Selected quad for the lemma: nature_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
nature_n	distinct_a	person_n	union_n	4,563	5	10.1986	5	true

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A70688	The exceptions of Mr. Edwards in his Causes of atheism against the Reasonableness of Christianity, as deliver'd in the Scriptures, examin'd and found unreasonable, unscriptural, and injurious also it's clearly proved by many testimonies of Holy Scripture, that the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ is the only God and Father of Christians.	Nye, Stephen, 1648?-1719.	1695 (1695)	Wing N1506B; ESTC R41202	41,602	48

of his Proposition We shall find those necessary Points best in the Preaching of our Saviour and the Apostles 6. The Epistles besides the main Argument of each of them do in many places explain the Fundamentals and that wisely by proper Accommodations to the apprehensions of those they were writ to Which he shows particularly in the Epistle to the Romans and that to the Hebrews also in the general Epistles At length These Holy Writers saith he inspir'd from above writ nothing but Truth and in most places very weighty Truths to us now But yet every Sentence of theirs must not be taken up and look'd upon as a Fundamental necessary to Salvation without an explicite Belief whereof no Body could be a Member of Christ's Church c. For saith he pag. 299. 't is plain the contending Parties on one side or t'other are ignorant of nay disbelieve the Truths deliver'd in Holy Writ as I noted before This little I have transcribed out of our Author for the sake of those who perhaps have not his Book but have Mr. Edwards's and that it may appear how unfairly to say no worse Mr. Edw. deals with our Author saying pag. 111. He passes by these inspired Writings with some contempt also he suggests his insincerity to the Reader But I have seen a Letter from a Gentleman of no ordinary Judgment who says Mr. Edwards has not only mistook Mr. Lock but abus'd and belied him for he says Mr. Lock cites only the Gospels and Acts but declares or insinuates his contempt of the Epistles as if they were not of like Authority with the Acts or Gospels but Mr. Lock has no where intimated any such Opinion His Book saith he shows He has read the Scriptures with very great Observation as well as Judgment he suffers nothing to escape him that belongs to the Subject he manages He names our Author Mr. Lock which I am assured he does by common Fame and Conjecture he has no other Grounds for it as neither have I no more than Mr. Edwards Whether we are mistaken or not in his Name I know not but I think I have proved that Mr. Edw. is much mistaken in his Judgment concerning his Book or has perversly censur'd him and it He is so far from contemning the Epistles as Mr. Edw. accuses him that whoever will take the Pains to reckon he will find he has quoted them and refer'd to them near FOURSCORE times And Mr. Edw. is no less Injurious in his Censures upon other Writers In the very Socinian Doctrine it self saith he there seems to be an Atheistical Tang. For proof he cites the Considerations on the Explications of Doct. of Trin. pag. 5. Where saith he the Self-existence of God which is the Primary Fundamental and Essential Property of the Deity is peremptorily pronounc'd by them to be a CONTRADICTION It 's strange a Man of Mr. Edwards's Undertaking should give forth such a Calumny His Ldp. of Worcester says If God was from Eternity he must be from himself That Author answers that that is an Espousing the Cause of the Atheists and he gives this Reason If God is from Eternity he must be of none neither of or from himself nor from any other not from himself for then he must be before he was and neither from himself nor from any other because all Origination of what kind soever is inconsistent with an Eternal Being Is this now peremptorily to pronounce that the Self-existence of God is a Contradiction or is it not to vindicate the Self-existence of God from a false Notion of it occasion'd by the Bishop's words But what will Mr. Edw. say to the Author of the XXVIII Propositions c. who they say is the Bishop of Glouc. who peremptorily denies nay says It is a flat Contradiction to say that the second and third Persons of the Trinity are Self-existent Prop. 8. Consequently neither of them is God because as Mr. Edw. says Self-existence is the Primary Fundamental and Essential Property of God which yet neither the Son nor the H. Ghost have I wish Mr. Edw. would either reconcile himself to the Bishop or the Bishop to him before he charges an Atheistical Tang upon the Socinian Doctrine upon account of the denial of God's Self-existence which he may see strongly affirm'd in the Reflections on the said Propositions c. As for Socinus's denying the Praescience of Contingencies I am not nor is our Author concern'd in it but which is more dishonourable to God to be the Author of all the Sin and Wickedness that ever was or ever will be in the World or to deny his Fore-knowledge of the certainty of that which is not certain Socinus and Crellius have denied such an Immensity of God which makes him to be essentially and wholly in every point of Space because such Immensity would take away all Distinction between God and Creature and has indeed an Atheistical Tang for the greater part of Atheists hold the Universe to be God hence Lucan Jupiter est quodcunque vides quocunque moveris Which opinion some of the Antient Fathers have wrote against as Clemens Alexandrinus and others Mr. Edw. may charge them all with a Tang of Atheism if he please As for God's Spirituality modest Divines confess it easier to say What it is not than what it is Mr. Edw. perhaps has attain'd to such a perfection of Knowledg in that Matter as may make him able to teach them what they are now ignorant of But Socinus nor Crellius nor any other of them ever denied contrary to most express and often repeated Scriptures and common Reason the most glorious Attribute of God's Vnity which gives Excellency to all his other Attributes for were Self-existence Omniscience Immensity and Spirituality and all other Attributes common to more than One where would the Excellency and Majesty of God's Name be How should we love and adore him with all our Hearts and Strength when there are others that require it and have as equal right to it as he But Mr. Edw. will count himself highly injur'd if I charge him with denying God's Unity but hold a little be not angry If you be Take heed it be not more for your own sake than for God's sake Do you not say that the infinite Nature of God is communicable to three distinct Persons pag. 79. and pag. 120. That the Father Son and Holy Ghost are one God or Divine Nature Are not these Terms convertible namely That one God is Father Son and H. Ghost that is three Persons and what are three Almighty and only wise Persons but three Gods The Father is one God the Son is one God distinct from the Father and the Holy Ghost is one God distinct from the Father and Son Thus your Proposition amounts to this That one God is three Gods that the Unity of God is a Trinity of Gods That Vnity or Oneness is no longer an Attribute of God but Trinity or Threeness But we cannot be

heard let us make out your Contradictions never so clearly nay you impute it to us as a heinous Crime that we make it an Argument against the belief of your Trinity that it cannot be understood without Contradiction You impute to us most injuriously that we are to admit of nothing but what is exactly adjusted to Nature's and Reason's Light pag. 68. That therefore the Trinity is a Doctrine that can't be born because it can't be understood pag. 69. and that the English Vnitarians declare they cannot believe it because Reason does not teach it pag. 72. This is a Topick the Trinitarians do always inlarge upon and urge with a great deal of Pomp in themselves and Ignominy in the Unitarians as Persons that prefer their own Reasonings before Divine Revelation how clear soever And though this Calumny has been answer'd and wip'd away and retorted upon them a hundred Times yet Mr. Edw. will still confidently charge it He cites the Letter of Resolution for proof of it and therefore has read it but passes by the Answer to this Imputation which is to be found in the very first Page of it where thus First 'T is not true that we prefer Reason before Revelation on the contrary Revelation being what GOD himself hath said either immediately or by inspired Persons 't is to be preferr'd before the clearest Demonstration of our Reason And in the Consider on Explic. on 4 Serm. and a Sermon of the Bishop of Worcester the Author says He utterly mistakes in thinking that we deny the Articles of the new Christianity or Athanasian Religion because they are Mysteries or because we do not comprehend them we have a clear and distinct Perception that they are not Mysteries but Contradictions Impossibilities and pure Non-sense But now that the Trinitarians do most expresly prefer their Reasoning Consequences and wire-drawn Deductions before Holy Scripture besides that it has been done in the Notes upon the Athanasian Creed and other Tracts I shall shew further from Mr. Edwards's Fundamental Doctrine but now recited if at least the Trinitarians will acknowledg him for their Orthodox Champion 1. It 's manifest he means by the one God not one Divine Almighty Person but three such but nothing is more evident in Holy Scripture than that God is one Person only For proof of it I have referr'd my Reader to the Scriptures from beginning to end in more than twenty thousand Texts even as often as God is spoken of or to or speaks of himself except as I have said But Mr. Edw. says expresly that his God is three distinct Divine Persons to wit the Father of the Son the Son of the Father and the H. Ghost which proceedeth from the Father and the Son 2. He says that these three distinct Divine Persons each of which is God in the most perfect Sense is the only true God or the one God or Divine Nature The Proposition which he advances as necessary to Salvation and more easy to be understood than that Jesus is the Messiah is That the Father Son and Holy Ghost are one God or Divine Nature Whereby it 's manifest that by ONE GOD he means not one Person but one Divine Nature and by one Divine Nature he means such a Divine Nature as is communicable to three distinct Persons see pag. 79. So that his three Persons which are one God are so one God as they communicate in one Divine Nature in like manner as Peter James and John are one Man because they communicate in one Human Nature as do also all the Men in the World Now I shall cite some Texts of H. Scripture which do expresly declare that God is ONE and that cannot otherwise be understood than that he is one Person or singular intellectual Nature Essence or Substance Here let me premise first How Equivocally Mr. Edw. and the Trinitarians express themselves in this great and necessary Point on which depends our Eternal Salvation and whereby the Bulk of Mankind for I think that 's a far more decent Phrase than Mr. Edw's Rabble or Captain Tom and his Myrmadons or the venerable Mob cannot escape being deluded He and they confess also that there is but one God though three Persons in that one God but by one God they do not mean as I have shewed from Mr. Edw. one singular intellectual Nature Essence or Substance compleat for that is a Person and if they did the Contradiction would presently appear to every Capacity to wit that three Divine Persons are one Divine Person but they as Mr. Edw. say The Father Son and Holy Ghost or the three Divine Persons are one God or Divine Nature Essence or Substance Hereby they conceal from their poor honest Reader thirsting after Truth that God is one intellectual Perfect Nature Essence or Substance and make him believe by that concealment that though there are three Divine intellectual perfect Natures yet there is but one Divine Nature or God I am also willing to premise that the Grecism of a solitary Adjective Masculine or Article without a Substantive where the Discourse is of intellectual Beings doth frequently if not always connote PERSON and our English Translators have in many Texts render'd it Person as the clear Sense of the Greek Text not as a word supplied in another Character to explain the Text but in the same Character as a verbal Translation Instances of this rendring are these among many others Mat. 27. 24. Of this just Person Luke 15. 7. Ninety nine just Persons Acts 17. 17. The devout Persons Eph. 5. 5. unclean Person 2 Pet. 3. 11. What manner of Persons In these places there is nothing in the Greek to answer the word Person but what is implied in the Adjective To come now to the Texts that assert the Vnity or Oneness of God against Mr. Edw's Trinity or Threeness or that God is one intellectual Nature or one Person against Mr. Edws's one Divine Nature or three Persons see Jam. 2. 19. according to the Greek Thou believest that God is ONE thou dost well Gal. 3. 20. But God is ONE Mark 12. 29. The Lord our God the Lord is ONE saith our Saviour out of the Law to the Scribe that asked him which is the first Commandment of all And Jesus answer'd him the first of all the Commandments is Hear O Israel the Lord our God the Lord is one And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy Heart c. And in the 32d ver The Scribe said unto him Well Master thou hast said the Truth for God is ONE and there is none other but he And ver 34. Jesus saw that he answer'd discreetly Our Bibles refer us to Deut. 6. 4 5. whence our Lord takes this his Answer and where we find the same Words which by Ainsworth are also render'd The Lord our God the Lord is one Now in these Scriptures the Numeral Adjective Masculine being without a Substantive and Singular it forces us to understand in

sense of the Word was made Flesh will be this God was Incarnate that is not by being made Flesh or Man but by taking Man into God that is God is now perfect God and Man Well but since God is a Person and Man another Person perfect God and perfect Man must unavoidably be two Persons but this is the Heresy of Nestorius Arch-Bishop of Constantinople An. Dom. 428. but how shall we help it For to believe God and Man not to be two Persons we directly contradict our Belief of God's being perfect God and perfect Man If we say with Apollinarius An. Dom. 370. That God and Man are not two Persons but one because the Man had no Human Soul or Understanding then we contradict God's being a perfect Man and are condemn'd to eternal Damnation as Apollinarian Hereticks And if for solving these Difficulties we should think good to hold that indeed there were two Natures in Christ when God was made Flesh but upon the Union the Human was swallowed up of the Divine and so there was one Nature made of two then we incur the Anathema of the Eutichian Hereticks And it follows saith Mr. Edw. in the same verse of this first Chapter of St. John that this Word is the only begotten of the Father whence we are bound to believe the Eternal tho ineffable Generation of the Son of God Answ Could Mr. Edw. be so weak as to think any Body but one deeply prejudiced would approve of either of his Inferences from that Clause either the Eternal Generation or that we are bound to believe it as an Article necessary to Salvation Does he not know that Jesus is the only Son of God by reason of that Generation which befel him in Time Does he read of any other Son that God generated of a Virgin but Jesus See Luke 1. 35. Did God ever sanctify and send into the World in such a Measure and Manner any that were called Gods or Sons of God as he did Jesus our Lord See John 10. 35 36 37 38. and Chap. 3. 34. Did he ever give such Testimony to any other Did God ever beget any other Son by raising him from the Dead to an immortal Life Acts 13. 33. by anointing him with the Oil of Gladness above his Fellows Heb. 1. 9. By setting him on his Right-hand making him to inherit a more excellent Name than Angels even that of SON in a more excellent Sense Heb. 1. 3 4 5. By glorifying Christ making him an High-Priest saying unto him Thou art my Son this Day have I begotten thee Is not Isaac call'd the only begotten Son of Abraham though Abraham had other Sons But for Mr. Edw's Eternal Generation there is not one Tittle either in this Text or in all the Bible and yet he has the Confidence to bind the Belief of it upon Mankind upon pain of Damnation I wish he would not be so rash but more reverent in so tremendous a Point Next he finds our Author faulty in not taking notice that we are commanded to believe the Father and the Son John 14. 10 11. and that the Son is in the Father and the Father in the Son which expresses their Vnity Wonderful Did our Author indeed take no notice that we are commanded to believe the Father and the Son when he all along in his Treatise makes the Messiah Christ Son of God terms synonimous and that signify the same thing and cites abundance of Texts to that purpose so that the belief of the Father the Son is required by him in the whole three quarters of his Book which Mr. Edw. takes notice he spent in proving his Proposition Did Mr. Edw. write these Remarks Or did some body else add them to his Book of the Causes of Atheism As for the Vnity of the Father and Son exprest he says by these words The Son is in the Father and the Father in the Son Does he think his Reader never read that Text in John 17. 21. That they Believers all may be one as thou Father art in me and I in thee that they also may be one in us with ver 23. Or that other Text 1 John 4. 16. He that dwelleth in Love dwelleth in God and God in him But for the word Vnity which he uses if he means by it any more than a close Union it implies a contradiction that two should be one that a Duality should be an Unity This saith he is made an Article of Faith by our Saviour's particular and express Command He must mean that Mr. Edwards's own sense of that Text is commanded as necessary to Salvation else he says no more of that than the Author allows concerning both that and other Scriptures If he means his own sense then I think he 's an inconsiderate and rash Man for I have shew'd that his sense is contradictious Here Mr. Edw. calls in question the sincerity of our Author and pag. 109. says It is most evident to any thinking and considerate Person that he purposely omits the Epistolary Writings of the Apostles because they are fraught with other Fundamental Doctrines besides that one which he mentions I will not question Mr. Edwards's sincerity in what he writes but I question much his due considering what he writes against Does not our Author make in effect the same Objection against himself pag. 291. and answer it in fourteen pages even to the end of his Book but Mr. Edw. takes notice of very little of it And the most of that he does take notice of he answers with a little Raillery upon the Bulk of Mankind the unlearned Multitude the Mob and our Author His note upon these Phrases is Surely this Gentleman is afraid of Captain Tom and is going to make a Religion for his Myrmidons We are come to a fine pass indeed the venerable Mob must be ask'd what we must believe Thus he ridicules the Doctrine of Faith on which the Salvation or Damnation of the Multitude depends and the Grounds of our Author's Design who finding in Holy Scripture that God would have all Men to be saved and come to the KNOWLEDG of the Truth the Gospel was preach'd to the Poor and the common People heard Christ gladly that God hath chosen the Poor in this World rich in Faith he concluded when he had overcome the prejudices of Education and the contempt of the Learned and those that think themselves so that the Gospel must be a very intelligible and plain Doctrine suted to Vulgar Capacities and the State of Mankind in this World destin'd to Labour and Travel not such as the Writers and Wranglers in Religion have made it To this Mr. Edw. answers besides what I have noted above and is forced to agree That all Men ought to understand their Religion but then asks as of a positive thing not to be doubted if Men may not understand those Articles of Faith which he had mention'd a little before pretended to be found in the Epistolary Writings