compound viz. the whole Man or Person as the Subjectum ultimum and Principium Quod and as that which receives the whole Denomination from what belongs immediately to any Part of it For it is the whole Man or Person who is properly said to be a living Reasonable Sensible Creature though it be by Virtue of his Soul as the Principium Quo that he is so After this comes another Absurdity where he tells us p. 48. l. 2. That an Hypostatical Vnion is the swallowing up of a Natural Personality in its Vnion with a superior Person Which if it be so Then say I where is the Hypostatical Union of Christ's Person with the humane Nature for the humane Nature which was united to his Divine Person had no Personality of its own to be swallowed up for Christ assumed it without any Subsistence or Personality belonging to it which it neither has nor ever had and consequently could never be said to be lost or swallowed up by this Union So that we have a new sort of Heresie started viz. That as Eutyches heretofore affirmed Christ's Humane Nature to have been swallowed up by His Divine so this Author holds an Humane Personality to have belong'd to this Humane Nature which in like manner is swallowed up by the Superior Person of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But where these vile Heterodoxies will stop God only knows For I cannot see but this Innovator may freely and uncontrollably vent as many of them as he pleases and no doubt he has a great many more such in Reserve and will in due time produce them But the Animadverter had argued against the Personality of the Soul in Conjunction with the Body thus If the Soul in the Composition of a Man's Person were an entire Person it self and as such concurred with the Body towards the Constitution of the Man then the Man would be an Imperfect Accidental and not a Perfect Natural Compound He would be that which Philosophy calls Unum per Accidens that is a Thing made up of such Beings as cannot perfectly coalesce and unite into One Animadvers p. 75. And what says he to this Why he tells us That the Soul and the Body are vitally united and that the Animadverter's own beloved Philosophy never calls Things vitally united Unum per Accidens To which I answer That no Created Person ever was or could be vitally united to any Being distinct from it self And therefore since it is certain That the Soul is vitally united to the Body it is impossible that the Soul should be a Person For this beloved Philosophy teaches me That in Created Beings there can be no Vital Vnion but between Parts and consequently that since there is a Vital Vnion between Soul and Body this Soul and Body must be united as concurrent Parts of the same Compound And this by this Author's Favour must utterly destroy his senceless Notion of the Personality of the Soul since that which is a Part cannot be a Suppositum or completely subsisting Nature and whatsoever is not so can never be a Person So that the Animadverter's Argument stands good viz. That in created Beings an Entire Person united to a Body would make an Unum per Accidens and consequently that a Vital Vnion between them would be impossible Yet nevertheless since it is certain that there is actually such a Vital Vnion between Soul and Body it is upon the same account also as certain That the Soul which must be one of the Terms of that Vnion and by consequence a Part cannot be a Person So that all this is but a meer Petitio Principii first to suppose the Soul a Person which is the principal Thing in Dispute and then to say that its being vitally united to the Body keeps it from making a Man That which we call Vnum per Accideâ—s Whereas it is affirmed and argued against him That this very Vital Vnion of the Soul with the Body overthrows the Soul's Personality as a Thing which this Vnion is utterly inconsistent with In short the Soul 's being a Person if it were so can never prove it vitally united to the Body but its being vitally so united irrefragably proves it to be no Person But he is now for confounding the Animadverter with Two Questions but still in pursuit of the same Point First Whether the Eternal 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 before the Incarnation were a Compleat Being which is readily answered in the Affirmative That he was Secondly Whether the Humane Nature assumed by him were a Compleat or Incompleat Being I answer That though it were a Perfect Nature yet since it was without a proper Natural Subsistence of its own it was upon that account an Incompleat Being But then I add that this was a Peculiar and a Supernatural Case there being no other particular Humane Nature in the World without its particular proper Subsistence but this alone which subsists wholly by a borrowed Subsistence as being assumed into that of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But now what is all this to the Vnion between the Soul and Body which are vitally united as essential Parts of the whole Humane Person But the Person of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is not vitally united to the Humane Nature as to a Part of it And though as I noted before it be impossible for a Finite Person to be vitally united to any other Being distinct from it self yet an Infinite Person as we see in the Person of our Saviour may be united to another distinct Being or Nature For this is neither a Composition nor yet a Natural Vnion But to this our Author very Learnedly excepts and affirms the Vnion between the Person of Christ and his Humane Nature to be a Natural Vnion and gives this as a Reason for it Because it is a Vnion of Natures and that an Vnion of Natures is a Natural Vnion by whatsoever Power it is done p. 49. In answer to which though I might say That This is not properly at least not immediately an Vnion of Natures but of the Divine Person of Christ to the Humane Nature which by and through the Person comes to be united to the Divine Nature yet to let that pass I absolutely deny both his Propositions viz. That the Vnion between the Person of Christ and his Humane Nature is a Natural Vnion And that all Vnion of Natures must be a Natural Vnion by what Power soever it is wrought Both which are absolutely false Forasmuch as a Natural Vnion is only that which is wrought by a Natural Cause or Principle acting according to the Ordinary Course and Measures of Nature which an Vnion between Two Natures so vastly disproportioned as a Finite and an Infinite can never be effected by For will this Man affirm That GOD by the ordinary Exercise of that Power by which He carries on the daily Production of Things in the World and which is properly called Nature united the Divine Person of the 〈◊〉
you no further trouble having with all the Respect and Reverence due to such great and renowned Bodies given you an account of the Occasion of this Address to you as a Thing well deserving your most serious Thoughts and representing the cause of our Venerable Old Religion now at stake as in truth it is I humbly leave the whole matter before you and remain As by Duty and Inclination equally bound Honoured Sirs Your most faithful and devoted Servant A. A. A Collection of several Choice New Theological Terms made use of in Two Books One Entituled A Vindication of the Doctrine of the Holy and ever Blessed Trinity c. The other A Defense of Dr. Sherlock 's Notion of the Trinity c. and first Introduced by the said Doctor for giving the Church a better Explication and a clearer Notion of a Trinity in Unity than it has had for above sixteen hundred years before Which Collection is as follows SElf-Consciousness Vind. p. 49. l. 27. Mutual Consciousness Vind. p. 52. l. 4. Natural Self-Consciousness Def. p. 8. l. 7. Natural Mutual Consciousness Def. p. 18. l. 8. Intimate conscious Knowledge Vind. p. 59. l. 4. Conscious life Def. p. 60. l. 20. Self conscious Principle Def. p. 67. l. 16. Natural Principle of mutual Consciousness Def. p. 67. l. 22. Conscious Union Def. p. 9. l. 10. Natural Unity of Mutual Consciousness Def. p. 33. l. 2. Communion of Mutual Consciousness Def. p. 72. l. 9. Self-Conscious Love and Self-Conscious Complacency Def. p. 68. l. 2 4. Intellectual Sensation Def. p. 77. l. 16. Self-Sensation Def. p. 39. l. 24. Conscious Sensation Def. p. 8. l. 4. Self Conscious Sensation Def. p. 7. l. 15. Natural Self Conscious Sensation Def. p. 7. l. 30. Natural Mutual Conscious Sensation Def. p. 8. l. 2. Feeling each other's Knowledge Vind. p. 56. l. 24. Self-Consciousness between the Father and the Son Vind. p. 60. l. 14. The Son 's feeling the Father's Will and Wisdom in himself Vind. p. 60. l. 22. The Son the Self Conscious Image of his Father's Will and Knowledge Vind. p. 60. at the end Continuity of Sensation Def. p. 7. l. 12 13. Three distinct Infinite Minds Vind. p. 66. l. 22. One Individual Nature subsisting thrice not by multiplying but only by Repeating it self Def. p. 24. l. 2 3. The Divine Nature repeated in its Image without multiplication Def. p. 37. l. 1. The same Substance repeated in Three distinct Subsistences Def. p. 91. l. 8. The same Individual Nature repeated in its living Image Def. p. 70. l. 4. One Eternal Infinite Mind repeated in Three Subsistences Def. p. 94. l. 6 c. Which Terms with some others like-them are to be substituted in the room of Nature Essence Substance Subsistence Suppositum Person Hypostasis and Relation All which though constantly used hitherto both by Fathers and Councils yet serving only as this Author affirms to pervert and confound mens Notions and Discourses about the Divine Nature and Persons ought utterly to be exploded and laid aside as meer Gibberish and Gipsie Cant especially by such as account all Greek and Latin so too Several New Heterodox and Extraordinary Propositions partly in Divinity and partly in Philosophy extracted out of the Two forementioned Books 1. THE Three Divine Persons are Three distinct Infinite Minds or Spirits and not to hold so is both Heresie and Non-sense Vind. p. 66. l. 25. 2. Unless every Person of the Blessed Trinity considered as a distinct Person be allowed to be a distinct Infinite Eternal Mind we shall have nothing left us but a Trinity of meer Modes Names and Postures Defen pag. 8. lin 24. pag. 30. lin 24. 3. That which makes a Spirit whether Finite or Infinite and consequently each of the Divine Persons which according to this Author are Three distinct Infinite Spirits One with it self and distinct from all others is Self-Consciousness and Nothing else Vind. p. 67. lin 11. p. 68. lin 5. 13. 74. lin 15 c. 4. A natural Self-Consciousness makes a Natural Person Def. p. 8. lin 7. 5. If the formal Reason of Personality be that which makes a Mind or Person which with this Author are always Terms convertible one with it self and distinguishes it from all others then Self-Consciousness is the formal Reason of Personality Def. p. 37. l. 8 9 10 c. 6. Mutual Consciousness is that which formally unites the Divine Persons in Nature or Essence and makes them all essentially and numerically one God Vind. p. 68. l. 6 7 8. and p. 84 l. 29 and elsewhere frequently 7. There is no other mutual In-being or In-dwelling of the Father in the Son and of the Son in the Father called by the Fathers 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 conceivable or possible but by mutual Consciousness Def. p. 9. l. 15 16 c. 8. The Son and the Holy Ghost are in the Father as in their Cause Vind. p. 69. l. 29. Which Term Divines generally decline the use of using the word Principle instead thereof However this overthrows the foregoing Proposition viz. That the Son can be no otherwise in the Father than by mutual Consciousness 9. The 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 used with reference to the Divine Persons by the Nicene Fathers is not sufficient to prove a Numerical Vnity of Nature or Essence in the said Persons Def. p. 69. l. 1 2 c. 10. The Unity of the Divine Nature in the Three Divine Persons is partly specifick partly numerical Def. p. 17. l. 27. 11. It is impossible to conceive a more close and intimate Union in Nature than mutual Consciousness Def. p. 35. l. 22. Whereas an Vnion in one Numerical Essence or Nature is and must be in the very Conception or Notion of it greater and more intimate as being the Ground the Reason and Foundation of the other 12. The very Nature and Subsistence of the Father Son and Holy Ghost is wholly Relative Def. p. 27. l. 21. And for their Subsistence I grant it to be so but if their Nature be wholly Relative too I am sure there is nothing absolute belonging to the Deity 13. The Case of a Man and his living Image though even by this Author 's own confession a meer Fiction or Supposition is a plain Account of the essential Vnity between God the Father and God the Son Def. p. 21. l. 10. That is to say in a Romance we have a clear Explication of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the first and second Person of the Trinity And in Two who are actually separate and loco-distant from one another we have a plain Account of the Union of Two who both in their Essence and Persons are actually and absolutely inseparable 14. If the Three Divine Persons be considered as Three Infinite Minds distinguished from each other by a Self-Consciousness of their own and essentially united to each other by a mutual Consciousness which is the only way of distinguishing and uniting Minds then a Trinity
to this Man is and must be even when united to the Body the whole Person Add to this that he affirms the Soul thus united to be the only Seat of Personality p. 60. l. 7. And if this Man will deny that to be the whole Person in which the whole Personality is he is rather to be exploded than disputed with But most remarkable are those wretched Assertions of his by which he directly and inevitably makes the constitution of every Man living to consist in an Hypostatick Vnion and Incarnation For the proving of which I shall first give this Account of an Hypostatick Vnion viz. That it is that whereby a Person or completely subsisting Intelligent Being assumes another Being or Nature into the Unity of its own Subsistence so that by vertue thereof the Person assuming and the Nature assumed are both but one Person yet so that the Nature assumed is not Part of the said Person This I affirm to be an Hypostatick Vnion and I gather it both from what Scripture and Reason discoursing upon Scripture teaches us concerning the Oeconomy of Christ's Person which according to the Unanimous Judgment of all Divines hitherto is the only Instance of an Hypostatick Vnion in the World But now let us see what a Parallel this Heady Venturous Man to say no worse makes between this and the Union of an humane Soul and Body in these following Propositions The Eternal 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is a Person The Eternal 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 assumes the humane Nature into the Unity of the same person The Eternal 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is vitally united to the humane Nature assumed by it The Eternal 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the humane Nature thus assumed by it and united to it are but one and the same Person The Eternal 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the humane Nature assumed by it are so One Person that the Nature assumed is no part of the said Person The Humane Soul is a Person The Humane Soul receives the Body into the Unity of the same Person p. 60. l. 22. The Humane Soul as a Person is vitally United to the Body p. 60. l. 21. The Body being United to the Soul which is the Person becomes together with the Soul one and the same Person p. 60. l. 19. The Soul and the Body United to the Soul as to the Person so become one Person that the Body is yet no part of the Person p. 60. l. 23. I know there are some disparities as to Finite and Infinite Eternal and not Eternal c. between the respective Subjects of the Union here represented but as to the Union it self and the Kind of it I freely refer it to the Learned Reader to judge whether those Conditions which Divines peculiarly assign and ascribe to that Supernatural Hypostatick Vnion be not here ascribed by this Author to the Natural Union between Soul and Body And indeed what other Kind of Union can it be For the constitution of an human Person must be either by such an Union as this or by an Essential concurrence of Parts compounding it But this though maintained by all the World besides this Author utterly explodes as absurd p. 48. l. 10. And the truth is if neither the Soul be a part of the Person nor the Body be a part of the Person as he denies both of them to be how can the Person be Such by an Essential composition where there are no Essential Parts to make the Composition Or what can be the Essential Parts if the Body and Soul are not so Nay and as a further proof of what he holds in this matter in the 268 269 270 271 pages of his Vindication he explains the Union between the second Person of the Trinity and the humane Nature and the Union between an humane Soul and Body by one Another and that in many more particulars than that mentioned in the Athanasian Creed But in the next place touching the Incarnation of the Soul in the Body which I likewise charge this Author's Opinion with as the direct result of it besides that it must necessarily follow from such an Hypostatick Vnion of the Soul with the Body as has been described he himself to give him his due in plain and express Terms owns so much by telling us That the Soul is an Embodied Person p. 60. l. 26. and that is manifestly only another word for an Incarnate Person For the Eternal 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I am sure may be truly said to be an Embodyed Person by his Incarnation So that the Parallel we see still holds From all which new Cartesian Divinity therefore it does and must follow That so many Men as there are in the World so many Hypostatick Vnions and Incarnations there are also and that a Man is properly constituted a Man by an Hypostatick Vnion of the Soul with the Body and by an Embodyment or Incarnation of it in the Body So that hereafter if any one would express or define an humane Person properly and exactly he must not say That it is an Intelligent Being compounded of Soul and Body and completely subsisting for that is the Gibberish of the Schools but he must say That an humane Person is a Soul Incarnate For our Oracle has declared it so and therefore in that we ought to rest And now has not this Author think we shewn himself an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Man indeed For was there ever a more glorious 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 either in Philosophy or Theology than this of a new Hypostatick Vnion and Incarnation Which having been so happily discovered and so authentically vouched possibly when the Alterers of our Liturgy shall fall to work again to alter what they cannot mend it may be brought into our Creed too But after all there are Three Questions proposed in the Animadversions p. 83 84. mentioned indeed here but not replyed to And since they are not I do here Challenge this Author to answer them and I do it with more Scorn and Triumph than the Animadverter as he pretends at first propounded them The design of which Questions was to shew that according to this Author's Assertions The Soul in every Man and the Man himself are and must be Two distinct Persons and they have shewn it with that force and clearness that they stand not only unanswered but against him unanswerable And therefore to direct his laughter to its Right object I leave him and his Friend some old Conventicler I suppose to laugh at one another and to take notice withal That nothing in Nature is more to be laughed at than he who laughs at an Argument because he cannot answer it I have now examined this Man's discourse about the Personality of the Soul and must profess that I never met with so many vile Heterodoxies in so small a compass before And what offence they will give to the Pious and Orthodox and what advantage to Hereticks and Atheists I doubt
and the seven first lines so that according to him an Act of Volition and an Act of Consciousness or Knowledge are formally and properly one and the same Act. In the last place as to his affirming That Three distinct Subsistences of the same Individual nature are by mutual Consciousness essentially one p. 71. l. 9. I answer That if he means hereby That they are by mutual Consciousness made essentially one as by the Cause or Antecedent Reason of that Unity I deny it But if he means That they are thereby proved essentially one as by an essential consequent of the said Unity I grant it But this will do him but little service For his Hypothesis requires more And so leaving this second Argument in its full force against him I proced to the Third Argument which is this To affirm mutual Consciousness to be the cause of the Union of the Three Divine Persons in the same Nature is to confound the Union and Communion of the said Persons together which confusion ought by no means to be allowed To which he answers That to affirm that the Three Divine Persons are essentially one by mutual Consciousness is not to affirm that mutual Consciousness is the cause of their Vnion p. 71. l. 18. But on the contrary I affirm That if for one Thing to be so or so by another does and must signify causally then to say That Things or Persons are one by mutual Consciousness and yet that mutual Consciousness is not the cause or antecedent Reason of their being one is a direct contradiction in the Terms And it is hard to imagine how a Man in his Sences can think otherwise In the next place he passes impertinently from the Union of the Divine Persons to their mutual Indwelling in each other which are very different Things affirming withal That his mutual Indwelling is their mutual Consciousness though this has been and still is peremptorily denied him and the Reader for the Confutation of it referred to the Two forecited Chapters of the Animadversions which this Author neither does nor can say one word in answer to Well but how does he prove The mutual Inexistence or Indwelling of the Divine Persons to be mutual Consciousness Why because forsooth they are in one another as Minds not as Bodies p. 71. l. 30. But here besides that we deny his very supposition viz. That the Three Divine Persons are Three Minds we deny also That Three distinct Minds can be made Identically one in Nature by any Consciousness or mutual Consciousness whatsoever and in the Divine Persons who are neither Minds nor Bodies it is the Vnity and Identity of their Essence by which alone they are mutually in one another as the sole proper Reason of their being so For there neither is nor can be such a Thing as a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of distinct Minds Essences or Natures in one another But he tells us That in the Divine Persons Vnion and Communion are one and the same Thing p. 72. l. 15. But if he means that they are formally and in all respects the same I deny it affirming withal that they are as much distinguished as the very Divine Essence and Personalities themselves are and consequently that the Union of the Persons consists in their Identification in one and the same Essence or Nature and their Communion consists in those mutual Acts towards each other respectively issuing from and belonging to them by vertue of their Personal Properties But the Animadverter he tells us falsly represents both the Communion of the Divine Persons with each other and their mutual Consciousness too in these words cited from him p. 72. l. 27. viz. That all Acts of several Persons upon each other as all that are mutual must be are properly Acts of Communion by which the said Persons have an Intercourse among themselves as acting interchangeably upon one another To which words of the Animadverter this Author replies first That this may be true in Persons separate but that Persons only distinct and not separate do not Act upon one Another for that such acting must as he says signify an External Impression made by one Person upon another p. 72. at the end and p. 73. at the beginning But will this Man here abide by this false and prophane assertion For do not the Divine Persons mutually know and mutually love one another and do not these Acts of Knowledge and Love both mutually proceed from them and mutually terminate in them too Or will he say that those Acts pass mutually between them by an External Impression upon each other Or lastly That the Divine Persons are any more than only distinct Certainly such Propositions as this Audacious man vents the Church of England was never accustomed to hear or endure before But in the next place after he had said that the Animadverter's Assertion might hold true in Persons separate but not in Persons only distinct which we have confuted He says also p. 72. at the end That it holds true of all other mutual Acts excepting mutual Consciousness which is a fulsome and ridiculous begging of the Question by presuming an Exception where he should first prove it and is as arrant a Petitio Principii as ever appeared in Argumentation And I challenge him to prove how the Exception holds in mutual Consciousness more than in mutual Complacency though indeed in neither But he is now for calling the Animadverter to an account for that unwary and improper expression as he represents it That all Acts of several Persons upon one another are Acts of Communion which says he in the Gravel-lane Dialect makes Boys in a state of Communion with each other at boxing and a match at scolding for it seems he cannot yet rid his head of Billingsgate another state of Communion To which my answer in the first place is That I am sorry to find his ill breeding got so far into his Religion as to dare to mingle such sacred matters with such dirty and prophane Comparisons In the next place I would have him know that the Animadverter abides by what he has said and accordingly would have this Man learn that words in discourse though never so general and indefinite are yet to be limited and determined in their sence by the subject professedly treated of And this in the present Case was such an Act only as supposed Persons in a state of Agreement and proceeded from them and passed between them considered only as such And I must tell him further That though the common use of the World has restrained the sence of the word Communion and Communication ad benigniorem partem yet the literal sence of it imports no more than a bare Interchange of Acts or Offices whether Friendly or hostile and there may be as real and as proper a Communication of ill Turns as of good and sometimes of ill for good as this Author very well knows But as for those words which he concludes this
his Criticism with That had the Deaâ— been pleased to have returned mutual Acts he and the Animadverter might have been long since in a very strict Communion with each other p. 73. l. 16. I shall only return him this one short word That though all this may be perfect Riddle to the Reader yet I understand him very well and could easily give him such an answer as should make him understand himself too But to let the Reader see that he is a foul a Disputant as he can be a Speaker and a fouler upon both accounts the World never had with a Frontless Impudence he declares here p. 73. l. 23. That the Animadverter grants all that he says about the Notion of a Trinity in Vnity And in Particular That every Individual Person has a Self-Consciousness of its own and every such Self-Conscious Person is thereby one with it self and distinguished from all other Persons In answer to which shameless Unconscionable Falshood I do here in the Face of the World challenge the Author of it to prove That the Animadverter grants any one thing that is peculiar to his Hypothesis and particularly to shew that place in the whole Book of the Animadversions in which the Animadverter owns That a Self-Conscious Person is by virtue of it's Self-Consciousness one with it self and primarily distinguished from all other Persons which is the only distinction here spoken of I say I do again and again challenge this Man to prove this and promise withal That if he can do it I will forfeit to him more than ever he was born to and if he cannot I humbly appeal to the most rigid if but Impartial Reader whether I have not all the cause in the World to proclaim him to all Mankind for a downright Lyar Slanderer and Falsificator And as hard as these words may sound less than this upon such an occasion I neither can nor will say But we will see what other holes he can pick in the Animadverter's Coat And here he first taxes him p. 74. l. 1 2. for the Improper use of the Term Vnion of Nature telling him That the Dean forsooth would have said Vnity of Nature as the same Dean not only would have said but has said That a Beast is a Person with several other such choice Proprieties as Chrysome instead of Chrisme and Paraphrases instead of Periphrasis and above an hundred Solecisms to boot But I must here declare to this great Master of proper speaking forsooth as appears from the whole Tenth Chapter of the Animadversions That had the Animadverter in the place cited by him used the Term Vnion instead of Vnity which upon this subject are often promiscuously made use of surely this Man had been the most unfit Person in the World to reflect upon him for it who has stated the Divine Nature in the Three Persons so as to leave no numerical real Vnity in it at all but only an Vnion instead thereof For three Distinct Infinite Minds asserted by this Author being Three distinct Natures or Essences neither have nor can have any such Vnity in them but being United only by mutual Consciousness are capable of no more than a Conjunction or Vnion thereby and that a very slender one too and far from that Essential Vnity which belongs to the Divine Persons But after all I would have His Critical Ignorance know that the Animadverter by the Vnion of Nature here mentioned understands as he may very well and properly do no other than an Vnion in respect of Nature so that it is really an Vnion of Persons Connoting the Nature as the Term which they are United in And accordingly the Animadverter in defiance of this Man 's long silly Parenthesis which it had been more for his Credit to have spared than put in still owns and abides by the Expression But our Critick has not done yet But whereas the Animadverter speaking of the Divine Persons had used these words Their Essence and Personality he here cries out like one Big and bringing forth nothing What but one Personality as well as but one Essence in Three p. 74. l. 11. But may it please your Ignorance good Sir the Animadverter here spoke of Personality not with any respect to number of Particulars but to the common Nature and notion of the Thing and consequently might without the least impropriety use the Term Personality without any Epithete of Plurality For suppose that in a discourse of the general Nature of Celestial Bodies one should speak of the Sun and of the motion of the Heavens together would this Philosopher of Goatham presently cry out What but one motion of the Heavens as well as but one Sun And to give an Instance in Divine matters when the Prophet Ezek. 36.26 tells the Israelites that God would give them a new heart would this wise Man of the forenamed Society cry out here What but One new heart amongst so many thousand Men For certain it is that strictly speaking the heart here mentioned which could be nothing else but a pious and gracious disposition of Mind inclining them to obey God was to be multiplied according to the number of Individuals which it was to be given to But such as understand the force of words and the way of using them know that there is a kind of Grammatica Philosophica by which we may judge when a single word ought to signify singularly and when indefinitely and including all the Particulars that it may be applied to But this I confess is Gibberish and a Riddle as all sense and learning is to one who has neither Grammar nor Philosophy And so having answered his impertinent Cavils I come to give an answer to his equally impertinent Questions with such great huff proposed by him p. 74. l. 17. As first Can they viz. the Divine Persons be one before they are mutually conscious even in the order of conceiving it I answer That in order of conception they not only may but necessarily must and that as necessarily as it is impossible to conceive of â—â—owledge without conceiving of Entity or Being as the â—bject of it and for that cause in the Natural order of â—â—â—ceiving or apprehending Things before it The second Question is Can the Divine Persons be one before they are in one another I answer That in Priority of Time they cannot but that in order of Nature they may and must be so conceived For to be in one Another is but a subsequent circumstance of Being and consequently must presuppose the Being it self whereof it is the Circumstance as in Nature preceding it His third Question is Can there be any other mutual in-being of Minds but by Mutual Consciousness I Answer First That the Divine Persons are not minds Secondly That there is no such Thing as a mutual in-being of Minds in one another And thirdly and lastly That the Divine Persons are not properly and originally in one another by mutual Consciousness but by an Indentity
in Unity is a very plain and intelligible Notion Vind. p. 73. l. 17. from whence follows another Proposition viz. the 15. That the Divine Persons have no other Distinction but what they have by Self-Consciousness and no other Vnion but what they have by mutual Consciousness And consequently That the Trinity thus stated really amounts to no more than a Council or Cabal of Gods and that it is in no degree so much Prophaneness for the Socinians to call it so as for this Man by his Three distinct Infinite Minds to make it so 16. The Three Divine Persons in the Godhead are not only modally distinguished Vind. p. 83. l. last But generally all the Divines in Christendom hold them to be so distinguished and no otherwise 17. There are no Modes no more than there are Qualities and Accidents in the Deity Vind. p. 84. l. first 18. Persons distinct yet not separate but essentially one by mutual Consciousness do not act upon each other Def. p. 73. l. 23. 19. The Divine Nature or Essence is not a single or singular Nature Def. p. 18. l. 13. 20. It is absurd to say That the one Divine Nature of the Father the Son and Holy Ghost is Incarnate and yet none but the Son Incarnate Def. p. 18. l. last and p. 19. l. first 21. One single Essence can subsist but once or have but one Subsistence Def. p. 19. l. 23. and p. 24. l. 29. and yet for all this it follows 22. One Eternal Infinite Mind is repeated in Three Subsistences Def. p. 94. l. 6. 23. There is no Distinction between the Divine Essence and a Divine Person Def. p. 91. l. 28. And yet all Divines speak of the Divine Essence as communicable or common to the Persons and account of the former as Absolute and of the latter as Relative and that surely â—mports Distinction 24. The Divine Essence makes the Person ibid. 25. The Divine Essence must be acknowledged to be a Person Def. p. 92. l. 19. 26. No man has an Idea of an Intelligent Nature or Essence distinguished from a Person Def. p. 92. l. 10. 27. Infinite Mind and Infinite Intelligent Person are Terms as equipollent and convertible as God and infinite Mind Def. p. 81. l. 23 c. 28. There are in God Acts of Sensation of a different kind and species from Acts of Knowledge and Self-Consciousness and mutual Consciousness are of the former sort Def. p. 77. l. 10 c. 29. It is the Soul only that can be happy or miserable rewarded or punished in or out of the Body Def. 54. l. 31. And if so what need say I can there be of a Resurrection Such Doctrines certainly back'd with Licence and Authority may come to something in time 30. We can frame no Idea of Substance but what we have from Matter Vind. p. 69. l. first 31. We cannot imagine how any Substance should be without a Beginning Vind. p. 70. l. 6. And if that be true then I affirm that Nothing can be imagined to be so 32. The Nature of a Spirit consists in Vital internal Sensation Def. p. 7. l. 11. 33. The Unity of a Spirit consists in Continuity of Sensation Def. ibid. 34. One Numerical Nature whether Finite or Infinite may be repeated without being multiplied Of the first whereof he often gives us an Instance in a man and his living Image Def. p. 91. l. 10. and of the other in the Divine Nature it self Def. p. 31. l. first 35. A man and his living Image are two distinct men though the Image is not another man Def. p. 31. l. 19 21. 36. An Image is wholly and entirely the same with the Prototype Def. p. 28. l. 16. 37. The Soul is the person and the Body only the Organ or Instrument of it Def. p. 51. l. 2. p. 57. l. 11. and p. 58. l. 16. 38. The whole entire Personality is in the Soul Def. p. 50. l. 20. 39. The Soul is the person and the Body is taken into the Unity of the said person Def. p. 60. l. 22. 40. The Soul is not properly part of the Person Def p. 61. l. 3. 41. The Body is not a Part of the Person Def. p. 60. l. 23. 42. The Soul is a Complete Being Def. p. 49. l. 30. 43. The Soul may be a complete and perfect Person and yet not a perfect Man Def. p. 49. l. 28 Whereas a Person implies all the essential perfections of a Man and something more 44. A Man with a Body Blind Deaf and Lame is not a perfect Man viz. upon a Natural and essential Account not so Def. p. 50. l. 10. 45. All Union between Natures is a Natural Union Def. p. 49. l. 16. 46. The Soul is as much the same with or without the Body as the Body with or without its Cloaths Def. p. 60. l. 29. 47. Unless there be two Personalities as well as Two Natures viz. Soul and Body the Two Natures cannot be two parts of one human Personality as they are parts of a Man Def. 45. l. 25. Now what gross Ignorance is this For an human Personality no less than a Particular Humanity essentially and metaphysically implies and connotes Parts Though only the Person and Man himself in the Concrete is actually and Physically compounded of them To which I add that Two Personalities can never be two parts of any essential compound whatsoever but Two Natures may and in the Present instance certainly are See this further explained p. 115 116. These Propositions with several others like them are his New Dogmata in Divinity and Philosophy which as they are most absurd and false in themselves so the Consequences of many of them with reference to the Incarnation of our Blessed Saviour I leave to the Thinking and Judicious Reader himself to draw out and to the Church â—oâ— judge of And possibly some time or other Foreigners also may be presented with a View of them in a Language which they understand better than they do ours THE CONTENTS Humbly Presented To the Reader 's perusal before he proceeds to read the following BOOK AN Account of the Civil Language bestowed by the Defender upon the Animadverter and Animadversions Pag. 2 3 The Objection about the word Mystery proved only the Blunder of the Objector 4. The Defender wearies the Reader with a nauseous Repetition of his old confuted Hypothesis without any new Argument to enforce it 7 He begins it with a gross Vntruth 7 8 9 He adds another as gross 9 10 c. He does not as he falsly affirms concur perfectly with the School-men in stating the Unity of the Godhead 11 The Vnconceivableness of the Mystery of the Trinity never accounted by the Christian Church any Objection against it at all 12 The Fathers way of explaining the Trinity wrongfully slighted and reflected upon by this Author 12 13 14 There is no such thing as Spiritual Sensation it being no better than a Contradiction in Adjecto 15 16 c. The
in this Article when if he should be put to it to explain this Profession he would never acknowledge those Three Persons to be That One God It is therefore mere Trifling to alledge the Verbal Profession of a Form where it is evident that a Man maintains such Doctrines as utterly overthrow the Sence of that Form For whosoever holds any Proposition inconsistent with or subversive of another Proposition held by him can no more be said truly to own that other Proposition than if he actually and in terminis denied it since surely there may be a Real and Vertual as well as a Verbal and Express Denial of Things But this Author thinks it an abundant Proof of his Orthodoxy in the Point before us that he pleads his entire acknowledgment of the Athanasian Creed in all the Parts and Expressions of it But by his favour I must tell him that neither is this sufficient unless he could prove that he cannot Contradict Himself Forasmuch as a Man He himself especially may make a Verbal profession even of that Creed also and yet own and maintain Assertions directly contrary to and inconsistent with the Sence and Design of it Now the Design of this Creed is to assert such a perfect Vnity in the Divine Nature or Essence and every essential Attribute of it as shall exclude all Multiplication of each notwithstanding the Plurality and incommunicable Distinction of the Divine Persons This I say is the Design of the Athanasian Creed and does our Author's Hypothesis fall in and agree with it If so let us make Trial of it by casting the Principal Part of his Hypothesis into the Athanasian Form thus The Father is Infinite Spirit the Son is Infinite Spirit and the Holy Ghost is Infinite Spirit and yet they are not Three Infinite Spirits but one Infinite Spirit So runs the Athanasian Form but then the illative Proposition viz. That they are not Three Infinite Spirits is a direct Contradiction to this Author's Hypothesis who positively affirms That the Three Divine Persons are Three Infinite Spirits and I as positively affirm That Three Infinite Spirits are Three Gods And this I suppose makes an Alteration in this Article with a vengeance an Alteration in the very Substance of it if a Total Subversion can with any Propriety of Speech be called an Alteration But this Author defends not himself only by his Acknowledgment of the Athanasian Creed but also by alledging his perfect Concurrence with the School-Men viz. That he asserts the Vnity of the Godhead in as high Terms as ever the Schools did even a Natural Numerical Vnity thereof p. 5. lin 3. But does not this Man in his Vindication p. 114. lin 26. tell us That the Fathers and Gregory Nyssen in particular asserted a Specifick Vnity of the Divine Nature and meant no other by the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 than an Vnion in such an one and that for so holding none ought to quarrel or find fault with them forasmuch as they asserted also a Numerical Vnity of the said Nature And therefore if this Author did indeed hold the Vnity of the Godhead in as high Terms as the Schools did I would Know what should make him talk thus of a Specifick Vnity of the Deity in the forecited place and not only there but of something Analogous to this Specifick Vnity even in this Defence also p. 17. l. 19. For I am sure the Schools allow of no such Thing Nor is this all but he also advances an Absurdity so peculiarly his own how falsly soever he may charge the Fathers that none who had but drank in the first Elements of Logick and Philosophy ever held or I believe so much as dreamed of before viz. Such an Vnity in the Divine Nature as is partly Specifical and partly Numerical that is to say partly Vniversal and partly Particular p. 17. l. 26. A thing so monstrously illogical and contradictious That to mention it is to confute it So that the Reader may here see how grosly he is like to be imposed upon if he takes this Author's word for a Just and True Account of his Hypothesis But he is now entring upon his Grand Project and a great one it is undoubtedly viz. To give the World a fuller a clearer and a more Intelligible Notion of a Trinity in Unity than all the Fathers and the Catholick Church ever had of it for above sixteen hundred Years before And as a Preparation to this he tells us pag. 5. lin 16. That the Great Objection all along against the Article of the Trinity has been the Unconceivableness of it And therefore no doubt there must needs be the highest Reason and Necessity in the World for the Churches admitting this Man 's New Explication of it as the only sure Expedient to remove this mighty Objection and so to render a Trinity in Unity for ever after Plain Easie and Intelligible But I must remind this Author by the way That the Catholick Church having ever looked upon this as the greatest of Mysteries never made the Unconceivableness of it any Objection against it at all and She had been very inconsistent with Her self if she had But he tells us here That the Fathers indeed endeavour'd to help our Conceptions and Imaginations of this mysterious Union by some sensible Images such as the Union of the Sun its Light and Splendour of a Fountain and its Streams and of a Tree and its Branches p. 6. l. 5. Adding very gravely That every one Knows this who has looked into the Fathers as no doubt Mr. Dean has and so have most Book-Sellers too But he proceeds and tells us That these material Images might serve to render the Notion of a Trinity in Unity Possible and Credible p. 6. And if they did so much I affirm that they did that which the Catholick Church being otherwise certain of the Article it self from the Scripture then fully acquiesced in without venturing or proceeding any further And where then I pray was the Defect of these material Images and Resemblances as they were used and applied by the Fathers Why our Author in the next Words tells us That the Defect of them was in this That they could not help us to conceive what kind of Union it is that is between the Divine Persons p. 6. l. 16. But this I deny as utterly false For first this Mysterious Union of the Divine Persons which the Fathers endeavoured to give the World some Resemblance of was as to the Kind of it an Union in Nature Essence or Substance and that in Opposition to an Union by bare Consent or any other Union whatsoever less than that in Nature or Essence So that the Kind of Union is here assigned And then as for what he says of the Inability of these Resemblances to help us to conceive of this Kind of Vnion If he means that they could not help us to any Conception of it at all this also is false for so farr as
more and a Specifical Vnity is the Unity of Several Particular Individual Natures or Beings and therefore unless the same Thing can both be One Individual and no more and be Several Particular Individuals too for any one to assert the same Vnity to be both Specifical and Numerical as this Author undeniably does is a monstrous Contradiction But this has been so fully laid open already as to that part of it especially which concerns a Specifick Unity in the Divine Nature that to say any more of it would be but a needless Repetition And so I proceed to the 2. Second Proposition viz. That the Divine Nature is not a single or singular Nature Def. p. 18. l. 13. which I on the contrary positively assert it to be upon these following Considerations First That the Divine Nature is either a Singular or an Vniversal Nature but not an Vniversal and therefore a Singular The Consequence is manifest because singular and universal adequately divide Being and therefore there can be nothing but what must fall under one of the Members of the Division and then that the Divine Nature cannot be Vniversal is as evident because if so it must be drawn off from several particular Natures but there are not several particular Divine Natures for it to be abstracted or drawn off from Add to this That the Denial of the Singularity of the Divine Nature would overthrow its very Existence for nothing exists but Singulars Secondly Individuality and Singularity of Nature are the same thing both of them importing the greatest and perfectest degree of Unity which is Numerical and consequently since this very Author affirms the Individuality of the Divine Nature p. 18. line 12. the Singularity of it must be granted too Thirdly This Man all along supposes Singleness or Singularity essentially to imply in it Subsistence but this is a gross Mistake for neither does it imply it in the Essential Notion nor yet in the Real Existence of the Thing Not in the first For the Singularity of a Thing belongs to its Essence even as prescinding and abstracting from its Subsistence as something posterior to it and therefore it does not essentially imply it And accordingly when we consider the Divine Nature abstracted from its respective Subsistences which we may and often do we still consider it as one Numerical Individual Substance that is to say in its highest Unity and Singularity and therefore the Essential Notion of Singularity does not imply Subsistence in it Nor in the next place does it necessarily imply the same as it actually exists For the Second Person of the Trinity assumed the Humane Nature without its proper Subsistence but not without its proper Singularity For it was one Numerical Individual Single Humane Nature which he took upon him so that upon this Account also Singularity does not necessarily inferr Subsistence But here I think fit to observe that the word single or singular which are here the same there being but one Latine word singulare for both may be taken in Two very different Sences First In its strict and most proper Sence for Numerical or Individual Unity of Nature Or Secondly in a larger and less proper Sence for that which has but one Subsistence only and this is not so properly called single as solitary and by no means applicable to the Divine Nature which has not only One but Three Subsistences belonging to it This was the Sence in which the Sabellians used the word or rather which they put upon it contending for and allowing only a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is such a Divine Nature as was capable but of One Subsistence and no more But such a Singleness in the Divine Nature the Catholick Church neither knew nor owned and yet still maintained the Individuality and Numerical Vnity and consequently the true and proper Singularity of the same And will this Man now from the Improper Signification of the word Single or Singular as applied by the Sabellians to the Divine Nature deny the Divine Nature to be a Single or Singular Nature according to the true proper and generally received Sence of Singularity which both with Logicians and Philosophers is so perfectly the same with Numerical Unity that it is impossible for any thing to be Numerically One and not Singular too But how positively soever he denies the Singleness or Singularity of the Divine Nature here he asserts it as positively and that as the Universal Concurring Sence of all the Fathers in his Vindication p. 121. line 18. where he roundly tells us That all the Fathers assert the Singularity of the Godhead or Numerical Unity of the Divine Essence and that the Three Divine Persons are united in this One Numerical Essence which according to the Fathers he calls the Singularity of the Godhead This I say he expresly says in the place alledged and I desire him to reconcile it to what he says every whit as expresly in page 18. line 12. of this Defence viz. That the Divine Nature is One Individual Nature but not one single or singular Nature And again that one single Nature can be but One Person whether in God or Man and yet further p. 19. line 23. That it is demonstrable that one single Nature can have but one Subsistence So that if he will abide by what he says in this Defence he absolutely casheirs whatsoever he himself had elsewhere owned to be the sence and language of all the Fathers and he might have added of the Schoolmen and all other Divines besides nor is this all but he utterly overthrows also a Trinity of Persons by averring it demonstrable that there can be no plurality of Subsistences in one single or singular Nature and if no plurality of Subsistences then I am sure no plurality of Persons neither But thanks be to God though he uses this Big word Demonstrable yet what he calls Demonstration others account not so much as a probable Proof where he is the Demonstrator And let none wonder that he can so scandalously contradict himself in Two Books who so often does it in the space of Two lines But methinks what he alleges out of Victorinus Afer for disproving the singularity of the Divine Nature in Three Persons comes something with the latest viz. those Notable Words of his Non oportet nec fas est dicere Vnam esse substantiam Tres esse Personas p. 19. l. 2. In opposition to which one forlorn Testimony it were easy to allege forty Fathers at least constantly expressing the Trinity by Vna substantia and Tres Personae but that I think it very needless to assign who does so when it is hard to assign who does not And therefore as for his thus recurring to Victorinus Afer I must take the Boldness to tell him that this is not so much a Quoting as a Weeding of Antiquity since surely a more Incompetent Authority in the present subject could not well be found as the Circumstances of the Man might
according as the Thing is which it belongs to For all these Three necessarily go together and essentially imply one another and consequently there must be one and the same Principle of them all And now if we would see whether or no this Author applies all this to Self-Consciousness with reference to Minds or Spirits which he constantly makes to be Persons let the Reader cast his Eye back upon some of the fore-alleged Passages particularly upon that in Vindic. p. 49. l. 12. That this Self-Consciousness makes a Spirit numerically one with it self And in Vind. p. 68. l. 6. That the Self-Consciousness of every one of the Persons viz. in the Trinity to it self makes them Three distinct Persons And again Vind. p. 74. l. 13. That the Essential Vnity of a Spirit consists in Self-Consciousness and that it is nothing else which makes a Spirit one and distinguishes it from all other Spirits Likewise in this Defence p. 7. He tells us expresly That the Nature of a Spirit consists in Sensation which with him is only another word for Self-Consciousness Nay and to go no further than the very next page to that in which he here so positively declares That he no where makes Self-Consciousness the formal Reason of Personality viz. Defence p. 43. He roundly affirms That Self-Consciousness makes a Mind or Spirit one with it self and distinguishes or separates it from all other Minds or Spirits And that such a distinct and separate Self-Conscious Mind is a Natural Person Now I would have this Man in the first place tell us whether all these Passages have not in them a causal sence but only an Illative or Probative and no more And in the next place I would have him shew me whether there be any Thing more signified by the formal Reason of Personality than what the forecited Passages fully contain in them and if he cannot prove that there is any more signified by it as there is not then let him for the future leave off shuffling and own that by what he has asserted in the said Passages he has made Self-Consciousness the formal Reason of Personality with reference to Minds or Spirits which he Universally affirms to be Persons And by this I hope the Judicious Reader will see with both Eyes what a slippery Self-Contradicting Caviller the Animadverter has to dispute with In the mean time the sum of the Animadverter's Argument against him stands thus This Author asserts every Mind or Spirit to be a Person He places this Personality in Self-Consciousness he holds this Self-Consciousness to be Essential to and Inseparable from a Mind for as much as he positively asserts the Nature of a Mind or Spirit to consist in it Defen p. 7. l. 11. whereupon it does and must follow That since our Saviour in assuming the humane Nature assumed an humane Mind Soul or Spirit he assumed an humane Person too for as much as its Personality was as Inseparable from it as its Self-Consciousness from which it necessarily resulted was Nor will it avail him to allege the Interposal of Supernatural and extraordinary Power in the present Instance since such Power though never so extraordinary and Supernatural never destroys the Essence or Essentially necessary Connexion of Things And therefore if the Personality of a mind be implied in the very Nature of a Mind a Mind can be no more without its Personality than without its Nature which would be a direct Contradiction to the effecting whereof the Divine Power it self does not extend But on the other side when we state the Personality of an humane Nature upon the compleat Subsistence of it which is a mode not necessarily implied in it the Humane Nature of Christ might very well by the Divine Power be made to exist without it and so in a supernatural way be taken into and supported by the Personal Subsistence of the Eternal Word And all this with full accord to the strictest Principles of Reason without the least necessity of making Two Persons in our Saviour whereas according to this Author's Hypothesis it is impossible for all the Reason of Minkind to keep off an Humane Person as well as a Divine from belonging to our Saviour by his Incarnation or Assumption of the humane Nature As for his taking shelter in Boetius's Definition of a Person that will not help him neither since the utmost that can be proved against it is that Boetius was under a mistake and one Man's mistake certainly cannot make another in the right For all both Schoolmen and other Divines agree that this Definition strictly taken is defective and that instead of substantia Individua alone it should be substantia Individua completa Incommunicabilis or something Equivalent to the Two last Terms For otherwise this Definition also would infer Two Persons in Christ since there are Two Individual Substances belonging to him viz. an Humane and a Divine But after all we have great reason to believe that Boetius here uses the word Substantia for Subsistentia as several of the Ancient Fathers of great note did and particularly St. Hilary in his Books of the Trinity very often and St. Austin sometimes And then the Boetian Definition is perfect and good and no such Consequence of a double Personality in our Saviour can be drawn from thence For as much as the Son of God took our humane Nature without its proper Subsistence into the Subsistence of his own Eternal Person And so I proceed to the Animadverter's Third Argument proving Self-Consciousness not to be the formal Reason of Personality in Created Beings which is this The Soul in its separate state is conscious to its self of all its own Internal Acts or Motions c. and yet the Soul in such a state is not a Person and therefore Self-Consciousness is not the formal Reason of Personality for if it were it would constitute a Person wheresoever it was This Argument is of the same Nature with the former each of them being brought as a Particular Negative against an Universal Affirmative And how does this Defender confute it Why by the easiest way of Confutation that it is possible for Ignorance to give it viz. by saying That it is nothing to the Purpose But does he know what is and what is not an Argument and what is to confute an Assertion or Position and what is not Let him know then That to confute an Argument is properly to conclude the Contradictory Proposition of that which is held by the Respondent or Defendant and is called by the Greeks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and by the Latines Redargutio And here I would have this hardy Ignoramus own before the World if he dares That one Negative Instance does not overthrow an Vniversal Affirmative as really and effectually as Ten Thousand But possibly one who can be of all sides may be for both sides of the Contradiction too and hold That Self-Consciousness is the formal Reason of Personality Personal
and moreover proves their Rationality from their Self-Consciousness So that we see here of what Virtue this Self-Consciousness is that it can extend even to Beasts themselves and make them Rational For having said That a Beast is Self-Conscious p. 46. l. 21. he adds That wheresoever there is a Conscious Life there is some degree of Reason And is not this think we a blessed Assertion both in Philosophy and Divinity For according to what he has here asserted a Beast may be properly defined Animal Rationale And which is more a Beast is not a different Species from a Man for Rationality is the Specifick difference of a Man And if a Beast has Reason to a certain degree as he affirms it has then the difference between a Man and a Beast the grinning race it self not excepted is only Gradual and consequently neither is nor can be Specifical I shall say no more upon this subject but leave the whole World to consider what this Man is and what fit Propositions these are to be Licensed by Authority However I would have the Reader observe that this poor Creature who explodes Parts in Personality which his Adversary in a strict and proper Sence never did nor does assert yet admits and holds Degrees in Personality p. 46. l. 22. For says he wheresoever there is a Conscious Life there must be some Degree of Reason and that entitles them viz. Beasts to as much share in Personality as they have in Reason But let me tell this utter stranger to all Philosophy That as there is no such Thing as a magis and minus in substance so neither is there in substantial modes of which Personality is one and the Principal one too But he goes on and tells us That no Man will pretend that an humanâ— Body though united to a Reasonable Soul has any Reason or Sence either p. 46. l. 27. And yet this very Man says Vind. p. 269. l. 18 19. That the Body is conscious to all the Commands of the Will Which how it can be without any thing of Sence belonging to it I must profess surpasses all the Sence that I am Master of to conceive and I cannot but declare withal That if a Thing may be Conscious and yet have no sence at all in it I shall have a worse and a meaner opinion of Self-Consciousness than ever I had before But these and the like wonderful Things I suppose our Author will tell us that he speaks only by way of Allusion which next to his meaning is the surest refuge he has when he is baffled to fly to And so from hence he comes to this Hypothetical Decision of the Point viz. That if Personality belongs only to a Reasonable Nature it is certain that the Soul makes or constitutes the Person p. 46. l. 31. Which is an Extraordinary Consequence indeed nevertheless I deny it as utterly false For in Men neither is the Soul all that is contained in a Reasonable Nature nor a Reasonable Nature all that is contained in a Person And therefore as the Soul cannot adequately constitute a Reasonable Nature so much less can it adequately constitute a Person A Reasonable or rather an Intelligent Nature may be either simple as the Divine and Angelical or Compound as the humane Nature is which essentially consists of Soul and Body as the whole World agrees and since it does so I deny that the Soul can adequately make or constitute either a Reasonable Nature or Person which includes in it the Nature and something besides any more than one Essential Part of the said Nature or Person can do the joint office of Two And whereas he adds That the Soul as he may so speak is the Centre of Personality I must tell him that I own the Soul to be the Principal constituent Part of the Person but as for the other Notion I know no more of the Centre of Personality than I do of the Continuity of Sensation Which word as it is perfectly new and not used before so it is very absurdly applied here for I demand of him how that can be called the Centre of Personality which diffuses it self through the whole Person even to the utmost extremity of its subsistence and consequently reaches as far as the Personality of the said Person does or can Nay and to use his own Cant as far as the conscious life extends For certainly it must needs be a pleasant thing to imagine a Centre reaching as far as That which must be drawn to such a considerable distance from it one way as well as terminate in it Another But if after all this our Author means by these words the Centre of Non-sence I assure him his Writings are of a Compass large enough to pass for the Circumference But let us see some more of his Monstrous Assertions The Body says he is part of the Man and so part of the Person but it does not make the Person but is taken into the Person by a Vital Vnion p. 47. l. 7. To this I answer That for the Body to be actually a part of the Person and yet while it is so not to go to the making of the Person as a Part to the making of the whole is a direct Contradiction And whereas he talks of its being taken into the Person by a Vital Vnion Let me tell him That there is no such Thing as a Vital Vnion in Created Beings which is not also a Composition that is to say A Concurrence of Parts to the Constitution of the whole And let him shew me in Created Natures one Instance of such an Union as is not also a Composition if he can So that all Composition as such is an Union of Parts and all Vital Union of Parts a Composition and the Body is as essential though not so noble a Part of the Person as the Soul it self For the Person of a Man supposes and includes in it the whole humane Nature and the humane Nature includes in it the Essential parts of humane Nature which are Soul and Body But he tells us further That since all Life Reason and Sensation are only in the Soul the whole Personality must be in the Soul also though the Soul when Vnited to the Body is not the whole Person p. 47. l. 22. To which I answer That the whole Person and the whole Personality adequately connote one Another and belong to one and the same suppositum and that otherwise there would be no Commensuration between the Abstract and the Concrete but there would be an essential part of the Concrete to which the Abstract could not extend or belong which would be a gross absurdity But besides I deny the Thing supposed by him viz. That all Life Reason and Sensation are only in the Soul For though they may be in the Soul as the Subjectum proximum Principium Quo that is as immediately proceeding from it and subjected in it yet they are properly in the whole
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the Humane Nature together If this be not a Supernatural Effect and consequently no Natural Vnion let this Man assign me any one that ever was or can be reputed such And therefore let him take notice for the future That it is not the bare Terms or Extreams of an Vnion as that it is between Two Natures that can make it Natural But an Agent acting and joining those Natures together according to the Ordinary Course of Nature which must make it formally so and which can never be wrought by any Agent so working where one of the Natures to be united is Finite and the other Infinite But as I said before what is all this to this present Argument which has nothing to do with the Hypostatick Vnion but only with that way or kind of Union by which Created Beings are united together And will this Man argue from one sort of Union to another between which there is no Cognation at all Wherefore let the Charge not only of Boldness but Prophaneness too rest upon him who dares make the common way of Natural Unions the measure of a Supernatural and that such a one as exceeds all the Miracles that Omnipotence it self ever yet wrought in the World But now as he tells us he is for quitting the School-Terms which he never understood and for speaking so as all may understand him And here the first Oracle thus delivered by him is this viz. That the Soul may be a Compleat and Perfect Person but not a Perfect Man p. 49. l. 28. To which I answer That a perfect Man is essentially a Compound Nature or Being And that an Humane Person is essentially so too And that therefore the Soul being as essentially a simple Vncompounded Being can neither be a Perfect Man nor a Perfect Person But this is such a Proposition that I shall say no more of it but leave it wholly to the Reader 's Admiration Nevertheless to dis-encumber him from such Stuff as this Man's Ignorance is still throwing in his way I think fit here to note the Difference between a Perfect and a Compleat Being Now a Thing is said to be Perfect in respect of its Essence as wanting nothing that is Essential to it But it is called Compleat in respect of its Subsistence as subsisting so by it self as to be neither a Part nor Adjunct of another Thing Accordingly the first of these is the Perfection of a Man considered barely as a Man as an Animal Rationale compounded of Soul and Body But the other is the Perfection of a Person or of a Man considered not only as a Rational Nature but as a Rational Nature completely subsisting From whence it follows That neither does the Perfection of a Man nor the Perfection of a Person depend upon the Perfections or Operations belonging to him as being neither Essential to him as a Man or as a Person and consequently though they be never so defective yet he who has the Essence or Essentials of a Man is a Perfect Man and he who has this Essence or Nature of a Man completed with the Proper Subsistence of the same is a Perfect Person But our Author is for explaining this matter to us further by an Instance Let us says he consider a Soul vitally Vnited to a Body with Organs so indisposed for Sensation that a Man can neither see nor hear nor tast nor smell but only just lives and breaths you will not say this is a perfect Man p. 50. l. 8. Yes good Sir I both will and do say so For he who has the perfect Essence of a Man is a perfect Man whether Halt or Blind or Deaf and as defective in the Actual Exercise of his faculties as of his Limbs But you will say do not all these great defects render a Man more Imperfect than he would be otherwise Yes as to his State or Condition they do but not as to his Nature or Essence And therefore this Author may take notice That there is a twofold Perfection belonging to a Man the first Essential which we have been hitherto speaking of and properly consists in that perfection of Nature or Essence without which he could not be a Man The other is Extra-essential and in respect of the former Accidental and may as we have noted be called a perfection of State or Condition and consists properly in an Integrity of Parts and a right disposition of the Faculties enabling a Man to exert all the Operations belonging to him And I do here according to all the Principles of Philosophy and the concurrent sence of Philosophers affirm that notwithstanding an Universal failure of all those Accidental Perfections a Man is as perfectly a Man by vertue of his bare Essence and as perfectly a Person by vertue of his Compleat Subsistence as if he had them all in their highest Pitch But our Author goes on If says he a Compleat Person may not be a Compleat and perfect Man then the Formal Reason of Personality and the Natural Perfection of a Man are Two Things p. 50. l. 15. I grant they are so But utterly deny That a Compleat Person can be otherwise than a Perfect Man though there may be a Perfect Man who is not a Person For every Person includes in it a Nature Rationalis which makes a Perfect Man and besides that a Compleat Subsistence of the same which makes the Person and whereas he says That the whole Personality must be in the Soul if a Man be a perfect Man who is united to a Body which is worse than none p. 50. l. 20. I must tell him first That there is no such Thing as a Man's being united to a Body for though the Soul is united to a Body yet the Man is not but contains both Body and Soul united to one Another And I must tell him further That the Soul 's being united to a Body which is worse than none does not make that Body less an Essential Part of the Man and of the Person than if it were the most accomplish'd Body in the World In the mean time I must desire the Reader to take Notice of the Intolerable Absurdity of this Author 's affirming a Man to be united to a Body and that his own Body too For at this rate the Man must be one Term of the Vnion and his Body the other But still he goes boldly on and tells us p. 51. l. 2 3. That the Soul is the Person and the Body only the Instrument or Organ of it In answer to which I must tell him That not the Soul but the whole Compositum is the Person and that the Body is not the Instrument of the Soul as of the Principal Agent but of the whole Compositum and moreover that the Soul is as much the Instrument of the said Compositum as the Body is or can be and lastly That Both of them are such Instruments as are also Vital Essential Parts of the Compound
Nature but to the Vnity in Trinity p. 69. l. 29. And will this Man say That any Thing can be essential to the Vnity of the one which is not as essential to the Vnity of the other For though we frequently use the word Vnion of Persons yet strictly speaking it is improper since it is not an Vnion which is but another word for Vnition but an Vnity of Persons in Nature or an Vnity of Nature in the Persons which is the proper expression and therefore we neither say an Vnion in Trinity nor a Trinity in Vnion but always apply the word Vnity to both But our Author closes this Paragraph with these words p. 69. at the end That if mutual Consciousness be essential to this Vnity of Nature so that the Three Persons are thus united and cannot be one without it he will contend no further And so far I think he does discreetly but too late For whether he will contend further or no his Adversary both does and will for as much as this Author has asserted a great deal more than what this Concession amounts to and if he does not prove all that he has asserted he is a baffled Person For he has positively asserted as we have shewn from his own words that mutual Consciousness makes the Three Divine Persons to be Naturally one p. 66. Def. 26. and to be essentially one God Vind. p. 68. l. 6. And this by his favour is quite another thing from only asserting that mutual Consciousness is essential to that Vnity of Nature which is in the Three Persons For that it may be as it is an essential consequent of the said Unity of Nature and no more As also from asserting as he here does p. 69. l. the last That the three Divine Persons cannot be one without it For surely that which is only a Conditio sine quâ non and without which the said Divine Persons cannot be one in Nature and that which formally makes them so or wherein their Vnity does consist are wholly different Things And therefore since it is manifest that this Man has no Logick I heartily wish that he had some shame In the mean time he is for shewing as well as he can how the Animadverter mistakes the whole matter in these words quoted from him Anim. p. 108. l. 14. The Divine Nature or Essence being one and the same in all the Three Persons there is upon this account one and the same knowledge in them also And they are not one in Nature by vertue of their mutual Consciousness but they are therefore mutually conscious because the Perfect Unity and Identity of their Nature makes them so Thus the Animadverter and where is now the mistake why our Author tells us That Three Persons who have the same Nature may know the same Things without feeling one another's thoughts and knowledge in themselves p. 70. l. 22. To which I answer first That the foundation of this reply is That there is such a thing as Feeling in God distinct from knowledge which is the height of nonsence and Absurdity as shall be declared before we pass from this head of mutual Consciousness Secondly I utterly deny That Persons who have the same Divine Nature can know the same Things I mean all the same Things for that only here can be insisted upon without knowing each other's thoughts and knowledge in themselves For as much as whatsoever each of these Divine Persons knows he does and must know by an Infinite Act of Knowledge comprehending both himself and the other Two Persons and all that is Knowable in the World besides and how each of the Divine Persons can know all this without mutually knowing one another I desire this Man to shew But he argues further That if by one and the same knowledge the Animadverter means that the knowledge of the Divine Nature in the Three Persons is but one Individual Act as the knowledge of one single Person is this destroys the Distinction of Persons which cannot be distinct without distinct personal Acts as mutual knowledge is and destroys mutual Consciousness for there is no place for mutual Consciousness or mutual Knowledge where there is but one single Act of Knowledge p. 70. l. 24. In answer to which I observe these Two Notable Instances of his Great Ignorance First His supposing and taking for granted the very Thing in dispute between him and his Adversary viz. That the Distinction of the Divine Persons depends upon certain Distinct Acts of Knowledge as the cause or antecedent Reason of that Distinction whereas his Adversary on the contrary affirms all Distinction of Divine Knowledge as well as all Diversification of the Divine Nature it self to be from the Distinction or distinct Subsistence of the Divine Persons as the Prime and original Reason of it And whereas this Author says again That the Divine Persons cannot be distinct without Distinct Personal Acts as mutual knowledge is it is true That they cannot be without them as Inseparably consequent upon their Personal Distinction but not as constituent of it Secondly The other Instance of his Ignorance here is his affirming that there can be no place for mutual Consciousness or Knowledge where there is but one single or Individual Act of Knowledge Which I utterly deny as false and in order to the proving it so I do here observe That there is but one single Act of Knowledge in all the Three Divine Persons that is to say single as to the Substance of the Act though diversified by the several modifications which it receives from the Persons whom it proceeds from and from the several respects it bears to the several objects it terminates upon Which different modifications and respects do by no means infer diverse or distinct Acts of Knowledge but only variously modify determine and distinguish one and the same Act. Accordingly in the present Case I do here affirm to this Author That mutual Consciousness is nothing else but one and the same Act of Divine Knowledge differently modified as it proceeds severally and after a different manner from Father Son and Holy Ghost as the Persons knowing and jointly terminated in them all as the objects known as on the other side Self-Consciousness is no more than this one and the same Act of Knowledge as it issues only from one of the Persons and terminates upon the same too Though I confess if the Three Divine Persons were Three distinct Minds or Spirits mutual Consciousness could not be one Act only but must be Three This I hold concerning the Divine Knowledge and the respective distinctions of it and I leave this Author to try his best skill in Divinity and Philosophy to confute it In the mean time he gives us one Absurdity more out of his inexhaustible stock viz. That the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ascribed by the Fathers to the Three Divine Persons is that very mutual Consciousness which the Dean means For these are his words p. 7.
is fully consistent with a plurality of Individual Substances which a Numerical Vnity of Substance would he stick to that neither is nor can be To which he adds That no man can have any Idea of Divine Persons which are not Substances p. 92. l. 13. But foul and impudent Self-contradiction is his constant practice from first to last and therefore without pursuing him any further I shall conclude all with that Testimony of Faustinus an eminent Divine in the Fourth Century and one of those who scrupl'd the use of the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for fear of being brought thereby to admit of Three Substances in the Godhead and those not Specifically but only Numerically distinct as appears from the following Passage at the end of the Confession of hiâ— Faith entituled Faustini Presbyteri Fides and exhibited by him to the Emperor Theodosius Miramur says he illos Catholicos probari posse qui Patris Filiâ— Spiritûs Sancti Tres substantias confitentur nam etsi dicunt non se credere Filium Dei aut Spiritum Sanctum Creaturam tamen contra fidem sentiunt cum dicunt Tres esse Substantias consequens est enim ut Tres Deos consiteantur qui Tres Substantias confitentur Quam vocem Catholici semper execrâ—ti sunt I know Faustinus waâ— mistaken in reckoning Hypostasis and Substantia â—oâ— Terms of the same signification but his Argument founded thereupon is certainly so clear a Proof of the Church's disowning Three Substances in the Blessed Trinity that a clearer cannot possibly be And yet this audacious man at this time of the day with his Three Infinite Minds or Spirits which are undeniably Three Substances is new dressing and setting up that Odious Tritheism which the Primitive Christians so highly abhorr'd and so zealously declar'd against Sad therefore at this time must needs be the State and woful the Circumstances of our poor Church of England once so deservedly reputed the Noblest and Best Reform'd part of the Catholick to have the Pest and Poyson of such an Heresie fretting in her very Bowels and to be forced to endure what at the same time I am sure she heartily does and cannot but deplore And so I come to canvase his Answer to the Animadverter's Third Argument which proceeds thus If it be truly said That one and the same Infinite Mind or Spirit is Father Son and Holy Ghost I mean all Three taken together and it cannot be truly said That one and the same Infinite Mind or Spirit is three distinct Infinite Minds or Spirits then it follows that Father Son and Holy Ghost are not three distinct Infinite Minds or Spirits But it may be truly said c. This is the Argument In the Defender's Reply to which these Two things are to be consider'd 1. The Representation he makes of the Argument and 2. The Answer he gives to it As to the first of which he tells us That the whole of the Argument is this That One Infinite Mind cannot be Three Infinite Minds nor Three Infinite Minds One Infinite Mind and that Three Infinite Persons who are One Infinite Mind cannot be Three Infinite Minds p. 93. l. 9. Now supposing this to be the whole Argument as confusedly and brokenly according to his known Talent in Logick he repeats it I demand of this man which of all these Propositions he can charge with Want of Sence Nay I confidently appeal to all the Reason and Common Sence of Mankind whether there can be in Nature a clearer and more Self-evident Proposition than this That one and the same Infinite Mind is not three distinct Infinite Minds or as even this Defender has curtail'd it That one Infinite Mind cannot be three Infinite Minds And if so let the Ingenuous Reader judge whether this Huff's crying out Want of Sence could proceed from any thing but extream Want of Shame But if in repeating the Argument he strips it of its proper Sence nay and of its principal Terms and thereby makes it so far his own surely the Animadverter is not responsible for that For he adds That the whole force of his Argument lies in the meer Opposition between Three and One which is Childish Sophistry p. 93. l. 17. But will this man say That these two Propositions Three cannot be One and Three Infinite Minds cannot be One Infinite Mind are the same For do not the very Words of the latter Proposition declare that the Animadverter founds not his Argument upon the bare Numeral diversity or opposition which is between One and Three but upon the peculiar Nature and Condition of the Subject to which this Numeral Difference is apply'd For it is not any Instance whatsoever but only this particular Instance of Infinite Mind and Minds which the Animadverter here argues from And certainly there is a vast difference whether this man perceives it or no between barely saying That Three cannot be One and That Three distinct Infinite Minds cannot be One Infinite Mind For suppose a man should say That three Gods cannot be one God nor one God three Gods since whatsoever may be said or deny'd of Infinite Mind may be equally said or deny'd of God Will this man now say That the whole force of the said Propositions lyes in a meer opposition between the Terms Three and One And consequently that all that can be concluded from them is but Childish Sophistry But to relieve his Ignorance and to correct his Prophaneness I would have him take notice that the force of the Animadverter's Argument consists in this That he argues from an Infinite Absolute Being which as such and in the very Nature or Essence of it is on the one side uncapable of all multiplication of it self and on the other as uncapable of any Essential Vnity or Vnion upon supposal of such a multiplication This I say his Argument manifestly rests upon and not upon those thin pittiful Terms of Three and One and One and Three And therefore None surely would have dared thus in the face of the World and even in spight of Self-Evidence and common sense it self to have called such Propositions Childish Sophistry but one who had a Brow of Brass and a Face never made to Blush But to pass from his shameless representation of the Argument to his senceless Answer to it he tells us That if this Proposition or Rule viz. That Three cannot be one nor one Three be universally True then there is an end of the Trinity p. 93. l. 13. To which I answer That the forementioned Proposition is neither Vniversally True nor Vniversally False nor ever affirmed so by the Animadverter but True in some respects and False in many others viz. according to the Different Nature of the Subjects which it is applied to As for instance it is everlastingly true where the Unity and Plurality is in the same kind And for that Reason three Infinite Minds can be no more one Infinite Mind than the three Divine Persons
77. And now what has this Defender here to except against Why as if he were upon a Tryal of skill in Ribaldry or railing Prizes with his old Parishioners of Billingsgate He says It is all mere GypsyCant For it seems none but Conventicle-Cant will down with Him p. 56. l. 13. But for that by his favour the Animadverter will be judged by Philosophers and Divines and not by him who is neither All that the Animadverter thinks fit to say at present is this That to subsist as a Part is an incomplete state and to subsist as a Person which this Author holds the Soul to be out of the Body is a complete state Again that for the Soul to subsist in the body is a state Natural to it and to subsist out of the Body is Preternatural And accordingly the Animadverter affirms That to make the Soul first subsist as a part viz. while it is in the Body and then as a Person in its separation from the Body and then lastly as a Part again in its Reunion to the Body at the Resurrection is absurd and Preposterous And if this Man of scorn cannot understand this I shall not concern my self to instruct him Only I think fit to state the sense of the word Natural as it is used by the Animadverter Now it may be taken either in a strict and proper sense Only for that which is done by a Natural Agent or Principle according to the stated ordinary course and measure of Nature Or secondly it may be taken in a large and less proper sence for that which agrees and sutes with Nature and any way improves or advances it by adding to it some accidental or extra-essential perfection And this sence the Animadverter here does not use the word Natural in but speaks of it only in its first proper and Phisophical sence which quite blows off all this Man's Cobweb Arguments and Objections taken from those Advantages of Grace Happiness and Glory which may attend the Soul after its dislodgment from the Body So that when he flourishes with these vaunting Questions p. 59. l. 15. Is not the Perfection of our Graces the perfection of humane Nature I answer Yes The Accidental perfection of our Nature it is but not the Essential And again Is not the Perfection of Nature a Natural Perfection I answer Not always but only when it is wrought by a Natural Principle and that in a Natural way For God is to be considered both as Author Naturae and as Author Gratiae And Divines always look upon these considerations of him as so very different that what God is said to do under one of the said Capacities he is reckoned not to do under the other What he does as Author Naturae is properly Natural and what he does as Author Gratiae is supernatural And if this Author will abide by this Assertion That whatsoever perfects Nature is a Natural Perfection then Grace and Glory are and must be natural Perfections and God never bestows any thing supernatural upon the Souls of Men either in this World or the next Which would be a blessed assertion indeed but much fitter to proceed from an arrant Heathen or an Atheist than a Dignitary of the Church of England In the mean time I do again affirm to this Man That all the Gifts of Grace and Glory that God bestows upon the Soul in its state of separation from the Body make it not a Person nor any other than an Incompletely subsisting Being still For being essentially but a Part whether in the Body or out of the Body it is essentially incomplete and consequently must be so for ever And this assertion the Animadverter has considered too well to be either shamed or huffed out of it But to pass from the Incomplete subsistence of the Soul to the Naturalness or Preternaturalness of its Estate which quite differ from the former Those words of this Author p. 55. l. 28. for the boldness and absurdity of them are very Remarkable How says He does the Soul's subsisting in the Body or out of the Body change the Soul's manner of subsisting any more than the Body changes its manner of subsisting when it is naked and when cloathed A very learned Question indeed as most of his are To which I answer That though the Soul as to its Incomplete state changes not its manner of Subsisting as being always but a part and no more in any Condition yet as to the Naturalness or Preternaturalness of its state it does change the manner of its Subsistence and greatly too And would any Man living but himself affirm it to be as natural for the Soul to subsist in the Body or out of the Body as it is for the Body to be cloathed or uncloathed when the Body is vitally united to the Soul and in the very Nature of it designed to concur with the Soul as an essential part towards the constitution of the whole Man whereas his Cloaths are neither united to nor part of nor any way essential to his Body What Senceless Paradoxes are these But he tells us in the last line but one That the Soul owes not its subsistence to the Body And what though it does not it owes the Natural manner of its subsisting to its being in the Body for all that And as for his saying in the next line That the Soul can neither subsist more nor less in or out of the Body and that he knows no degrees of Subsistence in the Soul All this is meer Impertinence since none affirms the contrary For Natural and Preternatural import not here different degrees but different sorts or conditions of Subsistence and are founded upon different states of the Soul viz. Its conjunction with or its disjunction from the Body But he goes on and tells us p. 56. l. 30. That the Souls of good Men out of the Body are more happy than in the Body and therefore not in a Preternatural state which can never be a more happy state Which is no more than a fallacy of the Accident Forasmuch as it is perfectly accidental to a Natural or Preternatural State that either of them are Happy or not Happy For if the Soul be out of the Body let it be never so happy upon other Accounts it is still out of that estate which it was Naturally designed to and therefore in a state Preternatural But he adds p. 57. l. 9. That the Natural progress of the Soul in this lapsed estate is from a less perfect to a more perfect and from thence to the most perfect state of the Soul All which is true indeed of the moral perfection of the Soul but not of the Natural and proves that it is the duty of the Soul and very agreeable to the Nature of it to make a progress in its moral accomplishments but by no means necessary or essential to it to proceed from a less to a more perfect Natural state For the Soul knows no Natural state
but in its vital Union to a Natural Body which from first to last is equally Perfect and the same But this Man is not to be stopped in his Heterodoxies And therefore whereas the Animadverter had all along asserted That the Soul in a state of separation from the Body is but a part of the Person still by reason of its essential Relation to the Compound He here very insultingly as well as Ignorantly asks What is this compound and where is this whole Man which the Soul in its separate estate is related to p. 57. l. 27 30. To which I answer That it is that compound and that whole Man of which the Soul was once actually a Part and of which it shall be a Part again at the Resurrection But can it then be part of a Compound which is not actually in being Yes by an Essential Relation to it it may be and is so though by an Actual Conjunction with the other part of it it cannot But to shew the captiousness of this Question Where is that Man and where is that compound which the Soul while separate must relate to as a Part since it is certain that it can be no Part of the Body I say to shew the silly Sophistry of this Question Let us see it in this obvious Instance Suppose a Fowl or Beast divided into its several parts I now ask concerning each of these parts where and what That is which it is a Part of For it cannot be a Part of any of the other parts nor yet according to this Author of the whole Beast for that ceases and there is no such Thing as an whole Beast after the supposed Division Nevertheless it is certain that it is still a Part and relates to that Beast as a Part of it From which it is evident that it must be understood of the whole Beast that was though at present the whole of it be actually dissolved And so in like manner the Soul in its state of Separation still retains the Relation of a Part to the whole Man viz. the whole Man that was though he does not now actually exist So that all such Questions are meerly Sophistical and proeeed à sensu diviso ad sensum compositum But he has another Question to confound the Animadverter with p. 57. l. 31. Does he mean says He That it is essential to the Soul to live in an earthly Body No Sir But he both means and says That it is essential to the Soul to relate to the Body as a Concurrent part naturally designed for the Constitution of the whole Man and consequently that it cannot live out of the Body but still in the capacity of a Part. Which makes it essentially an Incomplete Being as its being actually disjoined from the Body puts it into a Preternatural state besides Well but the Animadverter says also That the Soul has a Natural Aptitude to live in the Body To which this Author replies So has it a Natural Aptitude to live out of the Body too p. 58. l. 15. But this by his good leave I deny and affirm that it has only a non-Repugnancy to live out of the Body but a Natural aptitude which carries in it a positive Inclination or disposition to live out of it it has not but on the contrary a very strong one both to continue in the Body and as most judge when separated from it to return to it But says our Author This no Man can know p. 58. l. 21. I answer That the mighty aversion which the Soul has to part from the Body is a sufficient proof of the former and a Rational Presumption of the latter But says He again Does not St. Paul desire to be absent from the Body and present with the Lord p. 58. l. 26. I answer That this desire does not prove the Absence of St. Paul's Soul from the Body a more Natural state to it though it might upon a supernatural Account and by reason of that corruption accidentally adhering to a bodily estate be a more blessed one and more desirable as neither was this Desire it self a Natural Desire but such an one as proceeded from a Supernatural Principle of Grace as is evident from hence that where there is one who with St. Paul desires this there are Millions who desire the quite contrary which questionless is a surer Indication of the Bent and Tendency of Nature than St. Paul's Particular wish or desire could be But to give this Author an Instance which may shew him his Ignorance in the midst of his Confidence Let us suppose a Diamond or some other precious Stone placed in a King's Diadem Certainly it could not be placed more gloriously But for all that I ask His Profoundness whether this Diamond has not a more Natural place in its proper Centre as low as it is than in the Royal Diadem And for the proof of this let it be but unfixed from its place there and then we shall see whether it would not fall from its former glorious situation as low as possibly it could So that this very instance duly applyed were there no other answer to his Impertinent Objections would be sufficient For Nature is one thing and the Accidental State and condition of a Thing is quite another But the Paradoxes vented by this Author upon this Subject are Innumerable And now after all that he has said and that so confidently and without any Reserve he has the face to run counter to himself so far as to ask p. 60. l. 6. Whether he any where affirms the Soul while united to the Body to be the whole Person To which I answer That if the Person be the whole Person as it is and must be he has affirmed it over and over and there is hardly a Page where he treats of this subject in which he does not affirm it either expresly or by evident and direct consequence Particularly Vind. p. 268. l. 28. The Soul says he is the Person and Defence p. 51. l. 2. The Soul is the Person and the Body only the Instrument And again p. 60. l. 26. he affirms that the Soul whether in the Body or out of the Body is the same Person still and that its separation from the Body makes no more change in the Person than a Man's putting on or off his Cloaths does in the Man But if the Soul in the Body is not the whole Person and out of the Body it is so I hope that is a Change with a Witness Nor does he only affirm it while united to the Body to be the Person but he also denies it to be any Part of the Person p. 61. l. 3. and the Body likewise to be any Part of the Person p. 60. l. 23. And surely if the Soul be so the Person as neither to be part of the Person it self nor yet admit the Body to be any part of it then by immediate and irresistible Consequence The Soul according