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Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
nature_n	godhead_n	person_n	union_n	3,927	5	9.3251	5	true

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A52608	Considerations on the explications of the doctrine of the Trinity by Dr. Wallis, Dr. Sherlock, Dr. S-th, Dr. Cudworth, and Mr. Hooker as also on the account given by those that say the Trinity is an unconceivable and inexplicable mystery / written to a person of quality.	Nye, Stephen, 1648?-1719.; Wallis, John, 1616-1703.; Sherlock, William, 1641?-1707.	1693 (1693)	Wing N1505B; ESTC R32239	45,913	35

the Arian Trinity is but of Persons all of them Homogenial all of them Eternal Spiritual and Uncreated They that shall deny this to be the Doctrine of the Fathers will find themselves obliged to answer to two things which are indeed fairly and truly unanswerable The first is Why those Fathers who contend for the Homo-ousios consubstantial or of the same Substance do yet expresly reject the Tauto-ousios and Mono-ousios or of the self-same Substance and Essence in Number The Tauto-ousios and Mono-ousios or of the self-same Essence or Substance in Number is the very Doctrine of the Schools and Moderns but is denied by the Fathers as meer Sabellianism which invincibly proves that by one and the same Substance and Essence they meant not one and the self-same or one in Number but one for Kind Nature or Properties Secondly They must also satisfy the Citations of D. Petavius and S. Curcellaeus and these in the Intellectual System which do all of them severally and much more conjunctly clearly show what the Sense of the Fathers was about Homo-ousios and consubstantial It appears by this and abundance more the like that Dr. Cudworth had the same Apprehensions concerning the three Divine Persons with Dr. Sherlock they both apprehend the three Persons to be as distinct and different and as really three several Intelligent Beings and Substances as three Angels are or as Peter James and John are Dr. Sherlock saith they are however called one God because they are internally conscious to all one anothers Thoughts and Actions but I do not believe that Dr. Cudworth would have allowed so much to the Son and Spirit as to be internally conscious to all the Thoughts and Actions of the first Person he always speaketh of them as every way inferior to the Father he will not allow them to be Omnipotent in any other respect but only externally that is to say because the Father concurreth Omnipotently to all their external Actions whether of Creation or Providence Dr. Cudworth desires to distinguish his Explication from all others of the Moderns by this Mark that it alloweth not the three Persons to be in any respect but Duration Co-equal for saith he three distinct Intelligent Natures or Essences each of them Pre-eternal Self-existent and equally Omnipotent ad intra are of necessity three Gods nor can we have any other Notion of three Gods but if only the first Person be indeed internally Omnipotent and the other two subordinate in Authority and Power to him you leave then but one God only in three Divine Persons This is Dr. Cudworth's Explication Every one will readily make this Exception he thinketh either that there is one Great God and two Lesser Ones or else only the first is true God and the other two in Name only The Doctor foresaw without doubt this Objection therefore see how he hath endeavour'd to prevent it First he reports some Answers of the Fathers to this Difficulty which Answers he expresly rejecteth For some of them said that the three Persons are one God by their Unity of Will and Affection Others said they are one God as all Men or all Mankind are called Homo or MAN namely because they All have the same Specifick Nature or Essence or Substance even the Rational For as all Men have the same Specifick Essence or Nature which is the Rational so the Divine Persons also agree in one Nature namely the Eternal Spiritual and Self existent But Dr. Cudworth confesseth that an Union of Will and Affection is only a Moral Union not a Physical or real Unity and as three Human Persons would be three distinct Men notwithstanding the Moral Union in Affection and Will so also the three Divine Persons will be three distinct Gods notwithstanding such an Union in Will and Affection As to the other that the three Persons are but one God by their having the same Specifick Nature or Essence or as some call it Substance namely because they are all of them Spiritual Self-existent and Coeternal he calleth it an absurd Paradox contrary to common Sense and our common Notions of things for so all Men will be but one Man because they have the same Specifick Essence or Nature namely the Rational and all Epicurus his Extramundan Gods will be but one God Then he propoundeth divers other Explications which he neither approveth nor expresly rejecteth tho 't is plain that he disliked them for the Explication on which he insisteth and which appears to be his Sense of the matter is this that follows The three Divine Persons are one God because they are not three Principles but only one the Essence of the Father being the Root and Fountain of the Son and Spirit and because the three Persons are gathered together under one Head or Chief even the Father He adds here expresly that if the Persons were Co-ordinate i. e. equal in Authority Dignity or Power they should not be one but three Gods This is at large Dr. Cudworth's Opinion the short of it is that the three Persons are as really distinct Beings Essences or Substances as Dr. Sherlock hath imagined them to be And as their Substances or Natures are not one but three so also must their Understandings and other Personal Powers and Properties The Doctors differ only in this that Dr. Sherlock maketh the Unity of the three Persons in the Godhead to consist in the Mutual-Consciousness of the Persons But Dr. Cudworth in this that the Father is both the Principle Root or Fountain or Cause and also the Head of the other two Persons They neither of them believe one Numerical but one Collective God one God not who is really one God but is one God in certain Respects as of Mutual Consciousness or of being the Cause Principle and Head of all other Beings and of the second and third Persons Dr. Cudworth contends by a great number of very Pertinent and Home Quotations that his Explication I mean that part of it which makes the three Persons to be so many distinct Essences or Substances is the Doctrine of the Principal if not of all the Fathers as well as of the Platonists and I for my own part do grant it For I am perswaded that no Man hath read the Fathers with Judgment and Application but he must discern that tho they do not express themselves in the incautelous unwary and obnoxious Terms used by Dr. Sherlock as neither doth Dr. Cudworth yet the Fathers as much believed the three Persons are distinct Minds and Spirits as Dr. Sherlock doth all the Difference as I said is only this that they and Dr. Cudworth do not use his very Terms They do not say in express words three Minds or three Spirits but the Comparisons which they use and their Definitions or Descriptions of what they mean by Persons are such that it cannot be questioned by any that they apprehended the three Persons to be three distinct Spirits Minds and Beings having each of them his own

Understanding and all other Personal Qualifications It is indeed apparent Tritheism and that was the true Reason why the Schools advanced a new Explication but because the Schools durst not find fault with the Fathers or seem to depart from their Doctrine therefore what the Father 's intended of one Specifick Essence or Nature or Substance that the Scools interpreted of one Numerical Substance Nature or Essence but of that hereafter when we examine their Doctrine in its own place Dr. Cudworth being so great a Philosopher as every one knows he was found himself very hard put to it what to say colourably and reasonably concerning the Persons of the Trinity He saw that either he must say that they are but one self-same Essence or Substance in Number or that they have distinct and several Substances or Essences To say that they are or they subsist in one self-same Substance or Essence in Number is such Jargonry in Philosophy that is to say in the Nature and Possibilities of Things that he never speaks of it without a just mark of Contempt 't is Nonsense saith he and 't is impossible and besides that 't is Sabellianism and a Trinity not of Persons but of Words and Names Well shall we say then that the three Persons are three distinct Substances is it not plain Tritheism No saith the Doctor for the Persons are not equal the Father is both the Principle or Original and the Head of the other two Persons and besides that he only is Omnipotent ad intra But then will some say indeed this Explication leaveth us but one God which is the thing we look'd after but it is by utterly abolishing the Godhead of the Son and Spirit it maketh only the Father to be really God the other two Persons are so only by a certain Dependance on him both in Origination and Acting As bad as this Consequence is and as clear Dr. Cudworth is forced to swallow it and to sit down contented with it he thought it should seem it is better somewhat to strain the use of Words than the Natures and Possibilities of Things 'T is hard indeed that we must say one Supream and two Dependent Persons make but one God but 't is harder to say three Persons have but one Substance or Essence in Number Words are Arbitrary Signs applied to things according as Men please and therefore are capable of Alteration in their Use but the Nature of Things is absolutely unchangeable three Persons can never be one Substance Essence or individual Nature No Philosophy but that of Gotham will allow that one Intelligent Substance can be more than one Person but divers Philosophers especially the Platonists have called three Distinct Intelligent Divine Substances one 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one Di●inity or God therefore nothing hinders but that so also may Christians To this purpose Dr. Cudworth in divers places of his Intellectual System But it is now time to make our Observations on this Doctor 's Explication which I shall do the more carefully because I am perswaded that all the chief Fathers were in his Sentiments that the three Divine Persons are three distinct individual Substances or Essences in Number which by the Schools and all the Moderns is granted to be Tritheism and because it is evident by his Intellectual System that this Doctor understood all the Philosophies Antient and Modern in the most perfect manner and was himself one of the ablest Philosophers we have known His Explication hath these Parts 1. That the Divine Persons are one Specifick but three distinct particular individual Substances or Essences in Number or in the Reality of Things and that otherwise there could not be three Divine Persons but only one such Person 2. That three distinct individual intelligent Divine Essences or Substances commonly called Persons are yet but one God because tho they are three in Number yet they are one in Original for the second and third Persons are derived from the Father as their Fountain and Cause 3. Tho they are three Persons yet they are but one God because they concur to all the same Actions both of Creation and Providence under one Head even the Father The Emphasis of this lies in their concurring to all the same Actions but principally in this that they concur to the same Actions under one Head which is the Father 1. That the Divine Persons are three distinct particular individual Intelligent Substances Essences or Natures and that otherways that is were there but one self-same Substance or Essence in Number they should not be three Persons but only one Person I have granted that if there are three Divine Persons those Persons are of necessity three distinct individual Essences or Substances so that as to this first Proposition the Doctor and the Socinians are perfectly agreed all that we deny is that three such Essences or Persons are or can be but one God But tho the Socinians allow that three Persons must be three distinct Substances or Essences yet all the Modern Trinitarians utterly deny it the reason is because they saw plainly that to say there are three distinct Essences or Substances is to grant in effect to the Socinians what they so much contend for namely that the Doctrine of the Trinity doth imply three Gods Three distinct Divine Persons saith Dr. Cudworth are three distinct Divine Essences or Substances it is true say the Socinians and we grant this to the Doctor no say all the Modern Trinitarians three distinct Divine Essences are not only three distinct Divine Persons but they are also three distinct Gods if once we grant that the three Divine Persons are three Essences the Socinians will extort it from us as an unavoidable Consequence that we teach three Gods The Truth is since the Lateran Council which determined in favour of P. Lombard against Abbat Joachim and the Fathers that there is but one only Divine Essence or Substance in Number I do not believe there hath been any Divine of note but Dr. Cudworth and Dr. Sherlock and some few who may have borrowed it from them who durst ever publish it in Writing that there are three distinct Divine Substances Essences or Natures or that every distinct Person is a distinct Substance They all saw that so to say is to introduce three Gods for if you say there are three distinct Intelligent Almighty All-knowing and Pre-eternal Substances Essences or Natures you have actually said there are three Gods because you can possibly give no fuller nor other Description of three Gods If one All-knowing Almighty Essence or Substance is one perfect God to whom nothing at all can be added 't is no better than fooling or effrontry to deny that three such Essences or Substances are three Gods This plain and clear Reason hath constrained the School-Divines to depart from the Explication of the Fathers and has also obliged all the Moderns to follow the Schools and forsake the Fathers Yet so as out of good Manners

Habitude or Modality to be changeable and that the Personalities in the Divine Nature or God are not alterable or changeable He will say too it may be that there is no meer Modality but may be away from the Nature or Substance to which it belongs without any damage to the Essential Perfections of such Nature or Substance but you cannot take away the Personalities or the Persons from the Substance of God without lessening the Perfections of the Godhead Therefore we must not say that the three Divine Persons are only the Divine Substance with three Modes The three Divine Persons he saith are the one Substance of God diversified in three Postures But how shall we conceive that the Substance of God in the first Posture or in Posture A begat the same Substance of God in Number in Posture B and how doth the third Posture or Posture C proceed for under Pain of Damnation we must not say of this third Posture how was it begotten from the Substance of God considered in the Postures A and B The Divine Substance say they in Posture A or in the first Mode generated the Divine Substance in the second Mode or as Dr. S th speaks in Posture B and the self-same Divine Substance in the first and second Modes breathed you must well mark that the self-same Divine Substance in the third Mode which is Posture C. Now how shall we understand such Gibberish as this may they not as well tell us in plain terms that to be Trinitarians 't is necessary that we should renounce at once all good Sense and content our selves for ever with a Cant without Sense The Persons as distinguished from the Substance of God are only Personalities which is to say three such Modes as Posture Mutability and Dependence saith Dr. S th They that hear this will presently say Dr. S th and the Socinians are very near to an Agreement we are like to have this tedious intricate and dangerous Controversy fairly ended by the rare and particular Dexterity of Dr. S th For he hath taught us that all the Difference is indeed nothing both Parties confess one self-same Substance Essense or Godhead only the Orthodox contend for three Postures in this Substance and the sullen conceited Socinians hitherto seem unwilling to allow of more than one Mode or Posture but under the Institution and Instruction of such a Teacher as Dr. S th they will return to the full Acknowledgment of the whole Truth Dr. Sherlock had said that there are some who make the three Divine Persons to be nothing else but three Modes and he maketh thereupon this Note Can any one think that the Father begat only a Mode and called it his Son Let us see now how Dr. S th rates him for this piece of Ignorance No good Sir no none that I know of is in danger of thinking or saying so no more than that Socrates begat only the Shape and Figure of a Man and then called it his Son or to turn your own blunt Weapon against your self no more than God the Father begot another Self-consciousness and called it his Son Animadv p. 291. And at p. 241 242. and often else-where he saith the Personalities by which the Deity stands diversified into three distinct Persons are by the generality of Divines both Antient and Modern called and accounted Modes So that in short let all the Dunces take notice for the time to come that Dr. S th with all the Antients and Moderns at his Heels saith pronounceth and declares in manner and form following the Personalities in the Godhead not the Persons are three Modes Affections or Habitudes of the Divine Substance Nature or Essence Now were I Dr. Sherlock I would not grant to this arrogant Adversary the least Tittle of all he contends for It is certain there is nothing more common with the Metaphysicians who follow the Schools than to call the three Persons three Modes and sometimes more largely three Modes of Subsistence of the Divine Substance or the Substance of God Dr. Sherlock may well defend it that neither hath he mistaken the Modalists nor have they mistaken in what they mean to say He may say it is indeed true that in all other Persons Human Persons and Angelical Persons we may be so nice as to distinguish between the Persons and the Personalities for Example the Personalities of Peter James and John are only Modes or Properties peculiar to these three Persons by which they are ultimately distinguish'd from one another and from all other Persons of the same Specifick Nature namely the Human but the Persons of Peter James and John besides those Modes and Properties take in also three distinct intelligent Substances in which those Modes suosist It is true I say that Human and also Angelical Persons may be thus distinguished from their Personalities but 't is otherways in the three Divine Persons the three Divine Persons are properly and truly called only three Modes the reason is It is supposed by the Modalists that in the Godhead the three Persons have all the self-same individual Substance or Essence in Number and that they have also but one self-same Understanding Will and Energy or Power of Action in Number contrary to what happens in all other Persons whether Human or Angelical who all have distinct Substances distinct Understandings Wills and Energies as well as are distinct Persons this being so 't is evident that the very Modes or Personalities in the Godhead cannot be distinguished from the Persons we must say that the three Divine Persons are three Modes because they are distinguished from one another by nothing else as all other Persons are All other Persons are distinguished by their distinct Substances their distinct and several Understandings Wills and Energies as well as by their peculiar Modes and Properties but in the Godhead there is no such Distinction it has one self-same Substance Understanding Will and Energy 't is only distinguished by its Modes and those Modes are distinguished from one another by themselves only Briefly Dr. Sherlock may say that all the Modalists acknowledg no other Distinction between the three Divine Persons than is between Modes they are not distinguished by their Substances nor by particular Understandings Wills or Energies of their own therefore we properly enough call them three Modes Dr. S th may wrangle as long as he pleases he may if it be for his Credit write such another Book of Inadversions as this upon Dr. Sherlock but when he has done and said all he can say or do all Men but himself will perceive that these two Propositions are the same for sense this of Dr. Sherlock which he imputes to the Modalists and which Dr. S th so much abhors the three Divine Persons are only three Modes of Subsistence in the Substance or Essence of God and this which Dr. S th owns and maketh to be the Substance of his whole Book the three Divine Persons are the Substance

is ready to fling it into the Kennel at the first Nod that the Church shall make he cannot wonder that the Socinians will handle it will look on both sides of it will view it in a clear Light before they bargain for it Well see here it is The Personalities by which the Godhead stands diversified into three distinct Persons are called and accounted Modes Therefore for understanding the Mystery of the Trinity we must declare what is properly a Mode or Manner of Being It is not a Substance nor an Accident which two make indeed the Adequate Division of Real Beings but a Mode is properly a certain Habitude of some Being Essence or Thing whereby the said Essence or Being is determined to some particular State or Condition which barely of it self it would not have been determined to And according to this Account a Mode in things Spiritual and Immaterial hath the like Reference to such Beings as a Posture hath to a Body to which it gives some Difference or Distinction without superadding any new Entity or Being to it In a word a Mode is not properly a Being whether Substance or Accident but a certain Affection cleaving to Being and determining it from its common general Nature and Indifference to something more particular as we have just now explained it As for instance Dependence is a Mode determining the general Nature of Being to that particular State and Condition by virtue of which it proceeds from and is supported by another and the like may be said of Mutability Presence Absence Inherence Adherence and such like viz. that they are not Beings but Modes or Affections of Being and inseparable from it so far that they have no Existence of their own after a Separation or Division from the Things or Beings to which they belong Animadver p. 240 241 242. Behold the Birth of the Mountains We are kept in suspense seven long Chapters at length in the 8th at p. 240. of his Book he gives forth this Oracle That the three Divine Persons so much talk'd of are neither Substances nor Accidents and consequently saith he no Real Beings Nay they have no real Existence of their own but are Modes Habitudes or Affections of the Divine Substance or the Substance of God they are in the Godhead or in the Substance of God such as Mutability Presence Absence Inherence Adherence and such like are in the Natures or Substances to which they belong Or if you will have a great deal in one single word the very Iliads in a Nut-shell they are Postures or what amounts to the same thing they are such in Spiritual and Immaterial Beings that a Posture is to a Body I must needs here tell you Sir the Story of the Princess Dulcinea del Toboso Mistress to the Renowned Don Quixot of the Mancha in Spain This famous Princess had the Honour to be Mistress of the Affections of the so much celebrated Don Quixot for her he traversed Mountains Deserts and other dreadful Places for her he encountred Giants Knights-errant and other formidable Dangers and at length for her to satisfy his amorous Passions towards her he retired to a place called the poor Rock where he spent much time in lamenting the Disdains the Cruelty and Hard-heartedness of his Mistress towards himself as is largely related in the History Don Quixot was waited on in his long Travels and Adventures by his Esquire Sancho Pancha who greatly pitied his Master that he should serve so rigorous a Mistress but the Esquire had one Scruple in his Mind Who this Dulcinea del Toboso should be But while Don Quixot was tormenting himself at the poor Rock he unluckily happened to drop some words by which it evidently appeared that Dulcinea del Toboso was only an imaginary Lady or Princess and that indeed she was no other Person but a certain coarse Country Wench Daughter of the Farmer Alonso Zanchez and for her Plainness called Joan. Ta Ta cries Sancho Pancha and is the Princess Dulcinea our Neighbour Joan Zanchez By my troth a sturdy Quean well may my Master languish for her for I am well perswaded she hath no regard or sense of Love-matters but 't is a good-natur'd Wench c. Methinks Sir there can be nothing more pat or proper for this place than this Story For just such a Disappointment do we all meet with in the Explication for which Dr. S th hath made us wait so long as Sancho Pancha had when he found the Princess Dulcinea was Joan Zanchez Dr. S th had raised the Expectation of his Readers in no fewer than seven Preliminary Chapters in the eighth he promises in the Title of it the long-lock'd for the much-desired Catholick and Orthodox Explication of a Trinity of Divine Persons in the Unity of the Godhead but when all comes to all he tells us the three Divine Persons are nothing else but the Substance of God or the Godhead diversified into three Postures Never were Men so bilk'd before as his Readers are at this News 't is the Princess Dulcinea turned into Joan Zanchez Was it worth while to fall upon Dr. Sherlock in that outragious manner only because he would not call the three Divine Persons three Postures of the Godhead or the Substance of God in three Postures Dr. Sherlock poor sensless illiterate Cantabrigian Ignoramus thought that these words Father Son and Spirit implied something that was real He imagin'd that the Notion which all Men naturally have of a Father his Son and a Spirit distinct from both must be filled up with something that will honestly and satisfactorily answer to such Names and natural Notions of a Father a Son and a Spirit diverse from both therefore saith he seeing these Persons are Spiritual and Immaterial and Intelligent I call them three Minds three Spirits and three Beings But the Adepti of Oxford will make him know his Mistake First Dr. Wallis tells him Three Persons and one God is as much as to say three Respects of one God to his Creatures he is their Creator Redeemer and Sanctifier and in this sense is called three Persons tho he is indeed but one God and but one Being but Dr. S th answers 't is neither so nor so three Divine Persons are the Substance of God in three Gambals or Postures or in three such I know not what 's which have the same or like Reference to Things Spiritual and Immaterial that Postures have to Bodies The three Personalities are that in the one Substance of God which Mutability Presence Absence Inherence Adherence and such like changeable Affections and Habitudes are in the Substances to which they belong He thinks it should seem that the Faithful must put their Trust in three Postures and worship Mutability Presence Absence or something which in Spirituals is like to them something which is no more in the Deity than Postures are in Bodies I fancy Dr. Sherlock will object to him that it is of the Nature of a meer