Person Hypostasis or Subsistence of the Divine Nature It is too great Presumption for any in the State of Mortality to determine the manner of the Oneness of the Father Son and Eternal Spirit which is so clearly declared a Mystery near the close of the Canon of Scripture never unfolded after in it The Trinity hath been asserted and owned with the greatest Firmness and Forwardness in the purest State of the antient Christian Church and the least Derogation attempted against it by the Arians hath been condemned with Abhorrence by the most Eminent and Orthodox Fathers and by the Determination and Solemn Confession of Faith by the Council of Nice and it is amongst the most incontestably Catholick Doctrines of the Universal Church owned by all National Societies of Christians in the World above the course of a thousand Years Augustine and some others of the Fathers have attempted to give some Resemblances of the Trinity in Unity though he still acknowledgeth it to be a Mystery they could not fully comprehend So Augustine in his 15th Book of that Treatise he wrote upon the Trinity saith That we have a Representation of the Generation of the Son by the Father in that he is called the Word of God as all Idea's are conceived by Words of the Mind so God's Idea of himself and his Decrees is his Word essential and substantial For all that is in God is God The Son is also the Character of his Person his Image the Brightness of his Glory his Wisdom that was with him from Eternity He says also That the Procession of the Holy Ghost is his Love to Himself by his Idea of Himself with his whole Decrees and that all the Persons of the Trinity are Wise and Powerful by the same Power and Wisdom because they have but one Godhead The Generation of a Son doth not import an Imperfection or Inequality of the Nature of the Son more than of the Father much less doth the Generation of the Eternal Son imply an Inequality of the Son with the Father or a dependance of his Being from the Father as if he needed Preservation like Creatures Yea all the Persons are increated without any Cause and so Self-existent and Coeternal The Errors of Socinians are much more abominable than those of the Arians the Socinians acknowledg nothing of the Son before he was conceived in the Womb of the Virgin The Light of Nature was ever sufficient to confute the Multiplicity of Gods and to convince that there could only be one God Albeit the Multiplicity of Gods did far prevail in the World it was long before it did prevail and not until God had given Men up to their own Ways because of their Wickedness against the clear Light of Nature for they were given up to believe Lies because they did not receive the Truth which by the Light of Nature they knew in Love to live according to it The knowledg of one God was not alone among the Hebrew or Jewish Nation as the Scripture maketh evident in Job and his Friends among whom there was so much clear Knowledg of the Divine Perfections and even of a Saviour and of a Resurrection which are not deducible from any inbred Principle by the Light of Nature and therefore they could not want Revelation yet we have no ground to know any Communication between the Hebrews and them Neither were there a few Persons indued with that Light but a City and Common-wealth having Judges and Counsellors that sate at their Gates Balaam also knew and acknowledged the only true God not by Communication with the Israelites there being a vast distance and no Communication between Aram and Egypt The three Wise Men of the East that were led by a Star to come to Bethlehem when Christ was born could not possibly by Astrology have discovered the Birth of the Mediator and therefore did neither want Revelation nor a miraculous Sign Neither is there any ground to believe that they were Idolaters but that they knew and worshipped the true God and it is highly probable that they were not the only Persons of their Country that did so Yet they did not desire for ought I know to become Proselytes of the Jews Neither is there ground to doubt that Moab or Ammon the Sons of Lot or Ishmael and Abraham's other Sons by Keturah or Esau their nearest Posterity were convinced that there was but one God nor could their Posterity be soon brought to believe a Plurality of Gods So that we have no ground to doubt that the Knowledg of the one God did long and largely propagate it self in the World though through defect of History the Particulars be little known I do not hear of Idolatry before the Flood the cause of it in God's just Judgment is attributed to Mens corrupting of their Ways and the wickedness of their Works After the Flood the Notion of one God did long remain as appears by the common Name of Baal or Lord which was long almost universal and the several Nations that worshipped Baal gave him different Epithets according to their apprehension of his Attributes of which there is frequent mention in the Scripture So the Moabites God was Baal without addition the Sidonians also called their God Baal so did the Canaanites Some Nations called their God Baal Berith that is cursing Baal others Baal Gad Baal Hamon Baal Meon Baal Peor Baal Hanan Baal Hazor Baal Hermon Baal Perazin Baal Zebub the God of Ekron Places also were denominated from Baal as Baal Perazin Baal Shalisha Baal Zebub Baal Zephon and Bell of the Babylonians is but a different Dialect of Baal but that which was the Name of one God with different Epithets did easily come to be apprehended as so many Gods yet the several Nations did not worship many Gods but their own So after the Captivity of the ten Tribes those that were planted in their places being plagued conceived it was by the Anger of the God of that Place and therefore sent for the Jewish Priests to appease him The Greeks were the first that worshipped many Gods and after them the Romans for then the Souls of Men eminent upon Earth were supposed to be cooptated among the Gods in different Orders and as the Nations and Places had Interest in them they had Confidence in them and became forgetful of the true God After arose Images and the relative Honour and Worship attributed to them not only to the Images and Pictures of these Deified Men but also to those Bodies wherein the Gods were supposed to delight and to reside It is not imaginable that so many Men of Discretion and Spirit could with direct Worship adore inanimate Creatures or the meanest Brutes or Plants but that they thought they were delightful to and resided in by Deities and so the Sun the Moon Planets came to be worshipped even by those who did not believe that they had Life or Understanding or were Bodies informed by a Deity but that
in this present Life he continues to overrule them by his Providence in all these Relations for in some Measure he is good to all in this Life The Providence of God useth to be handled apart by Divines as it doth not only comprehend his Dominion and Government of his rational Creatures but his Wisdom and Goodness in his Preservation Provision and Direction of every Creature towards the End which he designed I have chosen rather to consider the Wisdom and Dominion of God apart as being thereby the more able to apprehend them distinctly and clearly The Dominion of God reacheth unto all his rational Creatures even unto the damned Spirits not only as they are Executioners of his Justice against Men as he sends them out wherein tho their End be always wicked the Act it self is ever just and good so an evil Spirit from the Lord vexed King Saul when he had forsaken the Rules of his Government but these Spirits are only permitted while they tempt to Acts which no Intention can make good or indifferent but most of all God doth overrule these Spirits by restraining their Malice from tempting or troubling Men and even in the Permission of their Temptations he puts no Man under an inevitable Necessity of being overcome but those that voluntarily or habitually have rendered themselves weak whether by positive Choice or by Neglect and Inadvertence It is a needless Curiosity to enquire how God doth over-rule damned Spirits who are scarce capable of farther Punishments being already condemned and in a continual Torment of Mind nor can they expect Rewards It would be no Punishment to them to annihilate them yet they have some Diversion by compassing the Earth going to and fro therein and endeavouring to bring Men unto the like Condition with themselves and they are still capable of greater Torment and therefore they tremble Men are much more governable in this Life being far more passable than Spirits and being seldom in absolute Despair but ever capable of Rewards and Punishments and the greater they are the more are they capable Single Persons that have no near Relations are far less liable to Shame or Suffering than the Masters of Families or Rulers of States and the Noble than the Ignoble who are liable to Shame Affront and Disgrace which they regard more than their Lives There are three sorts of Men the Godly the Honest and the Prophane the Godly are governed by the Love of God which is the Principle of true Piety and Religion reaching not only to Divine Worship but even to the Acts of Honesty and their own Happiness In all which the chief Reason and Motive is the Love of God whereby they determine themselves in every thing towards his Glory and Pleasure These are governed by eternal Rewards and Punishments after this Life and by internal Rewards in the Peace of a good Conscience and Joy in the Holy Ghost and internal Punishments in the Doubts and Disquiets of their Souls beside the other ways of Rewards and Punishments common to the rest Those that are only Honest are governed by the Love to Mankind which for that very End God hath placed in the Nature of Man whereby till they be depraved they are inclinable in every Case to do that which if it were done by all Men they would live happily And therefore the Wicked are ashamed to profess that in things in their Power they would prefer the Interest of a single Person to the Interest of their Family or the Interest of a Family to the Interest of a Nation or any of these Interests to the common Interest of Mankind Those that are prophane and wicked God overrules even by their Self-love for tho they would subordinate all things to their Selfinterest if securely they could and when with probability they can yet supposing others to be of the same Inclination their own Interest obligeth them to profess if not Piety in Hypocrisy at least common Honesty wherein God's Wisdom and Goodness is eminently seen for otherwise most Men would be as malicious and openly wicked as the damned Spirits God hath Rewards and Punishments sufficient and suted to the Condition of all Men tho their Rewards be not by exact Justice Prosperity and Peace are the common Encouragements to Good Trouble and Affliction are the common outward Punishments and more particularly Disquiet and Anguish of Spirit when the special Cause thereof is not known These are dispensed to particular Persons but the Punishments of Societies use not to be inflicted but upon atrocious common and avowed Vices for which God sendeth common Calamities as Plague Famine Inundation Sterility Shipwrack and the Destruction by ravenous Beasts which was more frequent when the World was less planted The Scripture doth frequently mention God's four sore Judgments God exciteth War about which there is no doubt when it is for just Causes and overrules it when upon unjust but rather uses the other Plagues God exercises his Dominion partly by the Law of Nature written in Man's Heart partly by Diyine Institutions revealed to Men. By the Law of Nature is the Government of Parents over their Children by the natural Affection of the Parents to the Children whereby they take Pleasure to preserve direct and provide for them and by the natural Affection of the Children to reverence and obey their Parents which Affections arise in both from their belief of these Relations even where they are mistaken and by the Law of Nature the Contracts and Pactions of Parties to govern and to obey as between Masters and Servants between Rulers and Subjects for the Force of these Pactions is by the Law written in Man's Heart by which his Conscience convinces him that he is obliged to perform God exerciseth his Dominion not only by the Laws of Nature but by positive Laws and Institutions which are not known by the Light of Nature but by Revelation such is the Government of the Husband over the Wife by the Divine Institution of Marriage and the Government of Common Wealths by God's Institution of a publick Judgment to order and determine all Controversies concerning such as should unite themselves in Civil Societies The former was propagated by an universal Tradition to all Nations from Adam till the Flood and from Noab and his Posterity after the Flood But Civil Government was only instituted after the Flood when Mens Lives became short God allowed the Fathers of Families to unite themselves and their Families into Civil Societies and to transmit the Power and Burden of the Government of their Families in most things upon the Governours of those Societies So that tho there be mutual Pactions in Marriage and Government yet the Essentials of both are by Divine Institution which cannot lawfully be altered Persons may choose whether they will marry or not and with whom but the Degrees within which they may marry are instituted The Power of the Husband and the Indurance and Dissolution of the Marriage are instituted
first six days These Men had better quit their Grounds than keep them with such Consequences and yet it is from Consequences that they take them up which might be better misbelieved than these tho they had far more probability both from Sense and Reason but if there be Incomprehensibility in either case it ought least to be applied with so great Derogation to the Power of God This Power working immediately by the Act of the Will is an incommunicable Perfection of God and a part of that Glory which he will give to no other and therefore it is impossible that any Creature could create and no more consistent than that God should make more Gods Whatsoever is effectuate by sole Will is an Act of Creation whether it be the Production of a Substance of a Power yea or of a Mode or Accident or any thing above the Powers of Nature or Grace Therefore no Creature can be any more than the Instrument of working a Miracle and that only when God willeth the individual Act and no Creature can have a Power to work Miracles of any kind as the Creature willeth or that God should work a Miracle at the choice of the Creature which were a Dependance unbecoming his Majesty We must not think that the Faith of Miracles was an Arbitrary Habit as when Christ said to his Disciples If ye had Faith as a grain of Mustard-seed ye should say to this Mountain Be removed hence and cast into the Sea it imports no more than that God at that time for Confirmation of the Gospel would make them Instruments of some particular Acts of supernatural Power as he moved them yet not at their Desire but his own There is a groundless Imagination that hath much spread it self That God hath given a Power to all Men or to all Christians to produce Effects in Creatures by their firm and full Perswasion and Desire that these Effects should be and that they are not such Effects is because few or none attain to that Perswasion and so the very Power vanisheth and were frustraneous and inconsistent with the Wisdom of God that doth nothing in vain as well as with the incommunicable Power of God I pray God Men would advert and consider what ground there is to believe that God hath given a Power to a Priest or Minister that at his Desire so oft as he pleases to express the words of Consecration of Bread and Wine in the Eucharist the most stupendous Miracles should then arise of course or that by their Consecration the Elements should have a Power or Efficacy to confer Grace or otherwise to confirm it than that by the solemn Preparation of the Heart and the earnest Prayer of the Creature God would more readily grant their Desire than at other times or how by applying the Water in Baptism at Desire Original Sin should be forgiven or Grace should be given which incroacheth not only upon the incommunicable Power of God but upon his Wisdom that he should give Grace to all that were baptized which in the most part would prove frustraneous by being lost They do not a little derogate from the Omnipotence of God who imagine that the very Nature and Essence of a created Will doth inseparably imply that God cannot otherwise determine it but by perswading yet no Perswasion can be so strong but it can reject it and choose the contrary whereby they fancy that they can clear God from any Accession to Sin even by Permission as if his Purity could not be preserved but by the loss of his Omnipotence So that God has done all that is in his absolute Power to make every Rational Creature holy and happy Yet the Pretext is vain for it cannot be imagined that God should be so mean an Orator that he could not perswade Men to go to all Nations to preach and spread Books perswading them to embrace the true Religion which yet he hath not done and yet he hath done all that he could do not by his absolute Power but by his regulate Power by his most wise and holy Decrees They might with more Pretext have said that God in his Freedom and Wisdom had decreed that he would make no farther use of his Power but by Perswasion yet that would have incorached upon his Wisdom and Soveraignty that he hath made Creatures which he could not effectually govern so that it is without all ground in Reason or Revelation that he hath so decreed It is a very brutish Pretence that it were a brute Power and not rational to infuse Habits or Inclinations in Rational Creatures seeing these infused Powers act at the Judgment and Choice of Reason though in some cases without Hesitation or Deliberation are Creatures perswaded to desire their own Well-being or Parents perswaded to love their own Children or any to pity the injured miserable MEDITATION VII Upon the Oneness of God IT is impossible and inconsistent that there could be more Gods than one both for the Omniscience and the Omnipotence of God for God is capable of no Imperfection and therefore is impassible He knows not by any outward Impression or Manifestation but from Reflection upon his own Nature and Decrees by which he knows what will be the Effects of the Capacities he hath decreed to give to Creatures and by his own over-ruling them for his Glory Therefore there can be no more Decrees but those which are in that Omniscient view if there were any other they could only be known by extrinsick Manifestations wherein God behoved to be Passive So neither are such Decrees possible nor the Actings of them nor could they be known in a way consistent with the Divine Perfection It is as evidently inconsistent there could be more Omnipotents than one for if they were equal in Power none of them could be Omnipotent for they could resist one another and so have no effectual Power and if they were unequal in Power the weaker could not be Omnipotent The Omniscience and Omnipotence of God are his most evident Perfections even by the Light of Nature and his Oneness is fully and frequently asserted in Scripture Scripture hath also revealed the Trinity in the Divine Nature which is the Foundation of the Salvation of the Elect carried along through the whole Current and Oeconomy of the Divine Decrees and Dispensations relating to Mankind from the Beginning revealing that the Seed of the Woman should bruise the Head of the Serpent and by all that is said of the Messiah in the Old Testament and of Christ in both Testaments But it is declared to be a Mystery and the greatest Mystery ushered in with an unparallel'd note of Attention 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Great is the Mystery of Gidliness God manifested in the Flesh. Therefore the Trinity of Persons must be consistent with the Oneness of God and it must be a nearer Oneness than that of Individuals of one kind yet not such an Oneness as if there were but one Divine
being fellow-Servants None of these did insist with a Distinguo that they were not worshipping them with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 neither is there any Precept or one Example in all the Scripture of praying to an absent Creature I know nothing can be pretended but that when the Scripture was published there was no canonizing of Saints and it 's very far from evidence that all who were canonized were truly Saints much less that their supposed Relicks were true if then Men be worshipping some damned Spirits if that be not Idolatry I know what can be but there is no ground of Confidence that no Pope hath err'd in canonizing which being a matter of Fact they do not pretend Infallibility in it I wish these Men would seriously consider how it is possible to shun the attributing of the incommunicable Perfections of God to Creatures the same Hours of publick Devotion being common through that whole Saint-worshipping Church If some Millions be at once praying to the same Saint can meer Human Nature be raised to that height to hear all those at once when there is not the least ground to believe that they can hear any one of them And suppose their groundless Invention that they see all in speculo Trinitatis yet they cease not to be such a Multitude reflected to their Knowledg at once so that they must make them Gods or else they must acknowledg themselves Idolaters And on their own Grounds it is yet more strange that they wholly neglect Abraham Isaac and Jacob Job Samuel and Daniel whom God hath singled out as the strongest Intercessors and Moses and Aaron whom God hath canonized the Scripture calling him the Saint of God If any Creature were to be worshipped in absence there were most to be said for worshipping Angels which yet is expresly forbidden and with the same Breath all Worship which God hath not required As the Heathens divided among their Gods the several Offices by which they might be useful to Men so they do exceed them in attributing to particular Saints their several Offices not only to Men but to Beasts to all the parts of Men and all their Diseases without the least Pretext of Reason they do not pretend even by their unwritten Traditions that God hath declared any such thing or that these Saints have so declared so that they must not only order all the Saints upon Earth but all the Saints in Heaven If the Saints be adorable how comes it that every one adores what Saint he pleases and neglects the rest And by what Warrant do they assign them their Tasks if it were their Duty to worship all as they do some The Burden of the Jewish Ceremonies were a small matter to theirs The Singularity of the Deity is not incroached upon by the blessed Trinity being in Unity in one individual God as the Word of God hath fully expressed it It is indeed a Mystery for the Knowledg of which we have no inbred Principle but it is a proper Object of our Faith In many Points of the Christian Religion the Light of Nature goeth a great length in the way of Science by a rational Deduction from self-evident Principles and the exact Harmony between the Light of Nature and the Scripture gives a mutual Confirmation of the truth of both yet both are rather Science than Faith until God by his free Grace endue Men with a sense of Spiritual Things which the natural Man cannot discern because by Nature he hath not that Sense by which they are perceivable There might have been other Objects of Sense and other Senses of these Objects and therefore we need not think it strange that God giveth a new inward Sense to the Regenerate only by which they believe the Trinity in Unity and the Incarnation of the Son of God the Covenant of Redemption and Grace the Mediator's willing and free Submission of himself to suffering in his Human Nature even to Death for Man that God's Justice might so be satisfied and his Purity and Abhorrence of Sin vindicated that free electing Love might take place in which the Elect could attribute nothing to themselves but all unto the free Grace of God The Light of Nature doth or may perswade all Men that God is merciful to penitent Sinners and yet that he is also essentially just and if it could have consisted with his Justice without Satisfaction thereto to pardon one Sin there could be no reason why to pardon one more than another and therefore God might have been without Punitive Justice Justice also differs from Benignity that it keeps a just Proportion between the Sin and the Punishment and therefore if all Sinners deserved Exclusion from God's Favour none of them could satisfy for himself much less could any one receive Pardon and Reconciliation by the Sufferings of all the rest but here the sharpest Natural Reason is confounded and left in the dark till Revelation and Faith step in discovering the Mediator 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 whose Humanity made him capable to suffer and the Dignity of his Person gave his Suffering an infinite Value and the outward Revelation of it might induce a strong Perswasion that supposing God had so done the Consequence were good and that it were likely that he had so done but to have a true Faith and full Perswasion of it upon Tradition written or unwritten requires more than Reasoning can infer Hence it is that Compulsion is adhibited for Religion so far as the clear Light of Nature goeth because there is the strongest Evidence beyond any other natural Duty in which none are spared from Coaction and Punishment but they are rather heightened by pretending the want of Perswasion because the Light of Nature is full and clear and the diverting the Thoughts or shutting the Eyes of the Understanding can no more excuse than if a Man should deny that there were Light at Mid-day because he would not open his Eyes to let it enter But we are not in that Capacity as to supernatural Light and therefore it is both against Religion and Humanity to compel Men to supernatural and institute Religion where they believe not these revealed Principles from which ordinary Capacities cannot refuse clear Inferences which require not long Deductions Those who pretend the Unity against the Trinity of the Deity because they cannot comprehend it must deny the Incomprehensibility of God which his Word so often asserts yea the whole Tenor of the Word And their pitiful Evasions do too strongly evidence that they only own the Scriptures lest they should be odious and that they have no more than Natural Religion but not the Christian Religion because they imagine God can forgive Sin without all Satisfaction to his Justice which is against the Light of Nature which can neither admit of an injurious God nor of a Justiceless God Those who from the Trinity wave all Reasons against a carnal Presence in the Eucharist