own Mind in your former Letter that must guide us in your Notion of Nature and Person where you undertook to explain them For if Nature and Person be abstract and complex Ideas as you say and such are only Acts of the Mind I do not see how it is possible for you to reconcile these Notions with the Articles of the Trinity and Incarnation I do not go about to accuse you of denying these Doctrines I hope you do not But I impute all this Hesitancy and doubting only to your Notions of Ideas which you had been so long forming in your Mind that as it often happens in such Cases one darling favourite Notion proves too hard for some Points of far greater Consequence when they are found inconsistent with it And because you had first fixed your Notion of Ideas and taken much Pains about them you thought all other things were to be entertained as they appear'd consistent with them But you could not but find that the Articles of three Persons and one Nature and two Natures and one Person were not reconcileable with your Ideas of Nature and Person which is that they are complex Ideas which depend upon the Act of the Mind for this were to make the two Natures in Christ to be only two complex Ideas For if Nature as you say be a Collection of several Ideas combined into one complex abstract Idea then two Natures can be nothing else but two such Collections or two abstracted and complex Ideas It may be said that when you make Nature an abstracted and complex Idea you speak of a specifick Idea but the Humane Nature in Christ was a particular Substance and this you assert to be a real thing and not to depend on the Act of the Mind But this doth not clear the Matter For in your former Letter you said that all the Ideas we have of particular distinct Substances are nothing but several Combinations of simple Ideas which in Corporeal Substances are sensible Qualities in Incorporeal are Operations of the Mind The utmost then which the Idea of Humane Nature in Christ comes to is that there were in him the sensible Qualities and Intellectual Operations of a Man with an unknown Substance to support them which belongs not to the simple Ideas but is supposed by them This is all I can make of your way of Ideas and so the Incarnation of Christ is the assuming the sensible Qualities and intellectual Operations of a Man to which a Substratum doth belong but is no Part of the simple Ideas So that we can have no Idea at all of the Humane Nature of Christ but only an Inference that since those are but Accidents there must be a Substratum to support them and consequently there was a particular Substance in him made up of Mind and Body But if this had come in the Way of Ideas yet it cannot make out the Humane Nature of Christ. For if it were in him no otherwise than in other Men then the Mystery of the Incarnation is quite gone and Christ is to be consider'd but like other Men which doth not answer to what the Scripture saith of the Word 's being made Flesh and that God was manifest in the Flesh. There must be therefore something beyond the meer Humane Nature in him and either it must be only some Divine Operation upon and with it and that is no Substance or if it be a Substance it must either cohabit with it or else be united to it If it only co-habits then there are two Persons dwelling together in one Body and the Actions of one cannot be attributed to the other If there be a real Union between them so as the Acts belong to one Person then there must be such a Manner of Existence in the Humane Nature of Christ which is different from it in other Persons For in all others the Acts belong to the Humane Person but if it were so in Christ then the Divine Acts of Christ must flow from the Humane Nature as the Principle of them which is to confound the Divine and Humane Nature and Operations together If they come from the Divine Person then the Humane Nature must have another kind of Subsistence than it hath in others or else there must be two Persons and Person being as you say a Forensick Term there must be two different Capacities of Rewards and Punishments which is so absurd an Opinion as I think no one will assert If there be then but one Person and two Natures how can you possibly reconcile this to your Way of Ideas Person say you in it self signifies nothing but as soon as the common use of any Language has appropriated it to any Idea then that is the true Idea of a Person i. e. Men may call a Person what they please for there is nothing but common use required to it They may call a Horse or a Tree or a Stone a Person if they think fit but since the common use of Language hath appropriated it to an Intelligent Being that is a Person And so you tell us That Person stands for a Thinking Intelligent Being that hath Reason and Reflection and can consider it self as it self the same thinking Being in different times and place How comes Person to stand for this and nothing else From whence comes Self-consciousness in different times and places to make up this Idea of a Person Whether it be true or false I am not now to enquire but how it comes into this Idea of a Person Hath the common use of our Language appropriated it to this Sense If not this seems to be a meer Arbitrary Idea and may as well be denied as affirmed And what a fine pass are we come to in the Way of Ideas if a meer Arbitrary Idea must be taken into the only true Method of Certainty But of that afterwards We now proceed in the Way of Ideas as you give it us But if this be the true Idea of a Person then there can be no Union of two Natures in one Person For if an Intelligent Conscious Being be the Idea of a Person and the Divine and Human Nature be Intelligent Conscious Beings then the Doctrine of the Union of two Natures and one Person is quite sunk for here must be two Persons in this Way of Ideas Again if this be the Idea of a Person then where there are three Persons there must be three distinct Intelligent Beings and so there cannot be three Persons in the same individual Essence And thus both these Doctrines of the Trinity and Incarnation are past recovery gone if this Way of Ideas hold So great a difference there is between forming Ideas first and then judging of Revelation by them and the believing of Revelation on its proper Grounds and interpreting the Sense of it by the due Measures of Reason You may pretend what you please that you hold the Assurance of Faith and the Certainty by
sown in Corruption and Weakness and Dishonour Either therefore he must speak of the same Body or his meaning cannot be comprehended For what doth all this relate to a Conscious Principle The Apostle speaks plainly of that Body which was once quickened and afterwards falls to Corruption and is to be restored with more noble Qualities For this Corruptible must put on Incorruption and this Mortal must put on Immortality I do not see how he could more expressly affirm the Identity of this Corruptible Body with that after the Resurrection and that without any Respect to the Principle of Self-consciousness and so if the Scripture be the sole Foundation of our Faith this is an Article of it and so it hath been always understood by the Christian Church And your Idea of Personal Identity is inconsistent with it for it makes the same Body which was here united to the Soul not to be necessary to the Doctrine of the Resurrection but any Material Substance being united to the same Principle of Consciousness makes the same Body The Dispute is not how far Personal Identity in it self may consist in the very same Material Substance for we allow the Notion of Personal Identity to belong to the same Man under several changes of Matter but whether it doth not depend upon a Vital Vnion between the Soul and Body and the Life which is consequent upon it and therefore in the Resurrection the same Material Substance must be reunited or else it cannot be called a Resurrection but a Renovation i. e. it may be a New Life but not a raising the Body from the Dead 2. The next Articles of Faith which your Notion of Ideas is inconsistent with are no less than those of the Trinity and of the Incarnation of our Saviour The former by the first Article of our Church is expressed by three Persons in the Vnity of the Divine Nature the latter is said Art 2. to be by the Vnion of the Divine and Humane Nature in one Person Let us now see whether your Ideas of Nature and Person can consist with these But before I come to that I must endeavour to set this Matter right as to the Dispute about the Notion of Nature and Person which you have endeavour'd with all your Art to perplex and confound and have brought in several Interlocutors to make it look more like an Entertainment Of which afterwards The Original Question was whether we could come to any Certainty about the Distinction of Nature and Person in the Way of Ideas and my business was to prove that we could not because we had no simple Ideas by Sensation or Reflection without which you affirm that our Vnderstanding seems to you not to have the least Glimmering of Ideas and that we have nothing in our Minds which did not come in one of these two Ways These are your own Words And then I undertook to shew that it was not possible for us to have any simple Ideas of Nature and Person by Sensation or Reflection and that whether we consider'd Nature as taken for Essential Properties or for that Substance wherein that Property lies whether we consider it in distinct Individuals or abstractly still my Design was to shew that in your Way of Ideas you could come to no Certainty about them And as to Person I shew'd that the Distinction of Individuals is not founded meerly on what occurs to our Senses but upon a different manner of Subsistence which is in one Individual and is not communicable to another And as to this I said that we may find within our selves an intelligent Substance by inward Perception but whether that make a Person or not must be understood some other way for if the meer intelligent Substance make a Person then there cannot be the Union of two such Natures but there must be two Persons Which is repugnant to the Article of the Incarnation of our Saviour That this was the true State of the Question will appear to any one that will vouchsafe to look into it But what said you in your first Letter in Answer to it As to Nature you say That it is a Collection of several Ideas combined into one complex abstract Idea which when they are found united in any Individual existing though joyned in that Existence with several other Ideas that individual or particular Being is truly said to have the Nature of a Man or the Nature of a Man to be in him forasmuch as these simple Ideas are found united in him which answer the â—omplex abstract Idea to which the specifick Name is given by any one which abstract specifick Idea he keeps the same when he applies the specifick Name standing for it to distinct Individuals And as to Person in the way of Ideas you say that the Word Person in it self signifies nothing and so no Idea belonging to it nothing can be said to be the true Idea of it But as soon as the common Vse of any Language has appropriated it to any Idea then that is the true Idea of a Person and so of Nature Against this I objected in my Answer to that Letter that if these Terms really signifie nothing in themselves but are only abstract and complex Ideas which the common Use of Language hath appropriated to be the signs of two Ideas then it is plain that they are only Notions of the Mind as all abstracted and complex Ideas are and so one Nature and three Persons can be no more To this you answer in your second Letter That your Notion of the Terms Nature and Person is that they are two sounds that naturally signifie not one thing more than another nor in themselves signifie any thing at all but have the signification which they have barely by Imposition Whoever imagined that Words signifie any otherwise than by Imposition But the Question is whether these be meer Words and Names or not Or whether there be not a real Foundation in things for such a Distinction between Nature and Person Of which I gave this evident Proof that if it were not the same Nature in different Individuals every Individual must make a different Kind And what Answer do you give to this plain Reason Nothing particular that I can find But in the general you say that all that you can find that I except against in your Notion of Nature and Person is nothing but this viz. that these are two sounds which in themselves signifie nothing And is this all indeed Did not I tell you in these Words which I am forced to repeat on this occasion although I am very unwilling to fill Pages with Repetitions The Question now between us comes to this whether the common Nature or Essence of things lies only in an abstract Idea or a general Name and the real Essence consists only in particular Beings from which that Nature is abstracted The Question is not whether in forming
From whence we see that Aristotle's Notion of Nature was very consistent with an Efficient Cause of Nature But your Gentleman saith That to those who admit not Matter and Motion to be Eternal no Nature in that Sense will be left since Nature is said to be a Corporeal Substance which hath the Principles of Motion in it self and such a sort of Corporeal Substance those Men have no Notion of at all and consequently none of Nature which is such a Corporeal Substance But if Aristotle did not suppose Matter to move it self without an Efficient Cause as certainly he did not then all this falls to the Ground and his Notion of Nature for a Substantial Principle of Life and Action may remain good But it may be said That this was one of his singular Notions and that no other Philosophers took it so Which is so far from being true that a great Enemy of Aristotle's confesses That the Name of Nature among the Writers before him extended to all kinds of Beings and not only to Individual but to Specifick Natures Aristotle's fault lay in applying Nature only to Corporeal Substances and whatever was above them he look'd on as above Nature but the Pythagoreans and Platonists took Nature to extend to Spiritual as well as Bodily Substances Which appears by Timaeus Locrus his Book of Nature in the beginning whereof he divides Things into two kinds Intellectual and Corporeal and the former whose Nature was more excellent he derives immediately from the best Principle viz. God himself But to make this plainer we are to consider that there were four Opinions among the Old Philosophers about Nature Some held Nature to be the same with Matter and attributed the Beginning of all things to that alone such were the followers of Anaximander and Democritus Others rejected this Doctrine as absurd and impious and held a Divine Being above Matter which gave the beginning to Motion and framed the World and they asserted Spiritual as well as Corporeal Natures and these were the followers of Pythagoras and Anaxagoras Others asserted the Beginning of Motion and of the World from a first Cause but confined the Sense of Nature to the Course of things established in this Visible World by an Universal Providence at first And this was the Notion of Aristotle and his followers to the time of Strato who attributed all to meer Nature Lastly there were some who made Nature to be the first Principle which formed all things which sometimes they called God and sometimes Nature as is obvious in all the Writings of the Stoicks Vis illum Naturam vocare non peccabis saith Seneca and in another place Quid aliud est Natura quam Deus divina Ratio and again Nec Deus sine Naturâ est nec Natura sine Deo sed idem est utrumque which he elsewhere calls Incorporalis Ratio ingentium operum Artifex With which Balbus in Cicero agrees when he defines Nature from Zeno to be an Intelligent Fire that produces all things For what he calls Ignem artificiosum ad gignendum c. Laertius calls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and it is called in Cicero Natura Artifex Consultrix Provida c. which can agree to nothing but a Spiritual Substance and when he explains what Nature is he saith That Epicurus called all by the Name of Nature and divided it into Matter and Vacuity and the Accidents of both but we saith he of the Stoicks by Nature understand no Inanimate Things which have no Principle within to unite them as Earth and Stones but a living Substance as an Animal in which is no Chance but Order and Contrivance And so Plato said That Nature ordered all things with Reason and Vnderstanding By which he understood the Divide Being If we come lower down among the Philosophers we shall find Nature taken for a Principle of Life So Sextus Empiricus distinguishes the Union of Matter in Stones and Wood from that which is in Plants and this he calls Nature which is the lowest degree of it for afterwards he speaks of Rational and Intellectual Natures and places God in the head of them Antoninus distinguishes Nature in Plants from a heap of the Particles of Matter in Wood and Stone But in another place he distinguishes that which is meer Nature in Man viz. what he hath in common with Plants from the Nature of an Animal in him and that again from the Nature of a Rational Creature in him Here indeed he speaks of the Properties of those Natures but he still supposes that where they are separate they are founded in distinct Substances So that I hope if the Philosophers of old of all kinds did understand the Sense of Nature and Substance the Gentleman may not continue in such a peremptory Humour of saying That for his Life he cannot understand Nature to be Substance nor Substance to be Nature For they all agreed in this however they differed in their Opinions of Nature But I have something farther to add concerning the Sense of the Christian Church in this Matter which I think is by no means to be despised It is observed by Damascen that some of the Philosophers made this difference between 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that the former was taken for simple Essence but the latter for Essence with a Specifical Difference but that the Christian Writers took both of them for that which was common to more than one as an Angel a Man a Horse c. So St. Chrysostom calls Angels 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and Theodoret 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 St. Basil 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but they all agree that Incorporeal and Invisible Substances are real Natures And the Reason Damascen gives is That they have both the same Original and you know that it is a good way to find out the true Idea for as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 both which are the same So that if Real Existence belong to Substance and Nature hath its Name from thence too then Substance and Nature must be of the same Importance And this Notion of Nature they do not take up meerly from the Etymology of the Word but from the Sense of it in Scripture as when St. Paul saith They worshipped those which by Nature are no Gods 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Alexandrian Copy hath it more clearly i. e. which are not really and substantially Gods They had the Names of Gods and the Divine Properties were attributed to them but because they had not the Divine Essence they are said not to be Gods by Nature And what Sense would this Gentleman make of the Apostle's words who cannot for his Life understand that Nature is the same