whether its Acts are as is commonly believed one with the Essence or distinct from it This Essence having necessary Existence in its first Conception those free Acts that might not have been are not easily apprehended to be one with his Essence and if those Acts are said not to be free then all things exist by the same necessity by which God exists for if the Immanent Acts of God are one with his Essence then since all the Transient Acts do certainly follow his Immanent ones there is an Universal Necessity equally spread over the whole frame of Nature and God can do nothing otherwise than he does But if those Acts of God are different from his Essence and distinct from it such as our Thoughts are then here are Accidents in God and a succession of Thoughts which seem inconsistent with infinite Perfection that is all one Eternal and Unchangeable Act. Here is a difficulty that perhaps few reflect on but it is every whit as great and as unaccountable as any of the Mysteries of Revealed Religion can be pretended to be tho this arises out of Natural Religion If to this we add all that we be believe concerning the Attributes of God his being every where his knowing every thing his Providence in governing all things together with those unsearchable Methods in which it exerts it self we must acknowledge that he dwells in a Light to which we cannot approach But that as the present frame of our Bodies and structure of our Eyes cannot bear the looking stedfastly on the Sun or the being brought much nearer him of which yet we may be capable in another texture of our Eyes and Bodies so in this state in which we have narrow Notions and gross Imaginations we are not able to frame distinct Ideas even of those Attributes of God of which we make no doubt but yet we find such difficulties in apprehending them that they do blind and confound us and put us to a stand in all our thinkings about them But for all that we still go on believing firmly those his Attributes In fine We are to make a great difference between those plain perceptions we have either of the objects of sense or of simple Theories and the difficulties and deductions that belong to them The one is the voice of our Faculties and we cannot oppose it or believe against it because it is in some sort the voice of God within us since it is the natural result of those powers that he has put in us but it is quite another thing when we go to Inferences and to frame difficulties In this appears our Ignorance of the nature of things of the several ways and manners in which they may operate and of the Consequences that seem to belong to them because we are apt to judge of every Being by our selves and have not extent enough of thought and observation to reason always true or to judge exactly So that this must be setled as a clear difference between plain perceptions and a train of Consequences we are always to be determined by the one but not by the other To instance it then in that which is now before us we have a plain perception that no Being can be both One and Three in the same respect because we are sure that is a plain Contradiction which cannot possibly be true but if a thing is represented as both One and Three this in different respects may be true Thus I have dispatched this first part in which it seemed the more necessary to state this matter aright that so it may appear that no part of the plea for Mysteries belongs to Transubstantiation since here is the fullest evidence of sense in an object of sense which plainly represents to us Bread and Wine to be still the same after Consecration that they were before and therefore we can never be certain of any thing if in this case we are bound to believe in contradiction to such a plain and simple perception but this is not at all applicable to any speculations concerning the Divine Nature I go on from this Previous Discourse to the Subject it self that I am now upon in which there have been three different Opinions the one is That Christ was a Divine Person miraculously conceived and wonderfully qualified for revealing the Will of God to the World which he did in so excellent a manner and set so perfect a pattern both in his Life and Death that in Reward of that God has given him the Government of the World putting the Divine Authority in him and commanding him to be Worshipped and Acknowledged as God and has subjected both Angels and Men to him tho he had no Existence before he was formed in the Virgin 's Womb and no other nature but that which he derived from his Miraculous Conception Others have thought that there was an Essence created by God before all Worlds by which he made and governs all things and that this Essence which was like God dwelt in Christ Iesus and was by the Gospel revealed to the World So that all were bound to honour and obey him Some of these called him a Being of a Nature quite different from and unlike the Divine Nature which was found to be of an unacceptable Sound so others softned it by saying that he was of an Essence like the Father But this was only a milder way of speaking since if this Being was created so that once it was not its nature must be essentially unlike the Father for sure nothing can be more unlike than created and uncreated And by Likeness such Men could only understand a Moral Likeness of imitation and resemblance so that he might be like God as we are called to be like him tho' in vastly higher degrees The 3 d. Opinion is That the Godhead by the Eternal Word the Second in the Blessed Three dwelt in and was so inwardly united to the Human Nature of Iesus Christ that by vertue of it God and Man were truly one Person as our Soul and Body make one Man And that this Eternal Word was truly God and as such is worshipped and adored as the proper Object of Divine Adoration By those of this Perswasion the Name Person came to be applied to the Three which the Scripture only calls by the Names of Father Son or Word and Holy Ghost on design to discover those who thought that these Three were only different names of the same thing But by Person is not meant such a Being as we commonly understand by that word a compleat intelligent Being distinct from every other Being but only that every one of that blessed Three has a peculiar distinction in himself by which he is truly different from the other two This is the Doctrine that I intend now to explain to you When I say Explain I do not mean that I will pretend to tell you how this is to be understood and in what respect these Persons are believed to
be One and in what respects they are Three By explaining a Mystery can only be meant the shewing how it is laid down and revealed in Scripture for to pretend to give any further account of it is to take away its Mysteriousness when the manner how it is in it self is offered to be made intelligible In this too many both Ancients and Moderns have perhaps gone beyond due bounds while some were pleased with the Platonical Notions of Emanations and a Fecundity in the Divine Essence For we have footsteps of a Tradition as Ancient even among Heathens as any we can trace up which limited the Emanations to Three And these thought there was a Production or rather an Eduction of two out of the first In the same manner that some Philosophers thought that Souls were propagated from Souls and the figure by which this was explain'd being that of one Candle's being lighted at another this seems to have given the rise to those words Light of Light It is certain many of the Fathers fell often into this conceit and in this way of explaining this matter they have said many things which intimate that they believed an inequality between the Persons and a Subordination of the Second and Third to the First So that by the same Substance or Essence they do in many places express themselves as if they only meant the same Being in a general Sense as all human Souls are of the same Substance that is the same order or sort of Beings and they seemed to entitle them to different operations not only in an Oeconomical way but thought that one did that which the other did not This was indeed more easily to be apprehended but it seemed so directly to assert Three Gods which was very contrary to many most express Declarations both in the Old and New Testament in which the Unity of the Deity is so often held forth that therefore others took another way of explaining this making it their Foundation that the Deity was one Numerical Being They then observed that the Sun besides his own Globe had an Emanation of Light and another of Heat which had different Operations and all from the same Essence and that the Soul of Man had both Intellection and Love which flowed from its Essence So they conceiv'd that the primary Act of the Divine Essence was its Wisdom by which it saw all things and in which as in an inward Word it designed all things This they thought might be called the Son as being the Generation of the Eternal Mind while from the Fountain-Principle together with this inward Word there did arise a Love that was to issue forth and that was to be the Soul of the Creation and was more particularly to animate the Church And in this Love all things were to have Life and Favour This was rested on and was afterwards dressed up with a great deal of dark nicety by the Schools and grew to be the Universally received Explanation Tho many have thought that the term Son did not at all belong to the Blessed Three but only to our Saviour as he was the Messias the Iews having had that Notion of the Messias that as he was to be the King of Israel so he was to be the Son of God We find Nathanael addressed himself thus to him and when the High-Priest adjur'd our Saviour to tell if he was the Messias he knits these two together Art thou-the Christ the Son of the most High God which shews that they did esteem these two as one and the same thing Now some Criticks do apprehend that since in many places the term Son of God has manifestly a relation to Christ as the Messias there is in this an Uniformity in the whole Scripture Style so that every where by the phrase Son of God we are to understand Iesus as the Messias in which the human Nature being the first Conception they conceive that all the places importing an Inferiority of the Son to the Father have no difficulty in them since they are only to be understood of Iesus as the Messias but that the Divine Principle that was in him is in the strictness of Speech to be called as St. Iohn does the Word So that by this if true all the Speculations concerning an Eternal Generation are cut off in the strict sense of the words tho in a larger sense every emanation of what sort soever may be so called These and a great deal more of this kind that might be further branched out and enlarged upon are the Explanations that Divines have offered at upon this Mystery But it may be justly questioned whether by these they have either made it to be better understood or to be more firmly believed or whether others have not taken advantage to represent those subtilities as dregs either of AEones of the Valentinians or of the Platonical Notions which last being in so high and just a Reputation among the Greeks it is plain that many of the Ancients thought it was no small service to the Christian Religion to shew a great Affinity between it and Plato's Theology and it being long before these Theories were well stated and setled it is no wonder if many of the Fathers have not only differed from one another but even from themselves in speaking upon this Argument While men go about to explain a thing of which they can frame no distinct Idea it is very natural for them to run out into a vast Multiplicity of words into great length and much darkness and confusion Many improper Similies will be urged and often impertinent reasonings will be made use of All which are the unavoidable Consequences of a man's going about to explain to others that which he does not distinctly understand himself This in general is the sum of the Received Doctrine That as there is but One God so in that undivided Essence there are Three that are really different from one another and are more than only three Names or three outward Oeconomies and that the Second of these was in a most intimate and unconceivable manner united to a perfect Man so that from the Human and Divine Nature thus united there did result the Person of the Messias who was both God and Man Here new Subtilties have been found out to state the formal Notion of a Person which was supposed to consist in a special Subsistence so that it has been thought that the Human Nature in Christ had no special Subsistence of its own tho it was not easy to explain this Notion since if Subsistence belonged to the Human Nature it might seem that it was not perfect if it had not a proper Subsistence A Hypostatical Union was proposed as a term fit to explain this by that is to say the Human Nature was believed to subsist by the Subsistence of the Word but it was not easy to make this the more intelligible by offering a Notion full as unintelligible as it self to explain it
by Tho indeed this is a point in which it is more possible for us to arrive at distinct Ideas or somewhat very like them than the other We plainly see that the Union of our Souls to our Bodies consists in a Harmony that God has setled between such an Organization of matter and such Sensations that arise out of the different motions of this Matter so organiz'd Upon which this Matter is in many things under the power of the Mind which by its thoughts commands and moves it and it has from it a continual Influence and Actuation that is called Life so that the Union of the Soul and Body is the result of such a proper Harmony of the Body according to the Mechanical Structure of its necessary parts as makes it fit to give proper Sensations to the Mind and to receive and obey the Impressions of the Mind the breaking of which Harmony brings on death From hence we may apprehend several degrees of the Union of thinking being with Matter The lowest is that if Infants where there is a thought but a thought so entirely under the Impressions of Matter that it is not able to rise above them and either to think of any thing else or to stop the Violence of these Impressions So here is a Spirit wholly immersed in Matter that is in every thing under its dominion and is a slave to it and in this state Ideots continue their whole life long A second degree is that of men in this Life duly ripened in which their Minds are as to their Sensations still subject to Matter that is they must feel pain or pleasure according to the dispositions of Matter but then there is a power in the Soul to govern Matter and not to yield to those Sensations So that there is a lasting struggle between the Sensations that arise from the Body and the Cogitations that spring in the Mind which have the better of one another by turns Here the Soul and Body are as it were equally yoked together only the Soul may by the use of Reason and Liberty be so assisted as to have the ascendant over the Body for the greatest part From these we may conceive two other degrees of Union which may be between Souls and Bodies The one is a State in which the Soul shall have an entire Authority over Matter but yet shall need the assistance of it as a necessary mean of Motion and as having in it a repository of Images and Figures for memory and imagination So that in such a state the Body shall have no power at all over the Mind but shall only serve it as Instruments do a Mechanick and this seems to be a Philosophical Notion of the use that our Bodies shall be of to us in another State in which they shall be no more clogs upon us to give us uneasy or grievous sensations but shall only be the proper Machines for Motion and Memory and for such like uses in which the Body when well tuned can serve the Mind A Fourth degree may be a State in which a Mind may be so entirely perfect in its self and in its own acts that it may have no need of a Body upon its own account but only in order to the ministring to another Spirit that is yet under the power of Matter to give it either Warnings or Assistances which perhaps it cannot communicate but through the Conveyance or by the Mechanical Motions and Impressions of one piece of Matter upon another Upon this account and for this end Spirits of the highest form nay God himself may at some times and for some unknown ends make use of a Body and put it in such a form and so actuate it as thereby to communicate some Light or Influence to minds that are yet much immersed in Matter These are all the ways that we can apprehend of a Mind 's assuming Matter and being united to it which is the having it under its Actuation or Authority so that the Acts of the Mind give such Impressions to the Body as govern and command it By the same way of thinking we may apprehend yet more easily how one Spirit may be united to another which is when a superior Spirit has another of an Inferior Order so entirely under its conduct and Impressions that the Inferior receives constant Communications of Light and Impulse from the Superior And as the Body lives by the presence of the Soul even when it does not by any distinct Act work upon it or enliven it so a superior Mind may have a perpetual conduct of an inferior even when it leaves it to its own liberty and does not break in upon it by any immediate enlightning or animating of it And thus we may conceive the Subsistence of an Intelligent Being to be its acting entirely in it self or upon Matter united to it without any other Spirit 's being constantly present to it actuating it or having it under any immediate Vital and inseparable Influence This seems to give some light towards the Idea of a Subsistence as separated from the Essence and by consequence of one person's Subsistence in by and from another I do not pretend to say that this is the strict Notion of Subsistence but it is the nearest thing that I can imagine to it which will at least help to form some general Idea of it for these being all the distinct Notions that we can frame of the Union of Spirits to other Spirits or of Spirits to Matter they will help us to a more distinct Apprehension of the Union of the Eternal Word to a Human Nature by which it assumed the Man into such an inward and immediate Oeconomy that it did always actuate illuminate and conduct him as we perceive our Souls do our Bodies This is the clearest thought that we give our selves of that Human Nature's subsisting by the Subsistence of the Word that dwelt in it This also agrees well with the Expressions of the Word 's dwelling in Flesh and of the bodily Indwelling of the Fulness of the Godhead in Christ Iesus But having now shewed how far these things may become in some sort intelligible to us I go to my main Design which is to examine no longers whether this ought to be believed or not in case we should find it very expresly affirmed in the New Testament for I hope I have already made that out fully Therefore the only question that now lies before me is Whether this is contained in the New Testament or not for if it is in it and is a part of its Doctrine then since that Doctrine is proved to be all true and revelled by God this must be likewise true if it is a part of it This I will also yield That Authorities brought to prove Articles that are so sublimeâ— as to rise above our ways of Apprehension ought to be made out by a greater fulness of express Proofs and bare Precepts of Morality or more easily
former House there must have been some eminent Character in it beyond the former In particular the whole World was to be struck with it which is expressed in the Prophetick Strain by the shaking the Heavens and the Earth the Sea and the dry Land and the shaking of all Nations I do not argue from that which follows of the desire of all Nations because I know it is capable of another Translation and I will build upon sure grounds This Glory was likewise to bring Peace with it which cannot be literally understood since the Iews had very little Peace either from the days of Herod to whom they apply this or from the days of our Saviour to whom the Christians apyly it Now from all this it is to be inferred that the Apostles applying universally the name 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to our Saviour could mean no other but that he was the true Iehovah by a more perfect Indwelling of the Deity in him than that had been which was in the Cloud This Glory was greater than the other for the other dwelt in a Mass of meer Matter whereas this dwelt in the Soul and Body of our Saviour and a Soul is much a perfecter sort of Being than the purest Matter possible This was also to last for ever whereas the other had a determined Duration and came to a period and the other did shine out only upon special Occasions whereas in this we all with open face as in a glass beholding the Glory of the Lord are changed into the same Image from Glory to Glory a period made up of the Phraseology that belonged to the Schechinah as is also that of his being the Brightness of the Father's Glory and the express Image or Character of his Person that of the Word which was made flesh and dwelt among us and we beheld his Glory the Glory as of the Only Begotten Son of the Father that of the light of the Glorious Gospel or rather of the Gospel of the Glory of Christ and that of the light of the knowledge of the Glory of God in the face or person of Iesus Christ all these with many more that might be quoted do so plainly allude to the Phraseology of the Cloud of Glory that it is not possible for any who consider things carefully to avoid the Evidence of it If it had not been so what can be said to justify this manner of expression especially the giving the Translation of the Incommunicable Name that was in the Old Testament in a thread all over the New to our Saviour This was the laying snares for the first Believers and that in the most important Point of all Religion so that since our Saviour denounced a Wo to him by whom Scandals should come the Apostles were the first that incurred it if they by a continu'd course of Style led the world to believe that a meer man was the great Iehovah If that had occurred only now and then the extent of the signification of the Greek word might be alledged but it being the Title which they constantly give him as well as it was that by which the Iews understood the Iehovah to be meant this cannot in any sort be justified from a gross Abuse put on the World if the Messias was not the Iehovah The great Objection that arises against this is that tho 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is indeed the common Translation for Iehovah yet sometimes it is put for the other Hebrew words both Elohim and Adonai and that in the New Testament it is used rather in opposition or more properly in subordination to the Name of God which seems to be stated very plainly by St. Paul when he says there were many that were called Gods whether in Heaven or in Earth as there were Gods many and Lords many in opposition to all which he asserts that to Christians there is but one God the Father of whom were all things and we in him and one Lord Iesus by whom were all things and we by him From hence it seems that the true Notion of this according to St. Paul is That as the Heathen Nations believed some supream Deities and other deputed or lower Deities that watch'd over particular Nations so we Christians do own only one Eternal God the Creator and Preserver of all and one Lord to whom he hath given the Government of all things So that this as it favours the Notion of one exalted to divine Authority and Honor it does likewise take away quite the whole force of this Argument and so it cannot be well establish'd without considering this very carefully It is then to be observed that through the Old Testament God is spoken of under two different Notions the one is general as he created and govern'd all things and the other is special as he was in Covenant with the Jewish Nation and as he govern'd them particularly by his Laws was present among them in a Visible Symbol and watch'd over them by a distinguishing Providence In this last sense Iehovah is the Name by which he is strictly express'd as their Federal God that had an immediate Care over them and a Right to them The Nations that lived in Idolatry had Notions which seem to be taken from this For as they believ'd some supream and some subaltern Deities so they also fanci'd that some even of those supream Deities were more especially related or appropriated to some places Thus as they conceiv'd them to be Supream they held them to be Gods and as they believ'd them to have a special Relation to any Place or Nation they were esteem'd according to this piece of Jewish Phraseology here us'd by St. Paul Lords as well as Gods In opposition to all which we Christians own but one Supream God and we do also believe that this great God is also our Federal God or Iehovah by his dwelling in the Human Nature of Iesus Christ So that he is our Lord not by an assumption into high Dignity or the communicating Divine Honor to him but as the Eternal Word dwelt bodily in him and thus he is our Lord not as a Being distinct from or deputed by the great God but as the great God manifesting himself in his Flesh or Human Nature which is the great Mystery of Godliness or of true Religion And this will give a clear account of all those other passages of the New Testament in which the Lord Iesus is mention'd as distinct from or subordinate to God and his Father The one is the more extended Notion of God as the Maker and Preserver of all things and the other is the more special Notion as appropriated to Christians by which God is federally their God Lord or Iehovah This I think does fully establish this Argument and takes away the whole force of the Objection against it But to carry this yet further the Apostles do not only name him thus in all their Writings but they
do propose him as the proper Object of Adoration at the same time that they commanded the World to renounce all Idolatry and to serve the living God St. Paul gives this Definition of Heathenish Idolatry that it was a worship given to those who by nature were not Gods yet he prays to Christ he prays for Grace Mercy and Peace from him to all the Churches he writes to he gives him Glory for ever and ever a Phrase expressing the highest Act of Adoration he believes in him he serves him he gives Blessing in his Name he says That all in Heaven and Earth must confess him and bow before him a Phrase importing Adoration he says the Angels of God worship him In other Epistles this is also often mention'd and in St. Iohn's Visions all the Hosts above are represented as falling down before him to worship him Now the bare Incurvation does not import Divine Worship but may be made â—o a Creature yet Incurvation join'd with Prayers Acts of Faith and Trust and Praises is certainly Divine Worship Since then our Saviour in his Temptation said to the Devil that according to the Law we must worship the Lord our God and serve him only since also the Angel when he reproved St. Iohn for falling down before him bids him worship God then when these things are laid together and it appears that all the Acts of Adoration by which we worship God are also ascribed to Christ and offered up to him either it must be confess'd that he is truly God or that the Christian Religion sets up Idolatry at the same time that it seems to design the pulling it down every where as if Idolatry had only been to be changed in its object and to be transfered from all others to the Person of our Saviour This point of the worship of Christ is so plainly set forth in the New Testament that the chief Opposers of the Article of his Divinity have asserted it with so much Zeal that they deny that such as refuse to pay it to him deserve to be called Christians and yet there is not any one point that is more fully and frequently condemned through the whole Scriptures than the worshipping a Creature It is also a main part of all the Exhortations of the Apostles Angels were often sent on Divine Deputations as the Instruments of the great God but yet they were never to be worshipped Idolatry is an Evil in it self and is not only the Transgression of a positive precept but it is a transferring of the Honor and Homage due to the Author of our Being and the Fountain of all our Blessings and the ascribing these to a Creature it is a worshipping the Creature besides the Creator And if the same Acts of Prayer and Thanksgiving in the same words can be offered up both to the Creature and the Creator then how can we still think that God is a jealous God and that he will not give his Glory to another In a word this is that which seems so sensible that one does not know what to think of those men's Reasons who cannot bring themselves to believe any thing concerning the Divine Nature which differs from their own Notions and yet can swallow down so vast an Absurdity that is more open to the compass of their Understandings as that the same Acts in which we acknowledge and adore God should be at the same time offered up to a Creature But to urge this a little more closely it is well known how averse the Iews were to all the appearances of Idolatry in our Saviour's time their Zeal against the figures of the Roman Eagles set over the Temple-gates by Herod and against the Statue of Caligula besides many other Instances prove this beyond all question They were much prejudiced against the Apostles as well as they had been against our Saviour and the Apostles do in several passages of their Epistles set down these their prejudices together with their own Answers to them They excepted to the abrogating the Mosaical Ordinances and to their calling in the Gentiles and associating themselves with them but it does not appear that they did ever charge them with Idolatry nor do the Apostles in any hint ever offer to vindicate themselves from that Aspersion Now if Christ had been only a Man Defi'd advanc'd to Divine Honor or if he had been ever so Noble a part and even the first part of the Creation and had been now made the Object of the worship of the Christians let any Man see if it is conceivable that the Iews who were such implacable Enemies to Christianity should not have held to this as their main Strength chief Objection Since as this was a very popular thing in which it was easy to draw in all their Country men so it was the easiest as well as the most important part of their Plea they might have yielded that all the Miracles of Christ and his Apostles were true and yet upon this pretence of Idolatry they had the express words of their Law on their side If there ariseth among you a Prophet or a Dreamer of Dreams and giveth thee a Sign or a Wonder and the Sign or the Wonder come to pass whereof he spake unto thee saying Let us go after other Gods which thou hast not known and let us serve them Thou shalt not hearken to the words of that Prophet or that Dreamer of Dreams for the Lord your God proveth you to know whether ye love the Lord your God with all your Heart and with all your Soul This was such an express and full Decision of the Case that he may imagine any thing that can imagine that they could have past it by and that they should not have objected it or that the Apostles if their Doctrine had been either that of the Arians or of the Socinians should not have either answer'd or prevented the Objection since they dwell long upon things that were much less important Several that join'd themselves to Christianity were scandaliz'd and fell back to the Iews but it does not appear that any of them ever charged them with Idolatry or that the Iews ever reproach'd them with it which yet we cannot think they would not have done if the Christians had offer'd Divine Adoration to a Creature to one that was a meer Man newly dignifi'd or that had been made by God before all his other Works Here a Creature was made a God and the Christians were guilty of serving other gods whom their Fathers had not known This cannot be retorted on us who believe that Christ was God by vertue of the Indwelling of the Eternal Word in him The Iews could make no Objection to this who knew that their Fathers had worshipped the Cloud of Glory because of God's resting upon it So the adoring the Messias upon the supposition of the Godhead's dwelling Bodily in him could bear no debate among the Iews