THE REFLECTIONS ON THE XXVIII PROPOSITIONS TOUCHING THE DOCTRINE OF THE TRINITY In a LETTER to the Clergy c. maintain'd against the Third Defence of the said Propositions By the same Hand 1 Tim. 2. 5. For there is one God and one Mediator between God and Men the Man Christ Jesus Printed in the Year MDCXCV The REFLECTIONS upon the XXVIII PROPOSITIONS c. maintain'd THough there is nothing in the third Defence of the 28 Propositions c. that can as far as I can perceive enervate the least Objection that is urged in my Letter yet because the Doctrine therein maintained tends to subvert the Foundation of the Christian Religion by introducing a Plurality of Gods I cannot but think my self in Conscience oblig'd to shew the Vanity of those Pretences that are urg'd in its behalf especially since the Defender's writing with so great an Assurance of his own Performance and so much contempt of the Reflections may have some influence upon some weak and prejudiced Readers Had the Author design'd a just Defence of the Doctrine of the Trinity he should have taken notice of what is said against it in general but more especially of what is urged against the real Trinitarians wherein he is equally concerned with them and not only of those additional Absurdities of his own Hypothesis Therefore I shall now set down his Opinion both as I find it in his Propositions and in the Defences of them and then shew the weakness of his Notions either with new Arguments or at least with enforcing those that were mentioned in my Reflections The Defender in his Propositions asserts That there are three Eternal and necessary Divine Beings or Substances each of which has unlimited Power Wisdom and Goodness and that so many Men or Angels are not more expresly distinguished in Scripture as different Persons or Substances Prop. 16 17. And pag. 8. of the second Defence I do affirm the Son and Spirit to be absolutely perfect Beings in reference to the Perfections of their Nature they are all boundless and Infinite So pag. 10. The Father's Existence being without a Cause does not make him to have another sort of Nature from that of the Son and Spirit which may be a necessary Nature and uncreated and constituted of all the boundless Perfections of which the Nature of the Father consists abstracted from the consideration of the manner of his Existence and in the same Page The Divine Nature speaking of the Nature of each doth comprehend all Perfections So pag. 11. An Essence of the same Kind though not the same numerical One So that here are three divine eternal necessary Natures or Essences as different as three Human or Angelical Natures which at first sight appear as much to be three Gods as three human Natures to be three Men which is a revolting to Polytheism or Plurality of Gods except he can shew that either two of these Divine Natures are not Gods or that these three Divine Natures are but one God We will therefore see what he saith to these two Points 1. He says that the Name of God is used in more senses than one in Scripture In the highest Sense the Father alone is God he is the only Independent the only True the only Good and Great and Self-existent God The Son and Spirit have a right to the Name of God next to that which is appropriated to the Father they depend on him with an entire dependance both for their Being and continuance in Being But is not this inconsistent with what is said before because it is first to assert that the different Ways or Manners of having their Natures does not make any difference in their Natures the second and third are as truly Divine as the First and then in effect to suppose it does because the Father has several Perfections the others are uncapable of To this he replies the Perfections the Father has above them belong immediately to his Existence not to his Nature but what is Existence abstracted from the Nature that exists but a Chimera If the Nature did not exist it would not be a Nature To say such a Nature exists is to say it is not only in our imagination but really or in act To make the Existence of a Nature a distinct thing from the Nature that exists and to suppose it to be the Subject in which the Attributes or Perfections of Independance and being the first Original of all things do exist is to suppose it a Substance because we have no other Idea of a Substance but that it is a Subject in which Properties exist which would be to make two distinct Substances in God his Nature that exists and the Existence of his Nature abstracted from the Nature What is the Existence of God the Father but the Existence of the Nature of God the Father except he exists distinct from his Nature And consequently if Self-existence be so great a Perfection it sheweth that the self-existent Nature of the Father is more perfect than the not self-existent Nature of the Son But suppose Self-existence which is Existence of the Father belongs to the Existence of the Father which by the way is only supposing Existence to belong to Existence yet Self-existence as I observed in my Letter is only a Perfection as it supposeth necessary or independant Existence and all those Perfections that belong to a necessary or self-existent Nature so that Self-existence barely considered in it self abstractedly from those Perfections notwithstanding his denial is no more a Perfection than any other way of having Existence if that way supposeth the same Perfections As suppose there was some Matter self-existent and some other Matter not self-existent and the Nature of the one were not any way different from the Nature of the other would they not be both equally Perfect and a parcel of Guinea's made of the One be as good as a parcel of Guinea's made of the other Or how could it be possible they being alike for Weight Colour Duration c. to distinguish them And if it be so in lower Natures the reason is the same in the highest Natures But however to carry the Simily as high as we can suppose a Human self-existent Father had two Sons who had all the Perfections of Human Nature and did as necessarily and independently exist as He there can be no reason assigned but that they would be Men in the highest Sense and as absolutely perfect as the Father He saith in pag. 44. of the first Defence That if a Human Father could be suppos'd to be Self-existent and that his Sons had the now mentioned kind of Dependance upon him viz. as the Light on the Sun the consequence must be that their Nature is short of the Perfection of their Father's Nature notwithstanding the many Properties they agree in which is owning that Self-existence and Independence belong to the Nature and that therefore the Nature of the Father is different from
the Nature of the Son and Spirit whose Natures are short of the Perfections of the Father's Nature and consequently their Natures are not Divine because the Divine Nature contains all Perfections but theirs want those that not only in themselves are the greatest and most excellent but the want of which is as he saith pag. 7. an abatement of all other Perfections And if the Father's Nature is independent and the Son 's and Spirit 's dependent it shews they have different kinds of Nature as different nay as opposite as Dependent and Independent But what can be a more staring Contradiction than that Beings that do eternally and necessarily exist and are Almighty yet notwithstanding this have not a Power to keep themselves in Life and Being no not a Moment and yet at the same time have a Power inherent in themselves from all Eternity to give Life and Being to all things whatever which also do entirely depend on them for the continuation of the same It is a contradiction to say a necessary Nature is dependent because a necessary Nature is that Nature which contains in it self the formal Reason why it cannot but be but a dependent Nature is so far from having any thing in it self that makes it necessarily exist that it not only owes to another its Existence but hourly depends upon another having no Power in its self to continue it in Existence which is the dependence of a Creature not of a Creator Is not a dependent Creator as great a Contradiction as an independent Creature And did ever any but our Author join necessary Existence and Dependence together How can they as I intimated Sect. 62. having necessary Existence be said more to depend on the Father for their continuance in Being than the Father on them since they as necessarily and as eternally exist as he who can no more hinder theirs than his own Existence nor could he more forbear emaning them from all Eternity than existing himself And if his Existence was without a Cause his emaning must be so too since the one was as necessary and eternal as the other In created Beings all necessary Emanations have the same cause as the Beings from whence they emane but God having no Cause of his Being his necessary Emanations must have no cause also And consequently eternal and necessary Existence as I observ'd in the same Sect. 62. is as great a Perfection as Self-existence since one is without a Cause as much as the other nay there can be no difference between them for if the Father is self-existent the Emanations that issue forth from him must be so too since they are emanatory Substances which were not produced by the Will and Power of the Father from nothing but they emaned from something which since there was nothing else to emane from must be the Father's self-existent Substance to which it was essential to have Emanations and consequently they have the same Existence as the Substance in which they existed when they emaned nor could their emaning make them lose their Self-existence But more of this hereafter But he says they depend on the Father for the continuation of their Being as the Streams on the Fountain or the Rays on the Sun But there 's no material Substance that depends upon another for its Existence or continuance in Existence all Matter is equally old and has subsisted ever since the Creation and Generation and Corruption is nothing but Matter according to the Laws of Motion changing its Shapes and Figures and therefore such Similies are not to the purpose because we are not speaking of any supposed Form or Figure of the Son and Spirit but of the Existence of their Substances viz. whether they have them by any third way different from both Creation and Self-existence As to the Streams depending on the Fountain it is no more than this that if the Water did not issue out of the Ground it could not run along the Ground if it did not bubble up in the Fountain it could no more flow to the next Place than if it stop'd there it could flow to a third but this does not make one part of the Water give being to another part or continue it in Being it is the same Body of Water which was in the Fountain that is now in the Streams And as to the Rays they no way depend on the Sun for their Being or continuance in Being except the Sun by a creating Power makes them to exist and by the same Power continues them in Existence If the Rays are as some imagin parts of the AEther set in motion by the Sun they no more depend on the Sun for their Being or continuance in Being than the Sun does on them but if they emane from the Body of the Sun they have the same cause of their Being and continuance in Being as the Sun it self because they like unto all other necessary Emanations were parts of the Body whence they emaned and consequently have the same Origin as the Sun it self And if the Sun had been self-existent they because parts of it would have been so too nor would their emaning destroy their Self-existing or any ways cause them then to depend on the Sun for their continuance in Being since the least Substance is as much a Substance as the greatest and consequently equally able to subsist by it self so that notwithstanding his altogether unlike Similies it 's evident if the Son and H. Spirit are Eternal and Necessary they are as self-existent and independent as the Father and consequently Gods in as high a Sense as he who if he were not a necessary Being would not be independent nor self-existent and consequently those three must go together but if their Natures are dependent and not self-existent they are so far from containing all Perfections and being as truly Divine as the Father's that they are truly created Natures or from no-beings made to be and like all such Beings as I observ'd Sect. 62. in God they live and move and have their Being I said Sect. 62. If the Persons have the same unlimited Perfections tho the manner of their getting them was different this would not cause any inequality between them to which he answers it would that is in reference to their manner of Existence though not in reference to their meer Essence But if there is not only a different manner of their getting their Essences but their Essences when gotten exist after a different manner which he must mean or else contradict himself and agree with me it 's impossible they should have the same kind of Nature because to exist is common to all Natures it 's the different manner of Existence that makes the difference between Natures and consequently a Nature that has a more excellent manner of Existing will be a more excellent kind of Nature And therefore if the Natures of the Son and Spirit had not only a different way of having their Existence
but do exist after a different manner their Natures or Essences must be of different kinds or sorts But if they exist after the same manner though they have different ways of coming by their Existence there can be no inequality or difference between them I asked Sect. 63. How the Father could be greater than the Son and Holy Spirit and be the only Good when they have the same that is unlimited Power and Goodness he answers they have unlimited Power but not the same which is since the Father's Power exceeds theirs to suppose that there is some Bounds and Limits of their Power and consequently theirs is an unlimited limited Power and Goodness He further adds That the Son's Power is not as great as the Father's ad intra because he could not beget the Father as the Father begat him But it being a Contradiction to suppose the Son could beget the Father and Contradictions being as he observes pag. 50. Objects of no Power cannot be Objects of Divine Power therefore it could be no diminution to the Son's Greatness that he could not beget the Father who always was in Being though upon supposition that the Son always was in Being it is equally a Contradiction to say That the Father gave him a Being But if it were an essential and necessary Perfection of the Father's Nature to beget or emane two Sons and the Son and Holy Spirit are not capable to emane Sons it shows there is a mighty Difference in their Natures or that they want some Perfections that is necessary and essential to the Nature of the Father nay which belongs as he observes pag. 13. to every Creature where he makes this remark That if there is not a Creature but can communicate his Nature what a Boldness is it to affirm That the infinite Creator cannot do the like He that hath planted the Ear shall he not hear and he that hath form'd the Eye shall he not see He that has given a Generative Power to the meanest of Creatures shall he not have the same Power himself c. So that by his Argument to deny to the Son and Spirit a Power to multiply their Species as the Father does is to deny to the infinite Creator since each is the infinite Creator a Perfection the meanest of Creatures have As to the Father's being called the only Good by our Saviour There is none good but God that Phrase says he signifies the Father's being the Original and Fountain of Goodness which he may be though not the only perfect Good He refers to Grotius but Grotius speaks of the Goodness of God as the Fountain of Goodness in Creatures But if the Streams be as perfectly good as the Fountain it would be very false to say the Fountain is the only Good I shall only apply to himself which he justly Prop. 11. says concerning the other Trinitarians If such a Liberty as this in Interpreting Scripture be allowable what Work may be made with Scripture Besides if the Son and Spirit are as he saith necessary and eternal they must be as much the Original and Fountain of Goodness as the Father himself who is so because he is the eternal and necessary Being The notion of Three necessary eternal Beings is in it self sufficiently absurd for the meaning of a necessary eternal Being is a Being which in the Nature of things and our conceptions concerning them could not but be or exist it was impossible it should be otherwise because it implies a contradiction that any Being or Person should now be if either it had not been from all Eternity or were not produced from that which was from Eternity for of nothing comes nothing but it was not necessary there should be more than one such Being because one such Being since he is all-sufficient is in all Reason sufficient for it self and all other Beings whatever and if one is sufficient two or more cannot be necessary for that implies this Contradiction That one is sufficient and not sufficient another is necessary where one is All-sufficient As the supposition of three necessary perfect Beings is in it self absurd so it is more absurd to say that two of these necessary perfect Beings want some Perfections because necessary perfect Beings cannot want any Perfections There was 't is true an eternal necessity that some Being should exist of it self or without a Cause and have all Perfections yet there could not be any necessity of another Being which should want any of those Perfections the first had for it is as much as to say that it was eternally necessary there should exist a Being in some respects imperfect that is an imperfect God nay not only imperfect but useless and superfluous And therefore it must be absurd to suppose it should be necessary and essential to the Divine Nature of the Father to have two Natures to emane from him which though they are supposed to be each Almighty and All-sufficient yet must be as needless to himself or to any Creation as he is All-sufficient for both and who can serve for no other end than to rob Him of that Honour Power Dominion Glory Praise Adoration Love c. which without those Emanations he would wholly enjoy to himself and which he can now only share with two others so that nothing can be a wilder Notion than of one God emaning two Gods If it be not contrary to Reason there should be more than one necessary Divine Nature I demand a Reason why the Heathens were blam'd for believing a Plurality of such since there can be no reason assign'd for above one which will not equally hold for as many or more than they worshipped all which but one they supposed were not self-existent but emaned Gods And if they were without excuse for worshipping more than one God it must be plain by the Light of Nature what that one God is otherwise the generality of Mankind could not distinguish between Theism and Polytheism And does not the Light of Nature demonstrate that one God is but one eternal necessary Being And can it be suppos'd that the Scripture should so severely condemn the Heathens as sinning against the clearest Light of Nature in adoring more than one and at the same time require the Christians upon pain of eternal Damnation to worship three eternal necessary Natures which is to make the Holy Scripture to contradict not only the Light of Nature but it self and let him if he can produce any one Argument against a plurality of Gods which will not equally hold against a plurality of Divine Natures There are none that have wrote against Heathenism but have thought the Impossibility of more than one necessary Nature a Demonstration against the Plurality of Gods and consequently they suppos'd it most evident that there can be no more but one such Nature because they use it as a Medium which ought always to be clearer than that which is prov'd by it to prove the Existence of
is God in the highest Sense to suppose him but a concurring God It is in a manner ungodding him since we cannot say then that we owe more than the third part of our Being Preservation and Happiness to him For to attribute them wholly to him would be robbing the other two who equally concur with him of what is their due and no Action can be wholly attributed to one which jointly belongs to Three But if it be injurious to each Divine Nature to ascribe to it but a Third of those Benefits we receive it must be injurious to say they concur'd in conferring them But if he says each wholly does all external Actions then he contradicts himself in supposing each concurs for he that wholly does an Action can never be said to concur in doing it And if the Father be the Original of Mankind there cannot be a second and third Original except Men can have as many Origins A second Original is as great nonsense as a Second First and a first Original is no more Sense than a First First But I refer the Desender to my Letter from Sect. 77 to 83. where I have handled this Point more fully By this time I believe it is evident to an impartial Reader that nothing our Author has affirmed of the Son and Holy Spirit does abate of their being Gods in the highest Sense or make them one and the same God with the Father and consequently there cannot be a more open and grosser Polytheism than his Hypothesis of three eternal and necessary Divine Natures But The Defender is not content with asserting three such Natures which one would think sufficiently absurd but he also runs into a Number of Inconsistences concerning the Manner of the Existence of two of these Natures in making them such and yet not self-existent or from none but that they had their eternal Beings from another Now as it is evident that whatsoever is self-existent is eternal because there is no Author or Cause of its being so it is as evident that whatsoever is not self-existent but has receiv'd its Being from another or has been caused to be cannot be from Eternity because to receive a Being or to be caused to be supposeth the Non-being to precede Being They must once not be otherwise they were not capable of being caused to be and consequently they could not always have been in being or from Eternity What can be a more manifest Contradiction than that that which had ever been should once be caused to be or that that which had been from all Eternity should from not-being be produced caused or emaned into Being Or must not that which is emaned into being sometime or other begin to be Or can that which has a Beginning be from Eternity which necessarily supposeth no Beginning For we have no Idea of any thing being from Eternity but that it had no Origin But our Author pag. 46. says That the Son and Spirit had an Origin And Prop. 6. The Father is the Original of all other Beings in which the Son and Holy Spirit are comprehended So that we must if we can believe that two necessary Natures had an eternal Origin or Beginning and that they have been caused to be tho they have always been It 's as great a Contradiction to say that that which has had an Origin has been from Eternity as that that which will have an End shall last to Eternity And if what has had an Origin can be from Eternity Creation which is but giving an Origin to things may be from Eternity And why might not God cause a thing to be voluntarily as well as necessarily from Eternity since in both Cases Being is equally bestow'd And every Being that is not without a Cause as God the Father alone is must have a Beginning for there is no Medium between having Being from none and from some one and what has Being from some one must once be without Being and so have a Beginning And if God be Eternal because he is Self-existent by parity of Reason what is not Self-existent cannot be from Eternity Eadem est ratio contrariorum is as undoubted a Maxim as any whatever so that nothing can be more evident than that To have an Origin or Cause or not to be self-existent and to be from Eternity are inconsistent And if they are inconsistent in themselves whatever Terms you express them in they will be still inconsistent Whence it favours to say no worse of great prejudice and fondness of an Hypothesis that when a thing is a Contradiction in some Terms to seek out others to hide the Contradiction But our Author is so unhappy in his Attempt that the very Terms he makes use of viz. To have Existence from God by way of necessary emanation contain in themselves a direct Contradiction for whatsoever substantial Being or Nature emaneth from another must before its Emanation exist some way or other in the Nature it emaneth from otherwise it is impossible to emane from it but it must emane from nothing which is the very same as Creation For every Nature must either emane from nothing or from the Nature in which it pre-existed But to suppose a Nature to exist by emaning is to suppose it did not exist before its Emanation and consequently could not emane from another Nature but from nothing Except it first emaned from the Nature and afterward existed which puts me in mind of a certain Poet who introduces Adam in great haste going to be created So that if the Son and H. Spirit did not exist before their Emanation it is impossible they should emane from God otherwise than that God by the voluntary exercise of his Divine Power emaned them from nothing and consequently they could not emane or issue forth as he Prop. 15. terms it from the Divine Nature But if the Son and Holy Spirit did exist before they emaned they did not exist by Emanation but were self-existent as the Nature of the Father Upon my asserting of which Sect. 58. he answers pag. 47. But I say with as great assurance that whatsoever Substance emanes from another must owe its existence to that other and the contrary is a manifest Contradiction but to whom I know not except to himself But I must beg leave to dissent and tell him that all Substances whatsoever owe their existence to God and not to the Substance they emane from and that all Generation Emanation or Procession in created Beings is only the different Forms and Figures which the various Coalitions of Matter according to the Laws of Motion do produce and consequently whatever Substance emanes from another however it may be modified by it does not owe its Existence to it but is as old as the Creation it self And by Parity of Reason whatsoever emanes from a self-existent Substance does not owe its Existence to the Substance it emanes from but is as self-existent as that Substance Though to exist by
in Time whilst it remains such being not subject to any alteration whatever becomes necessarily and eternally three eternal and necessary Natures two of which are not self existent Or in other words one immutable God necessarily and eternally becomes three Gods of the same Nature but not three self-existent Gods which though they are monstrous Contradictions in themselves and to our conception of but one God yet our Author is so happy as to be able to tell us how this is done namely by Emanation whereby two of these Natures issued forth as he terms it from the self-existent Nature And though each of these Natures is equal to the Nature from whence they emaned yet the emaning Nature is not capable of the least Diminution Though one would think to have two Natures to emane from one single Nature so as to be distinct and different in Number from it must be a diminution to that Nature since it has two Natures by emaning them from it self less than it had But if the Nature of God is indivisible and consequently no part nor any thing of it can emane nothing can be more evident but that all other Natures because not self-existent must be produc'd from nothing But he says pag. 13. There is not a Creature that generates another of the same kind but may be properly said to communicate its own Nature and yet notwithstanding forgoes not its own individual Nature nor any part of it But by his leave every generating Creature does part with some of its Substance which he may call Nature whereof the Foetus is form'd and which by Accession of Nourishment grows at length to be a Nature or Substance equal to its Parent But in the divine Generation the Son and Spirit have their whole Beings and Natures from the Father's Nature and not by accession from without but all at once and from all Eternity So that for the Father to communicate his Nature to each of them whose Natures are equal to his would be doubly to annihilate himself For a Nature to multiply its kind is a sign of Defect and Weakness in that kind of Nature for the same Reason that makes it capable of Propagating makes it subject to Corruption and Dissolution because it supposes it divisible and subject to augmentation and diminution which Beings in their Nature immortal are not and therefore what can be more absurd than to argue from Beings that are divisible and for that reason alone capable of Generation or Emanation to Beings that are indivisible and consequently not capable of having Emanations flow from their Substances I know none in his Senses ever supposed so gross a thing of finite Spirits as propagating their kind however some Men take the Liberty not only to suppose it of God himself but that he acts therein necessarily as inanimate Beings do nay they suppose it to be one of the highest and most essential Perfections of his Nature which I conceive to be most absurd as well as a most high Affront to the sole infinite Majesty of God and it carries this in it that it necessarily inferreth not only a Plurality but an Infinity of Gods For if God does not constantly and necessarily multiply Divine Natures he has lost a Perfection which they say is essential and necessary to his Nature which change cannot happen in the Nature of God but if as the Sun successively emits an innumerable company of new Rays he does from Eternity to Eternity produce new Natures they must needs be infinite in Number But if he says God is eternally emaning into Existence the Son and Holy Spirit it is so far from being true that they were eternally begotten or emaned into actual Being that they never will be so though the Father is in doing it from Eternity to Eternity by a continued successive Generating But how can they that were as he says boundless and infinite from Eternity be capable of any farther Production And every new or farther Production must be as infinite and boundless as each of them Having thus fully as I suppose shown the impossibility of the Father's issuing forth Emanations from his own Nature I shall be the shorter in my Remarks upon his Answers I said Sect. 59. upon Supposition that the Son and Spirit are necessary Emanations I cannot see how they owe their Origin more to the Father than the Father to them since they are all three of a Substance which is self-existent Which is he says very surprizing and as much as to say that the Root no less owes its Origin to the Tree or the Rays to the Sun than vice versâ As to his Simily from the Sun I have sufficiently spoken to it already As to that about the Root and the Tree it is evident not to mention that the Tree cannot owe its Origin to the Root because it is part of the Tree that the Trunk and Branches do not owe their Origin to the Root but are all visibly in the Seed which by Nourishment received from without do equally increase to their designed Bulk But to make it any ways parallel Suppose a self-existent Root to emane necessarily from it self without any new Matter added to it two Trunks each of which is as big as the emaning Root would not the Substances of all three be self-existent since they are all three of the self-same self-existent Substance and consequently one can no more owe its Origin to another than the self-same Substance can owe its Origin to it self In the same Section I said Whatsoever Substance proceeds from another must first be in it except it can be in it and proceed from it at the same time Upon which he asks Whether the Rays are not as old as the Sun or whether all Thoughts must be younger than Minds because they have their Original from them As to the first I grant the Rays are as old as the Sun and the reason is because they have the same Origin as the Sun yet they cannot be in the Sun and emane from it at the same time As to the second Whether Thoughts are younger than Minds it is not to the purpose because we are discoursing of Substances and of substantial Emanations which if he supposes Thoughts to be how many Substances would be created and annihilated in a Minute But however to answer his Question All Thoughts must be younger than Minds because Thoughts are Operations of the Mind in conceiving and comparing Idea's together consequently Minds must be before Thoughts But though all Thoughts must be younger than Minds because they owe their Origin to the Mind as being meer Operations of the Mind yet the Powers or Abilities that are essential to the Mind must be as old as the Mind because they do not owe their Origin to the Mind Here he blames me for calling Emanation a Separation and says That Distinction Separation and Difference are several things I suppose most of the Trinitarians think Distinction and Difference to be
as he and therefore have a right to be worshipped ultimately without reference to him who can be no more said to give them that right than to give it himself So that if our Author's Hypothesis be true there are two Divine Natures or Gods who enjoy all the Rights of their Godheads by as good a Title as the most High God himself which if they are not three Gods in the highest Sense it is impossible to imagine what are three Gods and as such it is too notorious that all Trinitarians worship them And tho they may with the help of Distinctions without any difference deny and wrangle about the plainest Contradictions yet it would be in vain to deny matters of Fact since it is evident they have three Objects of supream Worship each of which they adore apart one from the other which is either owning three Gods or else owning themselves guilty of wilful Idolatry in paying Supream Worship to what they do not believe to be God The reason why it is so necessary a Duty to believe the Unity of God is because we ought to have but one Object of supream Worship whoever has more destroys that Unity and is guilty of Idolatry For it is most evident that if the having one Object of Supream Worship be the adoring of one God or supream Being the having three such Objects and the adoring each singly and by himself is the Worship of three Gods And in this point whether it be lawful to have more than one Object of supream Worship turns at present the whole controversy between the Trinitarians and Antitrinitarians This was the Point I chiefly insisted on in my Letter and this is what I still desire a serious answer to For our Author's answer is a plain denial of Matter of Fact in their Worship and a condemnation of those that so worship But to return let the Relation between the Divine Persons be what it will that is wholly ad intra without any respect or reference to Creatures who being equally oblig'd to each for their Beings and all the Blessings they do here or shall hereafter enjoy which are the things they ought to pay the highest Adoration for ought to pay to each the highest and consequently not worship one for the Sake of the other but each for his own sake And this is evident from this farther Reason For suppose as we very well may if there are three Divine Natures that two of them no way concern'd themselves with human Affairs and that our Happiness or Misery no way depended upon them there would be no reason why we should give them Divine Worship but we ought to give it to him wholly from whom we have our Being and expect our Happiness and for the same Reason if we are equally indebted to each Justice and Gratitude will oblige us to pay to each equal acknowledgment and to terminate our Devotions no more on one than on the others And I challenge him to produce any Text of Scripture where there is any ground laid for the Worship of God but it will agree to him that has unlimited Wisdom Power and Goodness c. necessarily and eternally and who bestows upon us our Life and Happiness and what Worship we exhibit to God is certainly for his own Sake and ultimately terminates in him Thus if there be the same Reason for terminating our Worship on the Son as on the Father it 's absurd to do otherwise Nay were the Trinitarians consistent with themselves they ought to pay a thousand times more Acknowledgments to the Son than to the Father since the Benefits they receive from the one so much exceed the Benefits they receive from the other For suppose one should owe to two Persons to whom he was otherwise equally oblig'd an immense Sum without payment of which he must for ever suffer the Miseries of an intolerable Imprisonment would he not owe almost infinitely more to that Person who not only freely and generously forgave him himself but even voluntarily paid to the other though with loss of his Life by an ignominious and painful Death whatsoever their common Debter owed him to whom he was no further oblig'd than for accepting the full Satisfaction of him that became his Surety The application to the Father and the Son is very easy As to the Father's sending his Son if the Son were not his Subject and so he could command him it could amount to no more than the Father's being willing to receive and accept of the Satisfaction the Son was as willing to pay in the stead of the Debter But let us suppose the Father Son and H. Spirit as equal in Nature so also equally obliging to us and therefore each of them deserving from us our whole Hearts and Souls which it is impossible for us to give to more than one we must wittingly and willingly by bestowing them on one either commit Sacrilege against the other two or else by dividing them give each but a Third of that which is wholly due to each of them which would be Sacrilege against all three These are the Mischiefs of our Author's Scheme of Religion which it is impossible for him to avoid but by owning with the Unitarians that there is but one eternal necessary Nature which is to be lov'd and honoured infinitely above all and all others as his Creatures but for his Sake and for his Glory And now let the Reader judg what great reason our Author has to triumph and insult over his Antagonist as he does all along but more especially p. 62 63 64. where amongst other things he says he cannot but suspect it is the encreasing or upholding of a Party c. which has very much the ascendent of the Love of Truth How may the Learned Socrates shame the self-conceited Dogmatizers How much rather would I be modest Socrates than a Christian who so leans to his own or his Party's Understanding Our Author is a little unlucky in so much mentioning Socrates who chose rather to embrace Death than our Author 's beloved Hypothesis of more than one Divine Nature though that was the Religion of his Country and of the World but I cannot blame him that sets up for more than one such Nature which appears to be contrary to the clearest Reason as well as the most express Scripture for condemning others for leaning upon that Guide which the one God has obliged them to follow their own and not others Understanding As to his suggestion of our having other Motives not the Love of Truth in opposing him it is as groundless as uncharitable For what design but the Love of Truth is it almost possible for a Man to have in defending a Doctrine the doing of which exposes him to be ruin'd by Penal Laws and which is worse makes him an Object of the Aversion and Detestation of all Sects But since our Author has given me the occasion I shall presume to ask him how he can
surely make a rational Being as great as the greatest I come next to consider how his Lordship has answered 4 Questions which I put 1. Does the Divine Nature comprehend all Perfections or can it want one or two of the chiefest and be still the same Divine Nature To this thus he Self-existence is a Perfection relating immediately to the Father's Existence not to his Nature or Essence I reply that this is not answering the Question but a very sorry shuffling it off for let the Perfection of Self-existence belong to what he pleases yet I hope it is a Perfection and if the Divine Nature comprehends all Perfections that Nature which does not comprehend all must not be the Divine Nature 2. If Self-existence as he teaches relates immediately to the Father's Existence and as he seems to mean be but as good as no Perfection yet to be first Original of all things and Independent must relate to his Nature or none of all the rest relate to his Nature The Nature of a Being is that by which he is that which he is and if you abstract from the Divine Nature Independence and being the first Original of all things you do not conceive God to be that which he is 3. Even the Manner of God's Existence as his Lordship once phras'd it belongs to his Essence nay it is the very fundamental Notion of a God Whatever Excellencies you ascribe to a rational Being without self-existence you raise him not above the Character of a most excellent Creature nay more you cannot ascribe infinite Perfections to any but the Self-existent God For his Lordship grants that the Perfections of all other Creatures are in them but derivatively and by being so receive Abatement But if he can make these two things consist I will give him this Gift he shall never be able to contradict himself while he breathes 4. Tho' he will not allow Self-existence to belong to the Essence of God yet he says that it speaks a more excellent Manner of Existence peculiar to the Father I argue then If the Father does exist after a more excellent Manner than the Son then he is a more excellent Person than the Son and has a more excellent Nature even as created Adam it is his Lordship's Simily is more excellent than any of the Sons of Men. And if the more excellent Nature of the Father be not another sort of Nature than the less excellent Nature of the Son who can help it But then I 'll tell him that One absolutely perfect God with all Perfections all and every Self-existence Being the first Original and Independence not excluded and his 2 Gods not absolutely perfect but as perfect as 2 Gods can be that are not absolutely perfect is a Dream which would make sport for any Man that has not more Reverence for his Vertue than his Reasoning But his Lordship is positive that the Nature of the Son may be a necessary Nature and uncreated for all that I can object or he has said Well! I will try that I object that the Nature of the Son is not said to be necessary or uncreated in Scripture He offers no Reasons why it should be thought so I will produce some why it should not 1. Because there can be but one numerically necessary Existent Dr. Cudworth tho'a Trinitarian could not but own this p. 200. The true and proper Idea of God is a Being absolutely perfect absolute Perfection includes in it all that belongs to the Deity and is that alone to which necessary Existence is essential and of which it is demonstrable The Nature of the Son cannot be uncreated because there can be but One numerical uncreated Nature Indeed the Athanasian Creed pronounceth The Father uncreate the Son uncreate the H. Ghost uncreate but the Compiler did not believe it for he determines not Three uncreate but One uncreate His Lordship hints sometimes that the Nature of the Father Son and H. Ghost is specifically the same sometimes that it is closely inseparably unconceivably the same but he constantly teaches that their Natures are numerically distinct and now if every one of them is uncreate it undeniably follows that there are 3 numerical distinct uncreated Natures But this methinks he should scarcely venture to assert if it be but out of Reverence to the Athanasian Creed how much soever he may be tempted to trespass upon evident Principles of Reason 2. Neither the Son nor the H. Ghost is a necessary Nature because a necessary Nature must be also self-existent and independent That Being which exists necessarily could exist from no other but the Son exists from the Father therefore does not exist necessarily He will say The Son exists from the Father by eternal necessary Emanation what that is I shall presently enquire I argue on If a Being could exist necessarily then it would not depend on God for its Existence but the Son according to his Lordship does depend on the Father for his Existence therefore he does not exist necessarily If the Nature of the Son were necessary as is the Nature of the Father no reason could be assigned why the Father should not as much depend on the Son as the Son on the Father In short two necessary Natures there cannot be but if there were they would both be independent To my 2d Question he bids you Sir read again what he said to the former I have done so and find I have not censur'd these words God the Father's Existence being without a Cause doth not make him to have another sort of Nature from the Son and H. Ghost Here it is implied that the Nature of the Son and of the H. Ghost had a Cause whereas the Nature of God had none Will not this pass for a sufficient Character to distinguish them as different Natures I 'm sure no two different Natures which he can name do differ half so much as a Nature that had a Cause and a Nature that had not And then again To have a Cause and to be uncreated if that be not a Contradiction I am satisfied he may talk backward and forward securely My 3d Question Can a Being that depends on God be properly said to be essentially that God on whom it depends He answers Such a Being can be properly said to be essentially that God in one Sense but cannot in another i. e. can have an Essence of the same kind tho' not the same numerical One But by his favour an Essence of the same kind can at most but make a Being to be a God not make him to be that God on whom himself depends If a Being can be that God which depends on another and that very God also on whom himself depends then such Being may at once be Two Gods and so the Second Person in the Trinity is the Father that caus'd the Son to be and the Son that was caus'd by the Father Thus by his Lordship's Answer to my 3d Question it
appears he holds the Three Persons to be One God as having an Essence of the same kind but to be Three numerical Gods And to make his Polytheism look as heathenishly as possible he saith p. 19. that the individual Nature of the Father is not a Divine Nature more truly than that of the Two other Persons And then Self-existence Being the first Original and Independence signify much His Lordship makes the same Answer to my 4th Prop. as he did to my 2d i. e. he has answered it already What can be more extravagant than this Fancy on which the Weight of more Hypotheses than one depends viz. that Angels exist by voluntary Creation but the Son and H. Ghost by necessary Emanation It 's common with the Trinitarians to use these Terms Generation Emanation Procession it 's common also with the most eminent of them to acknowledg that it 's a difficult Thing to understand a dangerous Curiosity to enquire a bold Presumption to determine wherein these Terms differ and the Reason is tho' they are asham'd to own it because they know not what they would have their Terms signify In common speaking we know what is meant by To generate or beget To emanate or flow from To proceed To go or come forth but those Terms cannot be applied to the Father Son and H. Ghost in that natural obvious Sense why then should they be applied to them at all when no Man can distinctly say what they are to signify 'T is granted we have not an adequate Conception of God there may be something in his Nature whereof we have no just Idea but that which we cannot understand how can we talk of How can we form Propositions of Things out of the reach of our Knowledg But by this one particular Term EMANATION his Lordship will venture to say This is what is meant A more excellent Way of Existence than by Creation and to his Term Emanation he adds this Epithet Necessary so then the more excellent Way of Existence than by Creation is necessary Existence and so it is but then the Son does not necessarily exist That Being which could not but be ever was and that Being which ever was could be from no other But because his Lordship is wont sarcastically to deride my Arguing who am indeed an obscure and unlearned little Fellow tho' for ought he knows I may equal the very great Abilities of that DYING MARTYR yet a Trinitarian to my Knowledg who starves to the Reproach of this Nation to whom the envious Jovian allow'd the Praise of Mediocrity I shall therefore seek a little shelter from Authority that his Lordship may not renounce his Senses if any Man of Sense be of his Mind The Author I am going to quote is Dr. Cudworth a good Man and very near of his Lordship's Make too who in his Intellectual System contradicts his own and his Lordship's Hypothesis as plainly and liberally as heart can wish p. 210. Self-existence and necessary Existence are essential to a perfect Being and to none else But his Lordship teaches that the latter and not the former is essential to a perfect Being and that the Son is absolutely perfect tho' not in his strictest Sense without Self-existence and that the Self-existence which belongs to the Father does not belong to his Essence tho' he who can separate Self-existence from the Father's Essence may with as much Reason deny the Existence of his Essence for the Father is as certainly self-existent as he is existent Cudworth again p. 726. Nothing could exist of it self from Eternity naturally and necessarily but that which contains necessary and eternal Self-existence in its Nature I am apt to believe this Author put in that Phrase of it self to save an Emanation or two but it will not do it for he constantly makes Self-existence and necessary Existence inseparable Perfections And p. 748. he speaks full and home against his own and the Bp. of Gloucester's Tritheism in these words Tho' it be certain that something did exist of it self necessarily from all Eternity yet it is certain likewise that there can be but one such thing Necessity of Existence being essential to no more Now if Necessity of Existence be essential but to One I pray Sir what will become of his Lordship's necessary Emanations Cudw p. 764. Because something did certainly exist of it self from Eternity unmade therefore also is there actually a necessary existent Being The Doctor proves the necessary Existence of a Being from its Existing of it self from Eternity i. e. from its necessary Existence as I had done before Let the Reader judg if it be not a good Argument P. 13. his Lordship says A Creature communicating its Nature does not forgo its own individual Nature but neither does he communicate his own individual Nature nor any part thereof Here I beg his Pardon for the Creature does forgo a part a seminal part thereof the bodily Substance of the Foetus is by the wonderful Providence of God made from the bodily Substance of the Parents and as far as the bodily Substance of Men may be call'd their Nature they waste their Nature to produce their like How Souls are produced he says not neither I. But hitherto he has not offer'd any thing to make me retract my Assertion That we have no other Notion of the word Communicate but to impart or give and what one Person doth impart or give of any essential and singular thing THAT himself hath not but he hath it to whom it is given Who questions the Power of God to generate his Like He made Man in his own Likeness endued him with rational Faculties with noble Excellencies of Mind but the Unitarians do not see how God can communicate all his infinite Perfections for that is to communicate himself to beget himself to multiply himself which deserves a harder Name than I can give it Prop. 10. There seems to be no Contradiction nor the least Absurdity in asserting that God is able to communicate every one of his Perfections except those of Self-existence and being the first Original of all things Against this I did affirm and see no Cause I have to retract that for the same Reason as Self-existence and being the first Original of all things are incommunicable for the very same Infinite Power Wisdom and Goodness were incommunicable also and to make good this Affirmation 't was proper for me to declare why the former were incommunicable that the Reader might judg wherein the latter were not so likewise for the Reason alledg'd All that his Lordship has to offer is that I attempt to prove a self-evident Principle but that 's not so great a Fault I hope as to attempt to prove an evident Contradiction such as That two Persons have all Perfections necessary to essentiate a perfect God tho' they have not absolutely all Perfections That God the Father has more Perfections than are necessary to essentiate a perfect God That the
to play with Expressions by chance ambiguous than to answer Arguments Upon my Remark to his 15 Prop. he asks Who are they that determine any Notion to be true while they cannot conceive it to be so Why Sir in general they are the Trinitarians but in particular and more especially his Ldp. he is the Man for does he not expresly determine in this very Prop. that there is an unconceivably close Union between them the supposed 3 Persons Therefore unless he can conceive an unconceivable Notion or doubt of that which he determines to be true he is notoriously guilty of determining that Notion to be true which he cannot conceive to be so I grant him there may be a stricter Union between God and Christ than we know of but here I am bold and fixt there can be no such Union between them as contradicts the Notions he has implanted in us According to him the 3 Persons are 3 distinct Beings and there can be no distinct Being without its distinct Nature so 3 distinct Beings are 3 distinct Natures and 3 distinct Natures continuing so can never become one single Nature what Union soever there is between them I wonder the Trinitarians should so constantly amuse their Readers with that unsutable Comparison of Soul and Body in Union for 't is plain that in their Union they are that one thing which neither of them can be in a State of Separation Prop. 16. Such an Union as this between them being acknowledg'd by us together with the fore-mentioned intire Dependence of the Son and H. Spirit upon the Father the Unity of the Deity is as fully to all Intents and Purposes asserted by us as it is necessary or desirable it should be The End for which the Unity of the Deity was ever asserted What does he mean by this very odd Phrase My Sense is that it 's asserted because it is true and that the Consequence of its being true is this the Service of our whole Hearts is therefore due to him alone and our lower Respects to other Objects according as his Word and our own Reason directs us but we cannot both to God and Christ pay the Service of our whole Hearts notwithstanding their Union in Will and like Natures For if we love one Master with our whole Hearts we have no Affections left for any other but as he shall direct us and he cannot direct us to love another equally with himself Unity of Nature or 3 Beings united in 1 Nature is no better nor worse than 3 Beings in 1 Being 3 Natures in 1 Nature 3 and not 3 in the same respect which is a Contradiction if any thing be so Upon his 17 Prop. I had told him he was an Ismaelite Trinitarian whose Hand is against all the Heads of Trinitarian Expositors To this he replies 'T is false But since he deals so bluntly with me I will 1. Set down some of his Contradictions not consequential but broad Contradictions 2. Not to be wanting in the least to the Vindication of my Censure I will plainly show that I said no worse of his Lordship upon the account of his Hypothesis than he himself had said before of himself The first of his 28 Prop. is this The Name of GOD is used in more Senses than one in H. Scripture but in his first Def. p. 23. speaking of Perfections necessary to essentiate a God in the absolutely highest Sense he has these words Which the Name of God is ever to be understood in in the H. Scripture In the same Def. p. 17. he affirms that H. Script saith not of what Nature that Unity is which it ascribes to God But Prop. 13. of the 28. he says The Oneness so frequently affirmed of him in Script is a numerical Oneness In his second Def. p. 13. he says The individual Nature of the Father is not a Divine Nature more truly than that of the Two other Persons But Prop. 15 he says Each of them has a Right to the Name of God in a Sense next to that in which it is appropriated to the Father This Contradiction he is in love with it often occurs P. 10. of 2d Def. distinguishing between Perfections which he makes to belong to the Father's Existence and Perfections which belong to his Divine Nature or Essence he contends that the Son and H. Spirit have all the Perfections of the Divine Nature as well as the Father But p. 23. of first Def. he observes that Athanasius S. Basil Greg. Nazianzen and S. Chrysostom with several of the Latin Fathers interpret those Words of Christ MY FATHER IS GREATER THAN I to have been spoken not of his Humanity but his Divinity and himself gives his Judgment to their Sentence Prop. 16. of the 28. he affirms it to be evident from H. Script that the Son and H. Spirit have unlimited Power c. which also he allows 2d Def. p. 10. to be an essential Perfection but 2d Def. p. 24. he acknowledges that the Power of Judging the World was a Power committed to Christ not as Man and not essentially in him Prop. 17. he determines that they the 3 Persons are always spoken of in Script as distinct Beings or Persons according to the proper Signification of this word both from the Father and from each other nor are so many Men or Angels more expresly distinguished as different Persons or Substances by our Saviour or his Apostles than the Father Son and H. Ghost are But 1st Def. p. 20. he says They are outwardly and in reference to the Creation perfectly One and THE SAME God as concurring in all the fame external Actions I hope the Reader will allow me at least that these Instances do sufficiently prove that his Lordship's Hand is against one of the Heads of the Trinitarians I mean himself That it is also against all the other he will excuse me the Labour of proving by a tedious Induction of Particulars for Prop. 17. of the 21. he affirms that his Explication is the best and easiest way of reconciling those Texts which according to the other Hypothesis are not reconcilable but by offering extream Violence to them Here he prefers his Hypothesis indefinitely to all other Hypotheses Here 's no Restriction no Exception Nay in the Conclusion he doubts not to pronounce that the many Explications of the adorable Mystery have had little better Success than to make Sport for the Socinians My Animadversion on his 18 Prop. I have a better Opinion of since I saw his Answer than when I first pen'd them However I shall examine a few Lines P. 37. l. 30. How can he say saith his Ldp. that Jesus Christ desir'd not Divine Honours to be paid to him except he mean it when he was on Earth I mean as a plain Reader would imagin that Christ desired not any Divine Honours to be paid him either in one State or other meaning by Divine Honours such as are due to him that is by Nature
but one God I shall only instance one Authority which may be instar omnium and that is Grotius de verit relig Christ. The first Attribute of God saith he in the beginning of that excellent Book is that he is one God and no more This is thence collected that he is that Being which is necessarily and by himself for whatsoever is necessarily or by it self is not considered in Kind but as it is in Act but if you suppose more Gods then you will find nothing in each of them why any of them should necessarily be and no reason why there should be rather two than three or ten than five Add hereunto that the multiplicity of singular things of the same kind proceeds from the fecundity of Causes by reason of which fewer or more things are brought forth but God has no Origin nor Cause So that this great Man is contrary to our Author in every thing 1. In supposing it impossible there should be more than one necessary Being 2. That more than one such necessary Being would infer more than one God and that God could not out of the Fecundity of Causes multiply his Kind 3. Whatever had a Cause or Origin could not be God 4. That there is no difference between necessary Being or Being by it self or without a Cause they are really one and the same with Him and so they are with all that have writ on this Subject They suppose God self-existent or without a Cause because he is necessary and eternal They never make use of our Author 's admirable distinction pag. 50. of having necessary Existence from another and necessary Existence from one's self He asks me pag. 48. whether I think that God can be the necessary Cause of nothing or whether the Perfection of his Nature does not determin Him to do what is best or to do what he in his infinite Wisdom knows fit to be done To which I answer That the Question between us is not what the Perfection of his Nature doth determin him to but what the Perfection of his Nature is whether three perfect necessary Natures or one only which is questioning whether the Unity of God be a Perfection or not Whatsoever is necessarily in God must contain the highest Perfection otherwise it would not be essential to his Nature but God being in his own numerically one Nature absolutely and infinitely Happy and Perfect two other Divine Natures cannot be in Him or which is all one with our Author emane from him necessarily because they can add no Perfection great or little to Him who in his one Nature contains all Perfections whatever He and they together can be no more Good Powerful Wise than he is alone He alone is All-sufficient and two other such Natures can make him no more Therefore it must be directly contrary to the Nature of God and highly injurious to his Honour to suppose his Nature necessarily to emane two Persons who must be needless ad intra to God himself and as useless ad extra as God himself is All-sufficient But if God gave a Being freely to the Son and Holy Spirit because he in his infinite Wisdom knew it fit to be done they are no more necessary Beings than all other Beings which God also produced because he in his infinite Wisdom knew it fit to be done or that the Perfection of his Nature did determin him to what was best and consequently they as all others continue in Being because God's Wisdom thinks it best But to say that God acted otherways than so that is necessarily in producing or causing the Son and Holy Spirit to exist who are as distinct and different from Him as two Men are from all other Men is either to make him act without understanding or else to act contrary to his Mind for Necessity only takes Place where Thoughts are wholly wanting or else the Power to act or forbear acting according to the Direction of Thought But if God did not give them then Beings neither as necessitated nor because he in his Wisdom thought fit which our Author calls necessarily he could not there being no middle way give them their Beings at all or be the Original or Cause of them and consequently they having no Origin or Cause must be as much without a Cause or self-existent as the Father and the same necessity if I may so say that made the Father to exist must make them exist And the Father upon supposition that they necessarily eman'd can be no more the Original of them than of his own Nature because the same Necessity that made his Nature exist made it emane It was as essential to it to emane as to exist and consequently the emaning Natures must be as self-existent and independent as his own Nature since they no more depend on him for Existence or continuance in Existence than his own Nature does Which very thing would the Defender seriously consider it would make him abate of his confidence in his Hypothesis But more of this hereafter 2. Now I shall remind him that tho the Design of his Propositions is to prove the Doctrine of the Trinity is not contradictory to natural Reason yet they as I observ'd Sect. 64. directly destroy the Unity of God which is the second Point I am to examine and that we may be assured there are not three Persons or Divine Natures in the Godhead he affirms Prop. 13. That the Godhead or GOD in the highest Sense can be but ONE NUMERICALLY and therefore the Oneness so frequently affirmed of him in Scripture is a numerical Oneness and in his Answer to the Consid. to which he refers me he says pag. 23. That the Name of GOD in Scripture is ever to be understood in the absolutely highest Sense How could an Unitarian in more direct Terms deny a Trinity What he urges in behalf of the Trinity is pag. 17. where he says The Holy Scripture doth abundantly declare the Unity of God but no where distinguisheth of Unity nor says of what Nature that Unity is which it ascribes to God But is not this directly contradicting Prop. 13. where he declares of what Nature or sort the Unity of God is to wit a numerical Unity and pag. 22. That the Name of God in Scripture is ever to be understood in that highest Sense And indeed it had been very absurd to suppose the Scripture did frequently inculcate that God is one and yet not let us know in what Sense he is one except it be obvious to common Reason what that Oneness is to wit one eternal absolutely perfect necessary Being It 's most certain that when we ascribe any thing to God as a Perfection we ascribe it in the highest Sense and consequently the Oneness of God must be taken in that Sense I desire to know what will destroy the Unity of God if every thing Treble in him will not do it as three Natures with three unlimited Powers Wisdoms Goodnesses But he
pleads they are not three Gods because there is an immediate Union in their spiritual Substances But I say no Union whatever can make three each of which is one God to be but one God because it is first saying each is one God and then denying it by saying all three are but one God so that it cannot without a manifest Contradiction be said that while each remains one God they can any way be united into one God for three of the same kind will be thrice what one of the same kind is If Union make them one God it must either identify them by making them one and the same God and consequently there can be no real distinction between them or it must make none of them God by making them parts of God which by Union compose one God For we have no other Idea of Composition but of one thing being made up of several which by being united constitute that one and which whether material or immaterial we cannot conceive but as parts of the thing they constitute For since each is not the whole it must be only a part of the whole whatever our Author pag. 54. says to the contrary I would willingly know why they are not as much three Gods though suppos'd substantially united as if they were not united since each has in himself distinctly from the others all the Perfections of the Divine Nature and they could have no more if they were separate It is as much Idolatry to adore three united as three ununited Gods since in both Cases you equally rob God of his Honour by paying it to two numerically diverse and different Gods And being Substances they are in their Natures capable of subsisting apart from one another He pag. 53. misrepresents what I say concerning Union as though I argued against the bare possibility of their being united and not of their becoming one God by Union while each remain'd God distinct from the others and then makes a long Harangue about Mystery in which he says if he do not seriously cry Mystery I know what I know of him But however to do him the fuller Justice I will mention what he further says concerning this Union In his first Defence pag. 19. He saith They are as much one with one another as they without the most apparent contradiction are capable of being one A Heathen would not have scrupled to have said as much of his Gods But he goes on and says They are much more than specifically one but then it is evident they cannot be so much distinguished as so many Men or Angels which are but specifically one But he will not allow that they are identified or numerically one p. 53. but if we cannot apprehend any Medium between numerical and specifical Oneness then in professing to believe it we profess we know not what But I suppose he will say at this turn as he does in his second Defence pag. 26. Well suppose this Is it impossible for a thing to be of which we sorry Mortals have no Idea I say no by no means but with humble Submission he 's a very sorry Mortal that requires us to believe Words without any Idea's annex'd to them But let our Author say what he will he has still a Simily to help him out This Medium between specifick and numerical Unity is as great a Unity as that between the Sun its Splendour and the Light of both But those must be either different or the same thing if different though of the same Kind there can be but a specifick Unity or if the same a numerical Unity If by the Light he means a thin Collection of minute Particles as he pag. 58. defines it then he supposes the Splendor to be a second Sun emitting a small sort of active subtile and piercing Particles but if by Light and Splendor he means those Idea's those Particles cause in us he cannot distinguish between Splendour and the Light of the Splendor because Splendour is but a greater degree of Light caused by those minute Particles in a greater Quantity or more directly striking our Eyes so that his Simily is every way faulty But because in his often repeated Similies about the Sun its Light and Heat he supposes somewhat in the Sun or which does exist by emaning from it analogous to our Idea's of Light and Heat I told him Sect. 69. That though there is in the Sun a Power to produce in us Heat and Light as well as Pain and Pleasure yet there are no such Sensations or Qualities in the Sun which though pag. 57. he argues against yet he says the very same thing but lest his Reader should perceive it he calls the Effects which when one pretends to talk Philosophically is very improper by the Names of the Causes and will not say that Heat is caused by but that Heat is a close Collection of minute subtile active piercing Particles and Light a thinner Collection of them But do Clothes and Exercise by causing Heat Produce a Collection of such Particles Why do they not sometimes produce Light which is but a less close Collection But in arguing thus he grants all I would have viz. That there are no such Qualities in the Sun or emaning from it but the Sun being a Body in perpetual Agitation there are minute Particles flowing from it which by their Figure Texture and Motion alter the Figure Texture and Motion of some of the smallest parts of our Hands and Eyes and thereby produce in us Light and Heat which are as much meer perceptions as Pain and Pleasure And I say again there has not been any Book writ these late Years on this Subject but what proves there 's nothing in Matter besides Bulk external Figure and internal Configuration of its minute Parts which by their Motion produce in us Heat Light Colour Sound Taste c. But enough of this Our Author says in his first Defence pag. 20. That outwardly and in reference to the Creation they the three Divine Natures are perfectly one and the same God as concurring in all the same external Actions though in relation to one another there is a real distinction between them But if there is no distinction between them in respect of the Creatures to whom they are one and the same God why do the Trinitarians worship them as numerically different Gods for if they adored them as the same God it would be as impossible to worship the one and not the other as to worship and not to worship the same God But can there be a real and not a real distinction between them The reason he gives why the three Divine Natures are but one God is as surprizing as the thing it self it is because they concur in all the same external Actions But if each is God does it not suppose three concurring Gods Can one and the same God be said to concur with himself Is it not directly agaisnt the Honour of the Father who
emaning except from nothing be as hath been shown nothing less than a Contradiction yet our Author tells us pag. 18. it is a very presumptuous Conceit and in the second Defence pag. 25. an intolerable Presumption not to conclude it possible Though he further says we have a clearer Idea of it than voluntary Creation yet all the Idea he gives us of it is That it 's a more excellent way of existing than that of Creation But before I proceed in the Examination of his Hypothesis it will be necessary to obviate an exception he takes at my using words taken from material Substances in discoursing of Spiritual ones which is a most frivolous exception because it is impossible to be avoided since we have no Ideas and consequently no words to express them in but what we have from sensible or material Objects and the operations of our Minds about them as is fully demonstrated in Mr. Lock 's Essay of Human Understanding And it is sufficiently evident from Holy Scripture it self which that we may understand it represents God with Face Eyes Hands Bowels back parts Motion from Place to Place c. and so Spirits are describ'd as Standing Falling down c. and in a Word so are all other things relating to spiritual Beings But this exception is very strange from one whose Hypothesis is built chiefly upon Emanations which is a Word borrow'd from Matter and signifies those minute Parts or Effluvia's of Matter which flow from Bodies and his Hypothesis makes the whole or the one Divine Essence either to emane from it self or to be divisible and have parts emane from it or else what he says is wholly unintelligible The first Argument I made use of Sect. 57. to shew it impossible the Son and Spirit could emane from the Father was That they being both infinite Substances and as such being equal to suppose two Infinites to emane from one is to suppose twice as much to emane from a Being or Substance as the Being is To which he answers I change his Phrase Beings whose Perfections are unlimited and who have all they can have without a manifest Contradiction which Phrase by the way is not to be found in his Propositions But why might not I call them infinite Substances since twice in his Propositions by way of Explication he calls them Substances and every where talks of the Union of their Substances and pag. 56. of his third Defence defines Person by Substance And it is evident that if the Substances do not emane the Perfections that subsist in them cannot emane and if the Perfections are infinite or unlimited the Substances cannot be finite or limited and pag. 8. he expresly says The Son and Holy Ghost are all boundless and infinite But where is the Difference between Infinite and his own term unlimited Does not the one signify without Bounds as the other without End and the Argument will equally hold with the one Term or the other Therefore I have no Reason to change those Terms nor did I injure him in using them But that all Infinites are equal is as evident as that there is an inequality between Finite and Infinite for if one Infinite were less than another there must be some bound or end of that Infinite which would be to make it Finite wherefore for two Infinites to emane from one is to say twice as much emanes from a Being as the Being is Nay if the Son and Holy Spirit were both but one Infinite to suppose them to emane from but one other Infinite is to suppose the whole Infinite to emane from it self but if their Nature each of them is as truly Divine and Infinite as that of the Father they must each of them be equal to him and consequently cannot emane from him Can two Suns which is a more proper Simily for equal Natures than the Sun and the Rays emane from one Sun Would it not be to suppose twice as much to emane from the Sun as was in it The Defender upon better thoughts though I did not make use of his Phrases thus replies Be he pleased to take notice that there is nothing in this acute arguing except he means by infinite Substances Substances of an infinite bigness He might as well have said To be and not to be was a Contradiction only in Substances of infinite bigness for the Reason is the same of what Nature or sort soever the Substances be provided they were capable of emaning Because the Argument does not depend upon a Being having Bigness or Quantity but upon the equality of Beings that emane from one another For let an equal number which has neither Matter nor Bulk emane from an equal does not the whole Number emane from it self So substract an Hour from an Hour and see what becomes of the first Hour So that if the Nature of the Father emanes from it self an infinite and boundless Nature it must wholly exhaust the Nature of the Father which is but Boundless and Infinite But to suppose two such Natures to emane from him is to suppose twice as much to emane as the Father's Nature is It is as I observed Sect. 59. dividing one infinite Substance into three infinite Parts To which he replies How does our Author already run Taplash But I will not therefore forbear replying and I answer No doubt it is a horrid Contradiction so to affirm but how rank doth this smell of the gross thing called Body his Mind runs altogether upon material Substances which alone I say have Parts to be divided into Then he goes on to demonstrate that an infinite Spiritual Substance cannot be divided into infinite Spiritual Parts which is the absurdity or if he pleases the Taplash I am condemning as the immediate consequence of his Hypothesis For what difference can we perceive between one infinite Nature emaning out of it self two infinite Natures by which it so far parts with them as they become two distinct and diverse Natures from it as distinct and different as so many Men or Angels and one infinite Nature divided into three infinite Parts And by our Author's leave we not only attribute Parts to Matter but we are forc'd to do so to every thing whether Finite or Infinite we can in our Minds add to and abstract from which we cannot but conceive as Parts So we say that Numbers and Duration and Space though Infinite have Parts And the sober Enquirer in his View of the Considerations pag. 92. owns that conceptible parts in the Deity no Man can avoid And if neither the whole Divine Nature nor a part of it emaned from it self it is a Contradiction to our Idea's that any thing should emane from it What is a Contradiction in those Terms will be so in any other But to gratify our Author as much as possible we will express his Doctrine in the softest Terms we can viz. one self-existent eternal and necessary Nature which alone is first in Nature not
having necessarily inherent in himself infinite Power Wisdom c. our Devotion terminates in each we give each the same Divine Honour To which he says p. 58. This is a very false Charge for we heartily acknowledg that all the Honour we pay to the Son and H. Spirit ought to be ultimately terminated in the Father and I am sure he cannot think otherwise of those he calls the real Trinitarians because their Hypothesis necessarily obliges them so to believe whatever the Hypothesis of the others does But the Holy Scripture is so express upon this Point that I should think no Christian should find it hard to believe it no tho there were no oother Text but this for it viz. That at the Name of Jesus every Knee should bow to the glory of God the Father Phil. 2. 9 10 11. We will now first set when it can be said that the Honour we give a Person is not for his own but for the sake of another on whom it ultimately terminates and then examine whether it be such an Honour which the Trinitarians give to the Son and Holy Spirit The Honour we give a Person does not ultimately terminate on him when it is not for any inherent Quality in himself but for the sake of some Power Trust or Office that is receiv'd from another and which he holds during the Will of that other Thus we pay Honour to a Vice-roy a Judg a Magistrate because they are the Image or some way represent that Person who endued them with Power Whatever Honour or Deference we pay such Persons it still terminates in the Supreme it is for his Sake and to his Honour And the Reason is because such Persons how much soever they may be advanced above their fellow-Subjects yet in respect of the Person that advanced them they have no Power at all but are meer Ministers and Servants So our Lord Christ tho he is highly advanced as a Reward of his perfect Obedience above all his fellow-Creatures yet in respect of God he is a meer Minister and Servant wholly impotent can as he saith do nothing of himself and the Reason why the Honour given him in Scripture is not for his own sake but for the Glory of God the Father is because it is a delegated Honour God has made him a Prince and Saviour giving him all Power after his Resurrection or because as this Text says God has highly exalted him and given him a Name above every Name And there is no instance in Scripture where any Honour Glory Power and Dignity is ascribed to Christ either by himself or any Man or Angel but is expresly given to him either as a Man or as the free gift of God to a Man And it 's more than probable that this is so done lest it should administer occasion to People to terminate their Worship on him as a Divine Nature with all Perfections necessarily and eternally inhering in him It would be absurd if he had such a Nature not to worship him for himself ultimately except an eternal and necessary Divine Nature is not to be worship'd for its own sake which would be to say that the Father is not to be worship'd ultimately for the sake of his Divine Nature The Honour that does not terminate on the Person is never given to the Creator but to the Creature and of this Nature is that Honour or Worship we give to those Gods or supreme Powers which are the Deputies or Representatives of the most high God which Worship does not ultimately terminate on them because what they have they have from God and hold it only during his Pleasure What then can be a stronger Argument that the Son is not God than this that the Honour we are oblig'd to pay him does not ultimately terminate in him but in another If any thing were strange from our Author this would be that he that is God is not to be worship'd for his own sake or that a supream Being must not have supream Honour But let us now see what sort of Worship it is which the Trinitarians pay to the Son They of whatsoever Denomination are so far from honouring the Son for the sake and to the Glory of God the Father that in their publick Prayers and Liturgies they give him equal Honour with God the Father and both Papist and Protestant Trinitarians in their damning Creed make them equal and declare that none is before nor after another none greater or less than another the Glory equal the Majesty coeternal Which equality is as much to the Glory of God the Father as it would be to the Glory of a King to have his Subjects set up two others with equal Power and Majesty Therefore I wonder with what assurance our Author can deny that the Trinitarians have 3 Objects of supream Worship and he himself in this Treatise is for giving Divine Worship to the Son and Holy Spirit and Divine Worship can be no other than Supream and consequently must terminate in the Person to whom it is given Nay he cannot terminate his Worship more in one than in another since all three are as he says one and the same God with respect to the Creatures All that our Author can say is that it is to the Honour of God the Father because they depend on him but the more dependent he supposes them the more absurd it is to pay the same Honour to a dependent as he does to the independent Being But their dependence since he makes them necessary Beings is Independence And because our Author is much taken with Similies I shall oblige him with one that is more parallel than that of the Sun and Rays Suppose for there has been such a thing in Nature one Man born with and growing out of the side of another who was a distinct Man though necessarily united to him which was manifest by their discoursing one with another Now in this instance we have one intelligent Substance emaning from another yet this did not make him owe his Being or continuance in Being to the other since they had the same cause of Being and continuance in Being on which cause both were equally dependent and not one upon the other nor did the Honour and Respect Men paid the side-man terminate in the other for in honouring the one they no way honour the other The Parallel is very easy and natural for as the two Men depended on the same Cause and therefore the emaned Man was no way obliged to the other so God's Nature having no Cause his supposed Emanations must be as much without a Cause for what is necessary to the Nature is as much without a Cause as the Nature it self therefore they could no more be obliged to God for their Divine Natures or their being Gods than God is beholden to himself for his own Nature since there was the same necessity of his emaning them as of existing himself and consequently they are as independent
omniscient omnipotent and omnipresent but if we mean by Divine Honours such as agree to him that could do nothing of himself that judgeth as he hears and hath all Judgment committed to him by the Father that sent him that all Men should honour the Son even as they honour the Father that sent him I agree that such Divine Honour is due to the Son Divine Honour in the former Sense the Son himself forbad to be paid him even after he should leave the World and go to the Father Joh. 16. 23. At that day ye shall ask me nothing verily verâ—â—y I say unto you whatsoever ye shaell ask the Father in my Name he will give it you and ver 26. At that day ye shall ask in my Name I think he does not well to take no notice of the Account which the Unitarians give â—â— that Text. Will he build so great a Duty as is the worshipping of another besides one with the Worship due only to the One God upon the Interpretation of the Particle as which he cannot deny does in several places of Scripture import not an Equality in the things spoken of not the just Measure and Nature of the Duty enjoin'd but the Necessity of it and some Similitude which it bears to what was before-mentioned To love our Neighbour as our self is not to be understood equally with our self for that is impossible and contrary to the very Principles of Humane Nature for omnes sibi melius esse malle quam alteri but we should do the one as certainly as we do the other It is but just and equal that the great and only God be honoured with all the Powers and Faculties of our reasonable Natures and that Jesus Christ be honoured with an Honour next to that He saith Christ is not God in the highest Sense therefore say I the highest Honour is not to be paid him I said upon his 19th Prop. that the Socinians are not willing to confess that the Honour of the Father is as muoh taken care of in his Explication as they do wish it were He answers Sure they will not say that their own Hypothesis doth give more Honour to the Father than THAT which speaks him the Author of all that the other Persons either have or are I reply Yes they will because it 's more honour to be the voluntary Author of what the Son and H. Spirit have and are as the Unitarians hold than to be the necessary Author or indeed no Author as his Ldp. holds Upon my saying that it is not our Duty to think as honourably as we can of any Person but God the Father Almighty his Lordship answers He meant by as honourably as POSSIBLY we can as honourably as LAWFULLY we can Dr. S th made Dean Sherlock pay dear for this Evasion but I will not write after that furious Example preserving my Respects to his Lordship All I say is His Ldp. is a well-meaning Man and in 20 other places where his Words sound tritheistically and contradictorily I believe he meant honestly P. 40. From that Text I will not give my Glory to another his Lordship argues that the Son of God is not a Creature as if God had said I will give my Glory to no other but my Son But it 's a plain and good Consequence This taking the Words in an universal Sense because God will not give his Glory to another therefore no other no not the Son is to be worshipped with that Honour which is due to the Father As to my Animadversion on his 20th Prop. he appeals to you my Friend to judg Every Man that reads will judg and some will be biass'd by one Prejudice and some by another and some may chance to examine diligently to consider freely and to judg impartially among this latter sort of Readers I fancy I may have the most Friends but the other I fear are all his Prop. 21. he says His Explication agrees well with that of the Nicene Fathers and Athanasius I grant it of what some of them have said in divers places of their Works concerning the Trinity but it 's nevertheless true that in other places it disagrees with what that Council and Saint have taught For you must know Sir that even they are not all of a piece but sometimes Orthodox sometimes Heterodox and often need the Assistance of a candid Reader to interpret them according to a pretended sound Meaning quite contrary to the Grammatical Sense of their words As for his agreeing with them I wonder which of the Antients ever taught That 2 Beings which depend on God are as almighty as the God on whom they and all things depend I wonder which of the Antients found out the two Senses in one of which the Son and H. Ghost were each of them essentially God and in the other not I question whether there be any such Stuff among the School-men but if he can produce me the Father who has fallen into this particular Weakness that Tho' the Name of God is us'd in more Senses than one in H. Script yet the Name of GOD in H. Script is always to be understood in the highest Sense I will never question but he has Antiquity on his side whether any Truth and Sense or no. As for his Compliment that he knows not whether there be more of Arrogance than Ignorance or Ignorance than Arrogance in the Remark about Credit from the Judgment of the Antient Fathers it looks as if it was borrowed from Dr. S th it has the Air of his impatient Opiniativeness but does not at all become the better Nature of the Bp. of Glocester But he finds I am a sort of an Adversary that would not permit him to treat me otherwise And how did I compel him to treat me as he suspects he has done with too much Freedom Why I took a Liberty with him But Sir you can assure him that when I compos'd my MS. I knew not who was the Author of the 21 Propositions and could not dream they should have been printed my Aim was only to let you then my very new Acquaintance privately know my private Judgment I am none of your Proselyte nor no Man's else I profess sincerely I fell into what I hold touching the Trinity by freely thinking and seriously considering what I occasionally met with here and there now and then To conclude I thank his Lordship for his good Wishes and I do really believe now he has vented his Anger that he is sincere in them for which I make him this Return I heartily wish all Good to him as I ought upon many Accounts 1. In general because he is a very worthy and good Man 2. In particular because he hates Persecution 3. Because he has not only sworn to the Government but looks upon King William who gave him his Preferment as our Deliverer not Conqueror our just and lawful King and no Usurper But I cannot thank him for his Advice He would have me think it possible that those Opinions which I take for most evident and most necessary Truths may be gross and dangerous Errors Why my Opinion is that the Being of God and the Reasonableness of H. Religion are most evident and necessary Truths and no Man living shall perswade me to that Modesty as to think it possible for these to be gross and dangerous Errors Again He would have me believe that I may be mightily mistaken when I am most confident Indeed this Piece of Advice has not so ill a face as the other but his Lordship might have spar'd it for I will not be most confident but when the Truth is most plain and evident I am Sir Yours FINIS