of the Divine Persons as every one knows for there cannot be a Fountain but its Waters must flow out nor Streams without a Fountain from whence they flow and though Branches may be separated from the Tree yet they live no longer than they are united and are Branches of that Tree no longer But these are very imperfect Images and without great caution will corrupt our Ideas of the Divine Unity Of all Corporeal Unions the nearest resemblance we have of this and which the Fathers most insist on is the Sun and its natural Splendor for we cannot conceive the Sun without its Splendor nor the Splendor without the Sun they never were never can be parted and therefore though two are essentially one This Representation the Scripture makes of it which calls the Son 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Brightness of his Father's Glory and in this Sense they teach that he is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Light of Light as it is in the Nicene Creed whereby they do not mean two distinct independent Lights which either are or may be parted though one be lighted at the other this was the Heresy of Hierachas as St. Hilary tells us who represented this Mystery by two Candles one of which is lighted at the other or by one and the same Lamp which is divided and burns in two Sockets but that Light and Splendor which is essential to the same Sun and can never be divided from it as Athanasius teaches But the truest Images we have of this in Nature is the Inseparable Union which is between a Mind and its own Internal Word which are so essentially related to each other in the same Individual Nature that they can never be parted nor conceived apart the Mind can never be without its Word nor the Word subsist but in the Mind It is evident That two compleat absolute Minds can never be thus united for they are not Essential to each other not naturally one and therefore not naturally inseparable but a Mind and its Word though two are essentially One and therefore can never be parted but must subsist together and these are the Characters the Scripture gives us of God the Father and his Son the Father Infinite Eternal Self-originated Mind the Son his Eternal Infinite Living Subsisting Word And if Father and Son this Eternal Mind and Eternal Word be as essentially One as a mans Mind and his Word are One this is a Demonstration of their Inseparable Union and gives us a sensible Notion and Idea of it This is the account Athanasius every where gives of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that the Father and Son are inseparably One the Father being in the Son and the Son in the Father as the Word is in the Mind and the Light in the Sun To separate the Divine Persons so as not to be in each other whatever other Union we own between them Dionysius of Alexandria charges with Tritheism for the Divine Word must of necessity be one with God and the Holy Spirit be and subsist in him And this Athanasius resolves into such a Sameness and Unity of Nature as must be between two Relative Subsistencies in the same Individual Nature That the Son is in the Father as the Word is in the Mind and the Splendor in the Sun that he is a genuine proper natural Son in the Father's Essence and Substance not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not subsisting out of his Father's Substance as other Creature Sons do That the true Notion of the Sons being in the Father is that the whole Being of a Son is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Genuine Natural Birth of the Father's Substance the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Splendor is of the Sun That the very Being of the Son is the Form of Species and Divinity of the Father That as the Sun and its Splendor are two but not two Lights but one Light from the Sun enlightening all things with its Splendor and Brightness so the Divinity of the Son is the Divinity of the Father and therefore inseparable and thus there is but one God and none else besides him All this plainly refers to the Inseparable Union and Inbeing of Relatives of the same Individual Substance which are really distinct but essentially in each other as the Word is in the Mind and the Mind in the Word that Thought it self cannot part them which is such an Union as can never be between compleat absolute Substances which are not naturally Inseparable nor essentially One. Herein Athanasius places the adequate Notion of the Homoousion the Sameness Identity and Unity of Nature He tells us That for this reason the Nicene Fathers taught the Homoousion or that the Son is Consubstantial or of one Substance with the Father to signify that the Son is not only like the Father but to be so of the Father as to be the same in likeness not after the manner of Bodies which are like each other but subsist apart by themselves as Human Sons subsist separately from their Parents but the Generation of the Son of the Substance of the Father is of a different Kind and Nature from Human Generations for he is not only like but inseparable from his Father's Substance
the better for it An Union of Substances seems to signify some kind of Contact which is hard to conceive between Body and Spirit but however an Union of Contact and an Union of Life are two very different kinds of Union and do not include or infer each other and therefore the true Answer to that Question How Soul and Body are united is not to say That their Substances are united or fastened together which gives us no notion of a Vital Union but that the Soul lives in the Body and gives life to it receives impressions srom it and governs its motions But to inquire farther is to inquire into the Reasons of Natural and Essential Unions which are as great Mysteries as Nature is We may as well ask How a Soul lives as how it animates a Body and God alone knows both So that to inquire after the Natural Nexus or Cement of this Union is nothing at all to the purpose and is not the Object of Human Knowledge Now though the Vital Union between Soul and Body and the Union of mutual Consciousness be of a very different Kind and Nature yet the Dispute about the Nexus or the Natural Union of Substances is much the same Consciousness is the Unity of a Spirit Self-consciousness is the Unity of a Person and by the same reason mutual Consciousness is a Natural Union of Three distinct Self-conscious Persons in the Unity of the same Nature And to reject this for want of a Nexus or the Natural Union of Substances is as if we should deny the Union of Soul and Body to be an Union of Life or Animation because this don't explain the Natural Nexus between Soul and Body If a Mutual Conscious Union be an Essential Union of Three distinct Persons in the same Nature as a Vital Union is the Essential Union of Soul and Body we have nothing to do in either Case with the Union of Substances which we can know nothing of and if we could should understand these Unions never the better for it For whatever Union of Substance we may suppose between Soul and Body and the Three Divine Persons in the Holy Trinity it is the Kind and Species of Union which gives us the Notion and Idea of it If you inquire what Spirit and what Matter is It would not be thought a good Answer to these Questions to say a Spirit is a Substance and Matter is a Substance without adding their Specifick Differences that a Spirit is an intelligent thinking Substance and Matter is an extended Substance nor is it a better Answer to that Question what Union there is between Soul and Body or between the Three Divine Persons in the Trinity To say That their Substances are united which gives us no distinct Notion of their Union but a Vital Union and a Mutual Conscious Union contain distinct Ideas and if these be Natural and Essential Unions though we know no more of the Union of Substances than we do what Substance is yet we know that the Soul and Body must be one Natural Person and the Three Divine Persons must be naturally and essentially One God for a Natural Union makes One according to the Nature of that Union It is visible enough what has occasioned this Mistake Men consider Mutual Consciousness between Three Compleat Absolute Independent Minds and rightly enough conclude that how conscious soever they were to each other this could not make them essentially One for every compleat Mind is One by it self and not naturally Conscious to any One but it self and by whatever Power they should be so united as to be mutually Conscious this could not make them essentially One they would be Three Mutually Conscious Minds not essentially One Mind for they are not by Nature One nor mutually Conscious and therefore may be parted again and cease to be so But then in this way of stating it the Objection equally lies against the Perichoresis the inseparable Union and In-being of Minds which can never make Three Compleat Absolute Minds essentially One But if we apply this to the Union of Living Subsisting Intelligent Relatives of the same Individual Essence to Father Son and Holy Ghost Eternal Self-originated Mind its Eternal Living Subsisting Word and Eternal Spirit this Mutual Consciousness gives us the most Intelligible Notion of the Essential and Inseparable Union and In-being of Three in One. I dare not say what other Men can do but I have tried my self and can form no Notion of an Unity in Trinity but what either necessarily includes or ultimately resolves it self into One Natural Essential Consciousness in Three The Divine Nature is indivisibly and inseparably One in Three but we must not understand this Inseparability after the manner of Bodies whose Parts may be divided and separated from each other God is not Body and has no Parts but in the Unity of the Godhead there is Eternal Original Mind an Eternal Word and Eternal Spirit which are inseparable from each other that is can never be parted What then can parting and separating signify in a Mind which has no Parts to be torn and divided from each other I can understand nothing by it but that the Mind does no longer see and know and feel its Word in it self nor the Word the Mind for this would make a perfect Separation between the Mind and its Word that Mind has no Word which does not see and feel it in it self and were it possible that a living subsisting Word should lose all Conscious Sensation of the Mind whose Word it is it would cease to be a Word and commence a perfect separate Mind it self So that as far as we can conceive it the Inseparable Union between Father and Son between Original Infinite Mind and its Eternal Word is an inseparable Conscious Life and Sensation which is such a Natural Demonstration of their Inseparable Union as no other Notion can give us for all Men feel that a Mind and its Word can never be parted a Mind can never be without its Word nor the Word subsist but in the Mind Thus what other possible Notion can we form of the Perichoresis or Mutual In-being of Father and Son as our Saviour tells us I am in the Father and the Father in me which is their Natural and Essential Unity I and my Father are one We all feel how the Word is in the Mind and the Mind in the Word the Mind knows and feels and comprehends its own Word and a perfect living subsisting Word knows and feels that whole Mind whose Word it is in it self for the Word is nothing else but the whole Mind living and subsisting in the Word which is another Hypostasis but perfectly One and the same Nature and therefore as they know themselves so they know and feel each other in themselves As the Father knoweth me saith Christ so know I the Father 10 John 15. And thus to see and know God by an Internal Sensation and to be
Consubstantial Son is a true and real Son for which reason as he observes the Arians would not allow the Son to be Consubstantial because they would not allow him to be a true genuine Son and for this very reason the Nicene Fathers inserted the Homoousion in their Creed But yet if we would rightly conceive of God of Father Son and Holy Ghost of the Unity and Distinction of the Ever Blessed Trinity we must not form our Notions by the Ideas of Substance and Consubstantiality which we have no distinct conceptions of but we must learn their Unity Distinction and Consubstantiality from those Characters the Scripture gives of Father Son and Holy Ghost This Rule St. Ambrose expressly gives us with reference to the Son and the Reason is the same as to the other Divine Persons If we would avoid Error says that Father let us attend to those Characters the Scripture gives us to help us to understand what and who the Son is He is called the Word the Son the Power of God the Wisdom of God all this we can understand and not only St. Ambrose but all the other Catholick Fathers as I have already shewn prove the Consubstantiality Coeternity Coequality Unity and Distinction of Father and Son from these Names and Characters which they understood in a true and proper sense for a Living Subsisting Son and Word and Power and Wisdom and there is no difficulty in conceiving all this if we contemplate it in these Characters nay it is impossible to conceive otherwise of it As impossible as it is to form any notion at all of those Philosophical Terms whereby this Mystery is commonly represented when we abstract them from those sensible Characters and Ideas which the Scripture has given us and begin our Inquiries with them It will be of great use to represent this matter plainly that every man may see what it is that obscures and perplexes the Doctrine of the Trinity and confounds mens notions about it to the great scandal of the Christian Religion and the disturbance of the Christian Church The great difficulty concerns the Unity and Distinction of the Ever Blessed Trinity that they are really and distinctly Three and essentially One And this is represented by One Nature Essence and Substance and Three Hypostases and yet Hypostasis signifies Substance and every Divine Hypostasis is the whole Divine Essence and Substance Now if we immediately contemplate this Mystery under the notion of Substance it is impossible for us to conceive One Substance and Three Hypostases that is in some sense Three Substances or which is all One as to the difficulty of conceiving it though the form of Expression is more Catholick Three each of which is the whole Essence and Substance and neither of them is each other we may turn over our Minds as long as we please and change Words and Phrases but we can find no Idea to answer these or any other words of this nature But now if instead of Essence and Hypostasis we put Mind and its Word we can form a very intelligible notion of this Unity and Distinction and prove that Unity of Substance and Distinction of Hypostases which we cannot immediately and directly form any notion of For Eternal Original Mind and its Living Subsisting Word are certainly Two and neither are nor can be each other the Mind cannot be its own Living Word nor the Word the Mind whose Word it is and yet we must all grant that Eternal Mind is the most Real Being Essence Substance and that a Living Subsisting Word is Life Being Substance and the very same Life and Substance that the Mind is and all that the Mind is for a perfect Living Word can have no other Life and Substance but that of the Mind and must be all the same that the Mind is The Eternal Generation of the Son 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the Substance of the Father Life of Life Substance of Substance Whole of Whole is impossible to be conceived as immediately applied to the notion of Substance but the Generation of the Word Whole of Whole is very conceivable for the Mind must beget its own Word as we feel in our selves and a Mind which is perfect Life and Substance if it begets its Word must beget a Living Subsisting Substantial Word the perfect Image of its own Life and Substance And as impossible as it is to conceive much more to express in words this Mystery of the Eternal Generation yet the necessary relation between a Mind and its Word proves that thus it is we feel it in our selves though we are as perfectly ignorant how our Mind begets its dying vanishing Word as how the Eternal Mind begets an Eternal Living Subsisting Word And the Generation of the Word includes in it all the Properties of the Divine Generation that it is Eternal for an Eternal Mind can never be without its Word that it is without any Corporeal Passions or Esslux or Division begotten in the Mind and inseparable from it Now if we conceive after the same manner of the Eternal Procession of the Holy Spirit can any man deny this to be an Intelligible Notion of a Trinity in Unity though we can form no distinct Idea of One Essence and Substance and Three Hypostases For if we can conceive Father Son and Holy Ghost Eternal Original Mind its Eternal Word and Eternal Spirit to be Essentially One and Three the Catholick Faith is secured though we do not so well understand the distinction between those Abstract Metaphysical Terms of Nature Essence Substance Hypostasis especially when applied to the Unity and Distinction of the Eternal Godhead which is above all Terms of Art The Catholick Faith is That the Father is God the Son God and the Holy Ghost God but yet there are not Three Gods but One God and this the Doctrine of the Divine Relations gives us a very intelligible notion of for we cannot conceive otherwise of the Eternal Mind its Eternal Word and Eternal Spirit but that each of them are True and Perfect God and yet a Mind its Word and Spirit can be but One and therefore but One God But One Substance and Three Hypostases is but a secondary notion of a Trinity in Unity to secure the Catholick Faith against the Sabellian and Arian Heresies Against the Sabellians the Catholick Fathers asserted Three Hypostases against the Arians One Substance and the Essential Relations of Father Son and Holy Ghost necessarily prove both the One Substance and Three Hypostases but though One Substance and Three Hypostases be the Catholick Language yet those Men begin at the wrong end who think to form an intelligible notion of a Trinity in Unity from these abstract Metaphysical Terms This is not the Language of the Scripture nor have we any Idea to answer these Terms of One Substance in Three distinct Hypostases when we consider them by themselves without relation to the Divine Nature to which alone these
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
the Son of this One God the Father and the Spirit of God be the Spirit of this same One God And though the Son of God be God and the Spirit of God be God that is the Name of their Nature not of their Persons and therefore can no more be multiplied with the Persons than the Divine Nature is The Son of God is God but it is Authoritate Paternae Naturae as St. Hilary speaks not by any Absolute Godhead of his own but in right of his Father's Nature and Divinity which he received by an Eternal Generation Thus it must be where there is but One Absolute Nature with its Internal Processions Let us put the Case in a Human Mind and suppose That its Word and Spirit were Distinct Living Intelligent Hypostases in the Mind Essential Processions in the Unity and Identity of Nature perfectly the same with the Mind but distinct Hypostases but would any one for this Reason call these Three Three Men or Three Minds And yet such a Living Subsisting Word and a Living Subsisting Spirit would as perfectly have the Nature of the Mind as the Mind it self but neither of them would be an absolute Mind but one the Word of the Mind and the other the Spirit of the Mind not Three Minds but One Mind with its Essential Word and Spirit This though an Imaginary Case gives us a sensible representation of the difference between the Eternal Mind and its Eternal Word and Spirit which I freely acknowledge cannot properly be called Three Infinite Minds and Spirits for though the Eternal Subsisting Word is an Infinite Mind and so the Eternal Subsisting Spirit yet Mind as well as God is the Name of their Nature not of their Persons which is Identically one and the same in all This as I take it is what some Learned and truly Catholick Writers mean in distinguishing the several Acceptations of this Name God That sometimes it signifies the Divine Nature and Essence in general as when we say The Trinity is One God that is One Divinity that there is but One Divine Nature and Essence in all the Three Persons of the Holy Trinity Sometimes it signifies Personally as when we say The Father is God the Son is God and the Holy Ghost is God that is the Person of the Father the Person of the Son and the Person of the Holy Ghost is God But then they are still forced to acknowledge that the Name God is not predicated Vnivocally of all Three Persons but that the Father is God in a more excellent and eminent Sense than the Son is God or the Holy Ghost God as being God of himself an Unbegotten Self-originated God the Fountain of the Deity to the Son and Holy Spirit Upon which account he is so often by the Catholick Fathers called the One God and the only True God Now all this is very True and very Catholick but with all submission it seems to me to be an inconvenient way of speaking which perplexes the Article with different Senses and is liable to great Cavils and Misconstructions as the Examples of Dr. Payn and the Author of the 28 Propositions witness and when most dexterously managed will sooner silence than convince an Adversary The Divine Essence must be considered only as in the Divine Persons when we say That the Trinity is One God the true meaning is That Three Persons are One God and the general abstract Notion of the Unity of Essence does not account for this but the Unity of the Divine Essence in Three Thus to say That the Father is God in the highest sense of that Name God and that He alone strictly speaking is a Being absolutely perfect because he alone is Self-existent and all other Beings even the Son and Holy Ghost are from him may be expounded to a very Catholick Sense and was certainly so meant but is liable to great Cavils when Men take more pains to pick Quarrels with Words than to understand an Author An Absolutely Perfect God and a God that wants any Perfection sounds not only like Two Gods but like Gods of different Kinds for every diversity of Nature alters the Species All that is meant by this is certainly True and Catholick and taught in express words by the Primitive Fathers That the Father is not the Son nor the Son the Father that the Son is all that the Father is excepting his being the Father and unbegotten that is excepting Paternity and Self-existence or Self-origination and that upon this Account the Father is eminently called the One God the Son God of God that is God as the Son of God What I have now discoursed seems to me to give the fairest Account of this Matter I take the Name God always to signify a Person in whom the Divine Nature is not the Divinity in the Abstract and then the Name God must belong to any Person after the same manner as the Divine Nature is his that is he must be called God in no other sense than as he is God Now as I have already shewn there is but One Absolute Divinity with Two Internal Processions in the Unity and Identity of Nature And if we make this our Rule of Speaking as we must do if this be the Catholick Faith of the Trinity and we will fit our words to the nature of things then it is very plain That the Name God absolutely belongs only to him who is this Absolute Divinity that is the Person of the Father that no other Person is God in recto absolutely and simply God but only he that he is the One God the only True God as both the Scripture and Fathers own But what becomes then of the Son and Holy Ghost Is not the Son God and the Spirit God Yes the Name and Title of God belongs to them as the Divine Nature does that is not absolutely as to the Absolute Divinity but as to Divine Processions to Divine Subsisting Relations in the Unity of the Godhead that is the Second Person in the Trinity is God but not in recto as God signifies that Person who is the Divinity but as the Son of God as habens Deitatem having the Divinity not absolutely and originally but by Communication by Eternal Generation And so the Holy Spirit is not absolutely God but the Spirit of God and God only as the Spirit of God as an Internal Procession in the Divine Nature But in what sense then can we say That the Trinity is One God or that Three Persons are One God Must we not necessarily own that God in these Propositions is taken Essentially for the Deity in the abstract and not as considered in any One Person For will we say That the Trinity or Three Persons are but One Person No! and yet in this Proposition The Trinity is One God by One God I understand One who is absolutely God One Absolute Divinity which is the Father who has indeed a Son and Spirit in the Unity of his