For though the Three Divine Persons differ as really yet it is certain that they do not differ as much But what the Fathers alledged only as an Illustration of the Case this Man is pleased to make a direct proof of his Point which by his Favour is to stretch it a little too far For if he would make the foregoing Example a Parallel Instance to the Thing which he applies it to it would prove a great deal too much as has been shewn and therefore as to the Thing which it is brought for does indeed prove nothing at all Now the Thing it is brought to prove is That the Three Divine Persons are Three distinct Infinite Minds or Spirits but since we have shewn That a Real Difference or Distinction may be much short of such an one as is between two or more Minds or Spirits which we own to be as great as between two or more Men it follows That the Real Difference which is between the Three Divine Persons cannot prove them to be so many distinct Minds or Spirits In short our Author 's whole Argument amounts to no more but this which though it may sound something jocularly is really and strictly true viz. That because Peter Iames and Iohn are so many Men therefore Father Son and Holy Ghost are so many Minds A pleasant way of Arguing certainly I have now examined all that this Author has alledged about the distinction of the Three Divine Persons and I have done it particularly and exactly not omitting any one of his Quotations But how comes it to pass all this while that we have not so much as one Syllable out of the Fathers or School-men in behalf of Self-Consciousness Which being according to this Author the Constituent Reason of the Personality and Personal Distinction of the Three Divine Persons will he pretend to prove the Distinction it self from the Fathers and at the same time not speak one Tittle of the Principle or Reason of this Distinction Or will he profess to prove his whole Hypothesis by the Authority of the Fathers and yet be silent of Self-Consciousness which he himself makes one grand and principal part of the said Hypothesis Certainly one would think that the very shame of the World and that Common Awe and regard of Truth which Nature has imprinted upon the Minds of Men should keep any one from offering to impose upon Men in so gross and shameless a manner as to venture to call a Notion or Opinion the Constant Doctrine both of the Fathers and the Schools nay and to profess to make it out and shew it to be so and while he is so doing not to to produce one Father or Schoolman I say again not so much as one of either in behalf of that which he so confidently and expresly avows to be the joynt Sentiment of Both. This surely is a way of proving or rather of imposing peculiar to Himself But we have seen how extremely fond he is of this new Invented Term and Notion And therefore since he will needs have the Reputation of being the sole Father and Begetter of the Hopefull Issue there is no Reason in the World that Antiquity should find other Fathers to maintain it CHAP. VII In which is shewn That the Passages alledged by this Author out of the Fathers do not prove Mutual-Consciousness to be that wherein the Unity of the Divine Nature in the Three Persons of the Blessed Trinity does Consist But that the Fathers place it in something else OUR Author having undertook to make good his Doctrine about the Blessed Trinity from the Fathers and that both as to the Distinction of the Divine Persons and also as to their Unity in the same Nature And having said what he could from those Ancient Writers for that new sort of Distinction which he ascribes to the said Persons in the former part of his 4th Section which I have confuted in the preceding Chapter he proceeds now in the following and much longer part of the same Section to prove the Unity of the Three Persons in one and the same Nature according to his own Hypothesis And the Proofs of this we shall reduce under these Two following Heads as containing all that is alledged by him upon this point of his Discourse viz. First That it is one and the same Numerical Divine Nature which belongs to all the Three Divine Persons And Secondly That the Thing wherein this Numerical Unity of the Divine Nature does consist is that Mutual-Consciousness by which all the Three Persons are intimately Conscious to one another of all that is known by or belongs to each of them in particular And here the Authority of the Fathers is pleaded by him for both of these and I readily grant it for the first but however shall examine what this Author produces for the one as well as for the other But before I do this I must observe to him That if that Distinction Asserted by him between the Divine Persons whereby they stand distinguished as Three Infinite Minds or Spirits holds good all his proofs of the Unity of their Nature will come much too late For he has thereby already destroyed the very Subject of his Discourse and it is in vain to seek wherein the Numerical Unity of the Divine Nature as it belongs to the Three Persons does Consist after he has affirmed that which makes such an Unity utterly impossible And it has been sufficiently proved against him in our 5th Chapter That Three Infinite Minds or Spirits can never be one Numerical Infinite Mind or Spirit nor consequently one God Three distinct Spirits can never be otherwise One than by being United into one Compound or Collective Being which could such a Thing be admitted here might be called indeed an Union but an Unity properly it could not And hereupon I cannot but observe also That this Author very often uses these Terms promiscuously as if Union and Unity being United into One and being One signified the very same Thing whereas in strictness and propriety of Speech whatsoever Things are United into One cannot be Originally One and è Converso whatsoever is Originally One cannot be so by being United into One for as Suidas explains the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say Union is so called from the pressing or thrusting together several Things into one But our Author who with great profoundness tells us of the same Nature in Three distinct Persons being United into One Numerical Essence or God-head Page 118. Lines 9 10. has certainly a different Notion of Union from all the World besides For how one and the same Nature though in never so many distinct Persons since it is still supposed the same in all can be said to be United into any one Thing I believe surpasses all Humane Apprehension to conceive Union in the very Nature of it being of several Things not of one and the same I desire the Reader to consult the place and
to extract the best sense out of it that he can And thus having presented our Author with this Preliminary Observation I shall now proceed to consider how he acquits himself in the first Thing undertook by him viz. The proving a Numerical Unity of Nature in the Three Divine Persons out of the Fathers which tho' I do as readily grant and as firmly believe as this Author does or can yet I think it worth while to shew with what Skill Decency and Respect he Treats the Fathers upon this Subject And here in the first place he tells his Reader That this being a Mystery so great and above all Example in Nature it is no wonder if the Fathers found it necessary to use several Examples and to allude to several kinds of Union to form an adequate Notion of the Unity of the God-head And withall That they take several steps towards the Explication of this great Mystery viz. of an Unity of Nature in a Trinity of Persons page 106. In our Examination of which Passages reserving his former words to be considered elsewhere we will first consider the steps which he says the Fathers made towards the Explication of this Mistery And these he tells us are Two First The 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. the Coessentiality of the Divine Persons whereby all the Three Persons of the God-head have the same Nature Page 106. Secondly the other is a Numerical Unity of the Divine Essence or Nature Page 121. Line 6. which to answer one Greek word with another we may call the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 St. Cyril authorizing the Expression whom we find speaking of an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Ammonius Cites him in his Catena upon Iohn 17. 11 21. Now as this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Sameness of Nature and this Numerical Unity of Nature lying fifteen whole Pages in this Author's Book distant from one another must be confessed to make a very large stride so for all that they will be found to make but an insignificant step as setting a Man not one jot further than he was before For as touching those Words and Terms which the Fathers used to express the Unity of the Divine Nature by I do here without any demurr affirm to this Author That Coessentiality Sameness of Nature and Sameness of Essence all signified by the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as also Unity of Nature and Unity of Essence expressed by the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 do all of them in the sense of the Fathers denote but one and the same Thing viz. A Numerical Unity of the Divine Nature only I confess with some Circumstantial Difference as to the way or manner of their signification For 1. The 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies Unity of Nature with a Connotation of some Things or Persons to whom it belongs Upon which Account it is that St. Ambrose whom this Author cites speaking of this word in his 3d Book Chap. 7. tells us That 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 aliud alii non ipsum est sibi Nor indeed is any Thing said to be the same but with respect to some Thing or Circumstance besides it self And therefore no wonder if the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was anciently rejected since the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 relating to the Person whom the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 belongs to must import a Singularity of Person as well as an Unity of Essence which would be contrary to the Catholick Faith But 2. The 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies Unity of Nature or Essence without Connotation of any to whom it belongs Not but that it does really and indeed belong to the Three Divine Persons but that according to the strict and proper signification and force of the word it does not connote or imply them but abstracts or prescinds from them And this is a true Account of these words by which the Fathers without making more steps than one intended and meant the same Thing viz. a Numerical Unity of the Divine Nature belonging to all the Three Persons only with this difference That the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies the Unity of the Divine Nature with a Connotation of the Persons in whom it is which also gives it the Denomination of Sameness and that the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies the Unity of the same Nature absolutely and abstractedly without imploying or co-signifying any respect to those in whom it is and to whom it belongs So that these words as much Two as they are yet in the sense and meaning of the Fathers import but one and the same Unity But our Author tells us That though indeed the Fathers own an Unity of Nature in the Divine Persons yet since there is a Specifick as well as a Numerical Unity the Dispute is here which of these two Unities we shall assign to the Divine Nature with reference to the Divine Persons And for this He tells us That Petavius and Dr. Cudworth have abundantly proved That the Nicene Fathers did not understand the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of a Numerical but of a Specifical Sameness of Nature or the agreement of Things Numerically different from one another in the same Common Nature Page 106. about the end In Answer to which I must confess my self very unfit to take such Great and Truly Learned Persons to task and that upon comparing this Author and Petavius together if there can be any comparison between them I find much more Reason to believe that he mistook the meaning of Petavius than that Petavius could mistake the meaning of the Fathers But however I shall lay down this as a Conclusion which I take to be undoubtedly true viz. That the Ancient Fathers as well the Nicene as those after them held only a Numerical Unity of the Divine Nature in the Persons of the Blessed Trinity That is in other words They held and acknowledged one Numerical God and no more This Conclusion I hold and have good reason to believe That neither Petavius nor Dr. Cudworth shall be able to wrest it from me For the chief Reason of some Men's charging the Fathers with holding a Specifick Unity of Nature amongst the Divine Persons is drawn from this That some of them and particularly Maximus and Nyssen cited by this Author seem to argue from that Specifick Unity of Nature which is found in several Individual Men to an Unity of the Divine Nature in the Persons of the Blessed Trinity To which I Answer That the Fathers never used the Example of Three or more Individual Men agreeing in the same Nature as a Parallel Instance of the same sort or degree of Unity with that which is in the Three Divine Persons but
but Three Hypostases or Subsistences This keep this hold c. Theodoret also speaks very fully upon the same Subject in his first Dialogue contr Anomaeos 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That is to say Such Things as belong properly to the Divine Essence or Substance are in like manner common to Father Son and Holy Ghost But the Term Father is not common to them and therefore Father is no Property of the Essence but of the Subsistence or Person But now if one Thing be proper to the Hypostasis or Subsistence and there be other Properties of the Essence it follows That Essence and Hypostasis do not signifie one and the same thing And again a little after 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That is The Essence or Substance of the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost is common being equally and alike Immortal Incorruptible Holy and Good And for this Reason we affirm One Essence and Three Hypostases Auctarium sive Tom. 5. Theodoret. p. 286. Edit Paris 1684. Certainly nothing could with greater Evidence state the Personalities of Father Son and Holy Ghost upon Three several Subsistences than the Words here quoted out of this Father And I quote them out of him though I know the same Dialogues are inserted into Athanasius's Works but I am convinced by the reasons given by Garnerius the Learned Editor of this Auctarium that the said Dialogues cannot belong to Athanasius Next to him let us hear Basilius Seleuciensis speaking the same Thing in his first Oration upon the first Verse of the first Chapter of Genesis where upon these words Let us make Man after our own Image and Likeness he discourses thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That is to say The Image here formed is but One but the mention here made is not of One Hypostasis or Person only but of Three For the Thing formed being the common Work of the whole Deity shews the Trinity to have been the Former thereof and so gives us one Image or Resemblance of the Trinity But if the Image of the Trinity be but One the Nature of the Hypostases or Persons must be One too For the Unity of the Image proclaims the Unity of the Substance or Essence Basil. Seleuciens Orat. 1. p. 5. Printed at Paris with Gregorius Thaumaturgus c. Anno Dom. 1622. Zacharias Sirnamed Scholasticus and sometime Metropolitan of Mitylene of the Sixth Century in his Disputation against the Philosophers who held the Eternity of the World to a certain Philosopher asking him How the Christians could acknowledg the same both a Trinity and an Unity too Makes this Answer 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That is We affirm a Trinity in Unity and an Unity in Trinity hereby affirming the Subsistences or Persons to be Three and the Essence or Substance to be only One Johannes Damascenus a Writer of the Eighth Century in his Third Book de Orthodoxâ fide Chap. 11. about the end of it speaks thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That is The Godhead declares the Nature but the Term Father the Subsistence as Humanity does the Humane Nature but Peter the Subsistence or Person For the Term God denotes the Divine Nature in Common and equally denominates or is ascribed to each of the Hypostases or Subsistences Damascen Page 207. Edit Basil. 1575. I shall close up these particular Testimonies with some Passages in the Creed commonly called the Athanasian which I place so low because it is manifest that Athanasius was not the Author of it it being not so much as mentioned in any Antient Writer as the very Learned Dr. Cave affirms till it occurs in Theodulphus Aurelianensis who lived about the latter end of the Eighth Century Now the Passages are these 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in some Copies 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. That is Neither confounding the Hypostases or Persons nor dividing the Substance For there is one Hypostasis of the Father another of the Son and another of the Holy Ghost but the Godhead of the Father Son and Holy Ghost is One c. And again 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That is The whole Three Hypostases or Persons are Coeternal together and Coequal These Passages are full and plain and the Creed it self may well claim the Antiquity at least of the Eighth Century My next Authorities shall be those of the Councils But before I pass to them I cannot but observe and own to the Reader concerning some of the first of my Quotations viz. those out of Justin Martyr and that out of St. Athanasius that it has been very much questioned by some Learned Men Whether those Books from whence they are taken do really belong to the Authors to whom they are ascribed and among whose Works they are inserted or no. This I say I was not ignorant of nevertheless I thought fit to quote them by the Names under which I found them placed since many very Learned Persons and much more acquainted with the Writings of the Ancients than I pretend to be have upon several Occasions done so before me And the said Tracts are certainly of a very early date and though the Authors of them should fall a Century or two lower yet they still retain Antiquity enough to make good the Point for which I alledged them Nevertheless I must and do confess it very probable That the more distinct and exact use of the Terms 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as applyed to the Divine Persons did not generally and commonly take place but as by degrees the Discussion of the Arian and other the like Controversies through frequent Disputes grew to still a greater and greater Maturity And that the use of these Terms did obtain then and upon that Account I think a very considerable Argument to authorize and recommend them to all Sober and Judicious Minds And so I pass to the Testimonies of Councils concerning the same Amongst which we have here in the first place the Council of Chalcedon making a Confession or Declaration of their Faith concerning the Person of our Saviour and that both as to the Absolute undivided Unity of his Person and as to the Difference and Distinction of his Two Natures part of which Confession runs thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That is We confess One and the same Lord Jesus Christ the only begotten Son of God in Two Natures without Confusion c. the difference of the said Natures being by no means destroyed by their Union but rather the property of each Nature being thereby preserved and both concurring to or meeting in One Person or Hypostasis This Account of the Chalcedon Confession we have in the Second Book of Evagrius towards the latter end of the 4th Chapter and a lively Instance it is of the Council's expressing the Personality of Christ by and stating It upon Subsistence In the next place upon Justinian's calling the second Council of
Constantinople being the Fifth General one in the Year 553 for Condemning of the Tria Capitula we have a large and Noble Confession of Faith made by that Emperour and owned and applauded by all the Council and inserted amongst the Acts of it And in this we have the Three Divine Persons several times expressed by so many 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as a Term equivalent to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and indeed importing withall the Personality or Formal Reason of the same and that so fully and plainly that nothing could or can be more so 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. That is We profess to Believe One Father Son and Holy Ghost Glorifying thereby a Consubstantial Trinity One Deity or Nature or Essence and Power and Authority in Three Subsistences or Persons And again to the same purpose 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 We worship says he an Unity in Trinity and a Trinity in Unity having both a strange and wonderful Distinction and Union that is to say an Union or Singularity in respect of the Substance or God-head and a Trinity in respect of Properties Subsistences or Persons with several more such Passages to the same Purpose and Signification And then as for the Council it self the first Canon of it speaks thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That is If any one Confess not One Nature or Substance One Power and Authority of Father Son and Holy Ghost a Coessential Trinity and One Deity to be Worshipped in Three Subsistences or persons Let such an one be Accursed In the next place we have the Sixth General Council and the Third of Constantinople called by Constantinus Pogonatus against the Monothelites in the Year 681. In the Acts of which Council Article 6. we have the Council owning the same Thing and in the same words which a little before we quoted out of the Council of Chalcedon And moreover in the Tenth Article the Council declares it self thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. That is We believing our Lord Iesus Christ to be the True God do affirm in him Two Distinct Natures shining forth in One Subsistence or Person Agreeably to this the Council immediately following called by the Greeks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and by the â—atines Concilium Quini Sextum Consisting chiefly of the same Persons with the former and called by the same Constantine about Ten Years after for the making of Canons about Discipline by way of Supplement to the Fifth and Sixth Councils which had made none This Council I say in the first of its Canons which is as a kind of Preface owns and applauds the Nicene Fathers for that with an Unanimous Agreement and consent of Faith they had declared and cleared up one Consubst antiality in the Three Hypostases or Subsistences of the Divine Nature 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. And Lastly in the Florentine Council held in the Fif teenth Century in which the Greeks with their Emperor Iohannes Palaeologus met the Latines in order to an Accord between them touching that so much controverted Article about the Procession of the Holy Ghost In this Council Isay we have the Greeks also expressing the Personality of the Holy Ghost by the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For whereas the Latines affirmed that the Holy Ghost the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 did 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That is to say stream or flow from the Son the Greeks desired them to explain what they meant by that Expression 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and whether they understood that he derived both his Essence and Personality from him and that in these words very significant to our purpose 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 By which we see that even with these Modern Greeks also the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is all one with the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifie Essence and Person as applyed to the Persons of the Blessed Trinity Hist. Concil Florent in the last Chapter and Question 7. of Section 8. Pag. 246. set forth by Dr. Creyghton 1660. I cannot think it requisite to quote any Thing more from the Greeks upon this Subject it being as clear as the Day that both Fathers and Councils stated the Personalities of Father Son and Holy Ghost upon Three distinct Hypostases or Subsistences of one and the same God-head Essence or Substance distinguished thereby into Three Persons And so I pass from the Greeks to the Latines whom we shall find giving an Account of the same partly by subsistences and Modes of subsistence and partly by Relations But not equally by both in all Ages of the Church For we have before shewn That there was a long and sharp Contest between the Greeks and the Latines about the Word Hypostasis and that the Latines dreaded the use of it as knowing no other Latin Word to render it by but Substantia which they could by no means ascribe plurally to God and as for the Word Subsistentia that was not then accounted properly Latin and it was but upon this occasion and to fence against the Ambiguity of the Word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that it came at length into use amongst the Latines And even after all it must be yet further confessed That notwithstanding that fair foundation of Accord between the Greeks and Latines laid by the forementioned Council of Alexandria and the hearty Endeavours both of Athanasius and of Gregory Nazianzen after him to accommodate the business between them the Latines were not so ready to come over to the Greeks in the free use of the Word Hypostasis as the Greeks were to comply withthe Latines in the use of the Word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 answering to their Persona And therefore in vain would any one seek for an Explication of the Divine Persons in the Trinity by the Terms Subsistentiae or Modi Subsistendi in the earlier Latin Writers such as Tertullian about the latter end of the second Century and St. Cyprian about themiddle of the Third and Lactantius about the latter end of the same and the beginning of the Fourth Nevertheless find it we do in the Writers of the following Ages And how and in what sence it was used by them shall be now considered And here we will begin with St. Ambrose who is full and clear in the case in his Book in Symbolum Apostolicum Cap. 2. Tom. 2. in these Words Ità ergò rectum Catholicum est ut unum Deum secundùm Unitatem Substantiae fateamur Patrem Filium Spiritum Sanctum in suâ quemque Subsistentiâ sentiamus A Passage so very plain that nothing certainly could more effectually declare That this Father reckoned the Personalities of the Three Divine Persons to consist in their several and respective Subsistences The next whom we shall alledge is St. Hilary who flourished in the Fourth Century and wrote Twelve Books
examined and laid open in the foregoing Animadversions I shall now set down without any further Descant or Enlargement upon them or at least with very little But as for those which I there passed over without any Notice or Remark as I did it all along with full purpose to treat of them by themselves so I shall particularly insist upon them now And the Reader may please to take them as they follow PARADOX It is a vain and arrogant presumption says this Author to say What is or what is not a Contradiction when we confess we do not understand or comprehend the thing we speak of p. 4. And again I know nothing in the World that we do perfectly understand p. 7. line 19. Answer According to these Two Assertions taken together I affirm That though a Man discourses never so falsly and inconsistently of God or indeed of any thing in the World besides yet he cannot justly be charged as guilty of a Contradiction And moreover since this Author affirms page 97 That for any one to say That Three Divine Persons who are divided and separated from each other are each of them God and yet that they are not Three Gods but one God is a direct Contradiction I desire to know of him Whether he comprehends what the Godhead and what the Divine Persons are And if not Whether according to his own Rule it is not a vain and arrogant Presumption in him to say what is a Contradiction when he professes himself not to comprehend the thing he is speaking of and about which the Contradiction is said to be PARADOX This Author having declared the Intimate and Essential Unity between the Father and the Son from those Words of our Saviour John 14th Chap. 10. Ver. I am in the Father and the Father in me Subjoyns That this Oneness between them is such an Union as there is nothing in Nature like it and we cannot long doubt what kind of Union this is if we consider that there is but one possible way to be thus United and that is by this Mutual-Consciousness p. 57. Answer These Words I charge with Contradiction and consequently with Absurdity upon two Accounts First because they Contradict our Saviour's Words And Secondly Because they Contradict the Author 's own Words 1. And first concerning those of our Saviour Whereas this Author says That this Oneness between the Father and the Son is such an Union as there is nothing in Nature like it Our Saviour in Iohn Ch. 17. where this whole Passage is repeated twice affirms something to be like it viz. in ver 11. where he prays to his Father That they viz. Believers may be One as We viz. his Father and Himself are One And again ver 21. That they may be One as thou Father art in me and I in thee So that our Saviour expresly asserts a Likeness of something to this Union on the one side and this Author as expresly denies it on the other In which according to his blundering undistinguishing way he confounds Likeness and Sameness of kind as all One as shall presently be further shewn In the next place our Saviour as plainly as Words can express a Thing says That he and his Father are One by a Mutual In-being or In-existence in one another And this Man as expresly says That there is no possible way for them to be one but by Mutual-Consciousness But I on the contrary deny That Mutual-Consciousness is Mutual-Inexistence or Mutual-Inexistence Mutual-Consciousness any more than that Being or Existence is properly Consciousness or Knowledge and therefore if they cannot possibly be one but by Mutual Consciousness it is certain that they are not so by Mutual-Inexistence which yet our Saviour in Words properly and naturally signifying Inexistence affirms that they are And the more intolerable is this Assertion in this Author for that in Pag. 56. he affirms that these Words of our Saviour ought to be understood properly and if so I hope they do not only exclude Metaphors but all other Tropes and Figures also for Proper is not adequately opposed to Metaphorical but to Figurative whatsoever the Figure be And I do here affirm That if our Saviour's words be understood of Mutual-Consciousness they do not signifie properly but figuratively and the Figure is a Metonymy of the Subject for the Adjunct forasmuch as in God Being or Inexistence are to be look'd upon as the Subject and Knowledge and the like Attributes as the Adjuncts And therefore I do here tell this bold Man again that for him to say as he does that the forementioned words of our Saviour ought to be understood properly and yet to interpret them to a sense not Proper but Figurative which by interpreting them of Mutual-Consciousness he evidently does is both an Absurdity and a Presumption equally insufferable But in the 2d Place I charge the forecited Passage of this Author with the same Absurdity for being as Contradictory to his own words as it was to those of our Saviour For whereas he here says First That this Oneness between the Father and the Son expressed in those words I am in the Father and the Father in me can be no other kind of Union than an Union by Mutual-consciousness And Secondly That it is such an one that there is nothing in Nature like it I desire him to turn to Page 106. of his Book where he tells us That the Fathers use several Examples and allude to several sorts of Union thereby to form a Notion of the Unity of the Godhead in the Three Divine Persons Let him I say read this and tell me Whether those Examples and Allusions could be of any use to form a Notion of that Unity to which they bore no Resemblance at all For I for my part ever thought that there can be no Allusion of one thing to another without some similitude between them and that a similitude is always on both sides it being not possible for Peter to be like Iohn but Iohn must be like Peter too And if this Man does not yet blush at such contradictory Assertions let him turn a little farther to Page 126 127. where he tell us particularly that St. Austin explains this Unity by Examples of Mutual-Consciousness and by several Similitudes mark the words of which the Unity of Understanding Memory and Will with the Soul of Man is alledged by him for One and that a notable one too for that these Faculties as he there says are mutually in one another and the Example of Love and Knowledge in the same Mind is alledged by him as another such a Simile affirming them in like manner to be mutually in one another Now I say after all this ought not the Reader to stand amazed when he reads the Man first affirming that the Unity between the Father and the Son mutually existing in one another by virtue of the Mutual-Consciousness between them has nothing like it in Nature nor has any Example Metaphor or
to this Socinian Objection which by a manifest Fallacy proceeds à dicto secundùm quid ad dictum simpliciter viz. That because Equality cannot belong to the Essential Glory or Majesty of the Godhead considered abstractedly from the Divine Persons therefore neither can it agree to the same Glory or Majesty upon any other Account whatsoever which is utterly false forasmuch as considered according to the Three different ways of its Subsistence in the Three Persons it may as Subsisting under any one of them be said to be equal to it self as Subsisting under the other Two PARADOX This Author represents Gregory Nyssen as first asserting a Specifick Sameness or Unity of Nature in the Divine Persons which also he makes all along to be signified by the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and then asserting that this Specifick Sameness or Unity of Nature makes the said Three Persons Numerically One Page 118. the latter end Answer This is too great an Absurdity for so Learned a Father to be guilty of and therefore ought to lie at this Author 's own Door for that a Specifick Sameness or Unity of Nature should make any Thing or Person Numerically One any more than a generical Unity can make Things specifically One is beyond measure senceless and illogical PARADOX Though the Fathers says he assert the singularity of the Godhead or the Numerical Unity of the Divine Essence yet they do not assert such a Numerical Unity as where there is but one Person as well as one Essence but such a Numerical Unity as there is between Three who are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the very same Nature but are not merely united by a specifick Unity but by an Essential Union and therefore are Three and One Page 121 Line 15. Answer In these Words there are several Absurdities which he falsly charges upon the Fathers but ought in all Reason to take to himself As 1. He supposes a specifick Unity and an essential Unity to be distinct Unities whereas every specifick Unity or Union call it at present which you will is also an essential Unity or Union For a specifick Unity is one sort of an essential Unity which in its whole compass contains the Generical the Specifical and the Numerical and therefore thus to contra-distinguish a Species to its Genus is fit for none but such a Logician as this Author it being all one as if one should say of Peter That he is not only a Man but also a Living Creature 2. The second Absurdity is That he owns a specifick Unity of Nature in the Divine Persons which sort of Unity I have abundantly proved in Chap. 7. the Divine Nature not to be capable of for he says here of the Divine Persons That they are not merely United by a specifick Unity which Words must imply that however so united they are 3. He makes Two sorts of Numerical Unity contrary to all Rules of Logick viz. One where there are several Persons of one Nature as here in the Trinity and the other where there is but One Person as well as One Nature But let me here tell him That the Divine Nature is every whit as numerically One in the Three Persons as if there were but one Person in the Godhead and no more And in this very Thing as has been shewn does the Mysteriousness of an Unity in Trinity consist I say The Divine Nature is as Numerically One in the Three Persons as the humane Nature was numerically One in Adam while there was no other Person in the World but himself nay much more so since it is not multiplicable as that was And to affirm That the Numerical Unity of the Godhead is not so perfect or is not the very same Subsisting in Three distinct Persons as if we could imagine it to subsist but in One Subverts and Overthrows such an Unity in Trinity as the Church in all Ages hitherto has maintained PARADOX Having told us That the Fathers universally acknowledged the Operation of the whole Trinity ad Extra to be but One and from thence concluded the Unity of the Divine Nature and Essence for that every Nature has a Virtue and Energy of its own Nature being a Principle of Action and if the Energy and Operation be but One there can be but One Nature He adds within four Lines after That this is certainly true but gives no Account how Three distinct Persons come to have but One Will One Energy Power and Operation nor that any Account that he knows of can be given of it but by Mutual-Consciousness Page 124. Line 7 c. Answ. Were I not acquainted with this Man's way of Writing I should be amazed to see him in so small a compass so flatly contradict himself For will he in the first place assert in the Three Divine Persons a Numerical Unity of Nature And in the next assert also that this Unity of Nature is proved by Unity of Energy and Operation And after this tell us That this gives no Account at all how Three distinct Persons come to have but one Will and Energy Power and Operation For does not Unity of Nature in these three distinct Persons prove this While the said Unity of Nature proves Unity of Operation as the Cause proves its Effect and Unity of Operation again proves Unity of Nature as the effect proves its cause This any one of sense would think is a fair full and sufficient Account how Three distinct Persons having all but One Nature come thereby all to have but one Will Energy and Operation And should any one else argue otherwise I should think him beside himself but this Author in this Discourses like himself PARADOX Knowledge Self-reflection and Love are distinct Powers and Faculties in Men and so distinct that they can never be the same Knowledge is not Self-reflection nor Love either Knowledge or Self-reflection though they are inseparably united they are distinct P. 130. L. 11 12 c. Answ. Here also is another knot of Absurdities For First Knowledge Self-reflection and Love are not in Men distinct Powers and Faculties as this unfledged Philosopher calls them but only distinct Acts. Secondly Admitting that Knowledge were a Faculty as it is not yet I deny that Knowledge and Self-reflection would make Two distinct Faculties forasmuch as it is one and the same Intellectual Faculty which both exerts an Act of Knowledge and an Act of Reflection upon that Act of Knowledge or upon it self as producing the said Act. For which Cause it is as has been observed before that Philosophers hold that the Understanding is Facultas supra se Reflexiva all of them allowing both the direct and the reflex Acts of Knowledge to issue from the same Faculty Thirdly He says That albeit the forementioned Acts are distinct yet they are inseparably united But this also is false for whether an Act of Knowledge may be without an Act of Self-reflection as some not without Reason think it may I am sure in
yet every Person has his own proper distinct Subsistence by himself which must make as great a difference between Existence and Subsistence as that which unites several Persons into one Nature and that which personally distinguishes them from one another And then also for Christ's Person with reference to his humanity though this subsists by the Subsistence of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 yet it does not properly subsist by the Existence of it since every distinct Nature must have its own distinct Existence which shews That even in the Oeconomy of this Divine Person Existence and Subsistence must be considered as formally different since something we see may relate to and be affirmed of one which cannot be affirmed of or bear the same relation to the other Now whatsoever Being or Nature this Mode of Subsistence does belong to that is properly called a Suppositum as being a thing which by no means exists in any other but as a Basis or foundation supports such things or Beings as exist in it from which also it receives its Name of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And the Consequence of this is That as Subsistence makes a thing or Being a Suppositum so suppositality makes it incommunicable since that which makes it uncapable of existing in another must also hinder it from being Communicated to another And another Consequence of the same is That every Suppositum or Being thus Subsisting by it self is a compleat Being that is such an one as is not made for the Completion of any other For whatsoever is so must naturally exist in it as a part does in the whole or at least be originally designed so to do This Account being given of Subsistence and of a Suppositum which is Constituted such by it it will be easie to give an Account also what a Person is which is properly defined Suppositum Rationale or Intelligens So that as a Suppositum is substantia singularis completa per se subsistens so the Ratio Intellectiva being added to this makes it a Person which is a farther perfection of Suppositality and the utmost perfection of Subsistence as Subsistence and Suppositality is the utmost Bound and Perfection of Existence in all Beings not Intelligent If it be here now asked Whether Subsistence or Suppositality added to bare Nature does not make a Composition I Answer That in Created finite Persons it does but not in Uncreated and Infinite And the reason is Because though all Composition implys Union yet all Union is not therefore a Composition but something higher and transcendental so that in the Divine Persons of the Trinity The Divine Nature and the Personal Subsistence coalesce into one by an Incomprehensible Ineffable kind of Union and Conjunction And if this does not satisfie as I think it rationally may I must needs profess That my Thoughts and Words can neither rise higher nor reach further Having thus stated and fixed the signification of the fore-mentioned Terms I cannot but remark these two things of the Term or Word Essence As 1. That it is sometimes taken not only for the Ratio formalis entis but simply and absolutely for an entire Entity or Being it self And 2. That those two other Terms Nature and Form are for the most part used as Terms equipollent and of the same signification with it Nature being the Essence of a thing considered as an Active Productive Principle and Form being the Essence or Nature of a thing as it is the chief Principle giving Being and Perfection to it in the way of Composition Nevertheless it is sometimes also applyed to simple uncompounded Natures promiscuously with the other So that we see here That Essence Form and Nature generally taken are only three formally distinct Considerations of one and the same thing which I thought fit to take notice of to prevent all cavil or mistake about the use of these Terms I have now gone over and severally given an Account of the Notions of Being Substance Accident Modes of Being Essence Form Nature Subsistence and Personality and hereby I hope laid some foundation for our clearer and more intelligible discoursing of the great Article we have undertook to rescue from a false Vindication There being hardly any one of all the foregoing Terms of which a clear and distinct Notion is not highly requisite to a clear explicite and distinct consideration of the Subject now before us Concerning which I think fit to note this That so far as I can judge the thing now in dispute is not what fully and exactly expresses or represents the Nature of God for nothing can do that But what is our best and most rational way of conceiving and speaking of him and subject to fewest Inconveniences and for this we shall debate it whether this Author or we take the best course These things being thus premised and laid down we shall now resume the four Heads first proposed to be spoken of by us and Discourse of them severally And 1. I shall shew That the Ground upon which this Author excepts against the use of the Terms Substance Essence Subsistence c. in treating of this Subject is false and mistaken His Exceptions against them we find in Page 68 69 and 70. of his Book The great difficulty says he of conceiving a Trinity of Persons in one Infinite and undivided Essence or Substance arises from those gross and material Ideas we have of Essence and Substance when we speak of the Essence or Substance of God or Created Spirits We can form no Idea of Substance but what we have from matter that is something extended in a triple dimension of length breadth and depth which is the Subject of those Qualities which inhere and subsist in it And therefore as matter is the Subject of all sensible Qualities so we conceive some such Substance of a Mind or Spirit which is the Subject of Will and Understanding Thoughts and Passions and then we find it impossible to conceive how there should be three Divine Persons which are all Infinite without three distinct Infinite Substances each distinct Infinite Person having a distinct Infinite Substance of his own And if we grant this it seems a plain Contradiction to say That these three distinct Infinite Substances are but one Numerical Infinite Substance c. Thus far our Author And I freely grant That this does not only seem as he says but really is a Contradiction And before I have done with him I will prove to him also That to say That three distinct Infinite Minds are but one Numerical Infinite Mind which shall be effectually laid at his Door or That three distinct Infinite Minds are not three distinct Infinite Substances or Essences are as gross and palpable Contradictions as the other But he goes on in the same Page a little lower We know nothing says he of the Divine Essence but that God is an Infinite Mind and if we seek for any other Essence or Substance in God but an
But the former is true and therefore the latter must be so too The Proposition is proved thus Nothing which together with the Body Constitutes a Person is or can be it self a Person For if it be then the Body must be joyned to it either by being assumed into the Personal Subsistence of the Soul as the Human Nature of Christ is assumed into the Personal Subsistence of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Whereupon the Composition and Constitution of a Man will be an Hypostatick Union between Soul and Body which I suppose no body will be either so bold or absurd as to affirm all Divines accounting an Hypostatical Union so peculiar to Christ's Person as not to be admitted in any other Person or Being whatsoever For an Hypostatick Union and an Hypostatick Composition viz. Such an one as makes a Compound Hypostasis are quite different things and this Author shall in due time be taught so much if he has any thing to object against it Or Secondly The Body must be joyned with the Soul as one part joyntly concurring with another to the Composition of the whole Person And if so then the Soul being a Part cannot possibly be a Person Forasmuch as a Part is an Incomplete Being and therefore in the very Nature of it being designed for the Completion of something else must subsist in and by the Subsistence of the whole But a Person imports the most complete Degree and Mode of Being as Subsisting wholly by it self and not in or by any other either as a Subject of Inherence or Dependence So that it is a direct Contradiction to the very Definition and Nature of the Thing for the same Being to be a Part and a Person too And consequently that which makes the Soul the former does irrefragably prove it not to be the other Besides if the Soul in the Composition of a Man's person were an entire person it self and as such concurred with the Body towards the Constitution of the Man then a Man would be an Imperfect Accidental and not a Perfect Natural Compound He would be that which Philosophy calls Unum per Accidens that is a thing made up of two such Beings as cannot perfectly coalesce and unite into one For a Complete Being as every Person essentially is having received the utmost degree of Subsistence which its Nature can give it if it comes afterward to be compounded with another Being whether Complete or Incomplete it must necessarily make such a loose unnatural Union and Composition But to assert That the person of a Man is such a Compound would be exploded by all who understood any thing of Natural Philosophy So that it would be a very idle thing to attempt any further Confutation of it Let this Author overthrow these Reasonings and support his Assertion against them if he can But having thus disproved the Personality of the Soul while in Conjunction with the Body I go on to disprove it also while in a state of Separation from it Which I do thus If the Soul in such a state be a Person then it is either the same Person which the Man himself was while he was living and in the Body or it is another Person But to Assert either of them is extreamly Absurd and therefore equally Absurd That the Soul in such a state should be a Person And First It is Absurd to affirm it to be the same Person For a Person compounded of Soul and Body as a Man is and a simple uncompounded Person as the Soul if a Person at all must needs be can never be numerically one and the same For that differing from one another as Simple and Compound they differ as two things whereof one implies a Contradiction and Negation of the other A Compound as such including in it several parts compounding it And a simple Being utterly excluding all Parts and Composition So that if a Man while alive be one Person and his Soul after his Death be a Person too it is impossible for the Soul to be one and the same Person with the Man And then for the other part of the Disjunction To Assert That they are two distinct Persons is as Absurd as the other as drawing after it this Consequence viz. That it is one Person who lives well or ill in this World to wit the Man Himself while he was personally in the Body and another Person who passes out of the Body into Heaven or Hell there to be rewarded or punished at least till the Resurrection for what that other Person had done well or ill here upon Earth And does not this look mightily agreeable to all the Principles of Reason and Divinity Nevertheless so much is certain That wheresoever there are two distinct Persons we do and must by all the Rules of Grammar and Logick say That one of them is not the other and where one is not the other we cannot in Truth or Justice say That one ought to account for what was done or not done by the other But then if it be intolerably Absurd as no doubt it is That the Soul in the other World should not be responsible for what the Man himself in Person had done in this then it is altogether as Absurd and Intolerable for any one to represent and speak of these Things under such Terms and Notions as must necessarily throw all Discourse and Reasoning about them into Paradox and Confusion But 't is needless to insist any longer upon a thing so clear or to add any other Arguments in so plain a Case And indeed to me the Soul 's thus changing its state forwards and backwards from one manner of Subsistence to another looks very odd and unnatural As that from an Incomplete state in the Body it should pass to a Personal and Complete state out of the Body which state is yet preternatural to it and then fall back into an Incomplete state again by its re-union to the Body at the Resurrection which yet one would think should rather improve our principal parts in all respects not merely relating to the Animal Life as the bare Subsistence of them I am sure does not These things I say seem very uncouth and improbable and such as ought not without manifest Necessity to be allowed of which here does not appear since all this Inconvenience may be avoided by holding That the Soul continues but a Part of the whole Person and no more in all its Conditions And thus having proved our Assertion against the Personality of the Soul Whether in the Body or out of it let us now see what may be opposed to it And here I suppose some will object That the Soul in a state of Separation is not properly a Part forasmuch as it exists not in any Compound nor goes to the Composition of it To which I answer That an Actual Inexistence in a Compound is not the onely Condition which makes a Thing a Part but its Essential Relation to a Compound
Created and Finite Persons I shall now proceed to the Consideration of what he says of it with reference to the three Persons in the Glorious God-head And this I shall do under these following Heads which shall be the Subjects of five distinct Chapters As First I shall treat of his two new Notions viz. of Self-Consciousness and Mutual-Consciousness and shew That Self-Consciousness is not the formal Reason of Personality in the three Divine Persons nor Mutual-Consciousness the Reason of their Unity in one and the same Nature And this we have here allotted for the business and Subject of this 4th Chapter Secondly I shall prove That the Three Divine Persons of the Godhead are not Three Distinct Infinite Minds or Spirits in the 5th Chapter Thirdly I shall Consider what this Author pretends to from the Authority of the Fathers and School-men in behalf of his New invented Hypothesis and shew That they speak nothing at all for it or towards it And this shall make the 6th and 7th Chapters Fourthly I shall set down the Ancient and generally received Doctrine of the Church and Schools concerning the Article of the Trinity and Vindicate it from this Author's Exceptions in the 8th Chapter And when I shall have discussed and gone over these Particulars I cannot imagine what can be found Considerable in this his Book so far as I have undertook it but what will have received hereby a full and sufficient Answer Though when all is done I confess I have some further Complements to make to this Author upon some other Accounts though still occasioned by this Work of his which I should be extremely wanting both to him and the Cause now before me should I not with all due Address pass upon him And this will add three or four Chapters more to the former and so conclude this Work And First To begin with the first of these I shall endeavour to prove That Self-Consciousness is not the formal Reason of Personality in the Three Divine Persons In order to which I shall premise and lay down these following Considerations Consideration 1. That although the Divine Nature be one Pure Simple Indivisible Act yet in our Conceptions of it which are always inadequate to it there is a Natural Order of Prius and Posterius founded in the Universal Reason of Things according to which the Conception of one Thing presupposes and depends upon the Conception of another which though it can make no Prius or Posterius in the Divine Nature yet is by no means to be contradicted or confounded in our discoursing of God forasmuch as without our admitting this Rule it is impossible for any Humane Understanding either to Conceive or Discourse consistently or intelligibly of Him at all Consideration 2. Which I think affords us a Rule safely and universally to be relied upon is this That in Things having a dependence between them where we may form to our selves a clear and distinct Conception of one Thing without implying or involving in it the Conception of any other Thing there that Thing is in Order of Nature precedent to all those Things which are not essentially included in the Conception of it Thus for instance we may have a clear and distinct Conception of Entity and Being and of Unity too without entertaining in our Mind at the same time any Notion or Conception of knowledge at all and therefore the Ratio Entitativa of any Thing must needs in Nature precede the Ratio Cognitiva as well as Cognoscibilis of the same Consideration 3. We must distinguish between the Affections or Modes of Being as they are strictly so called and between the Attributes of it The first sort are reckoned of the same Order with Being it self and so precede whatsoever is consequent upon it as the Attributes of it are accounted to be which relate to the Being or Subject they belong to as things in Order of Nature Posterior to it Accordingly in the first rank are Existence Subsistence Personality c. and in the second are all Acts issuing from a Nature or Subject so Subsisting whether they be of Knowledge Volition Power Duration or the like The Denominations derived from which are properly called Attributes Consideration 4. Though there can be no Accidents inhering in God yet there may be Accidental Predications belonging to him And I call those Accidental which are not Necessary or Essential Such as are all Extrinsecal Denominations of him founded on such Acts of God as were perfectly free for him to do or not to do nothing in the Divine Nature obliging him thereto Of which number are the Denominations or Predicates of Creatour Redeemer and the like Since there was nothing in God that made it necessary for him to be so Consideration 5. When the Terms Cause Formal Reason Constituent or productive Principle and the like are used about the Divine Nature and Persons they are not to be understood as applicable to them in the strict and proper signification of the said Terms but only by way of Analogy as really meaning no more than a Causal or Necessary Dependence of one Notion or Conceptus objectivus upon another so that it is impossible for the Mind to Conceive distinctly of the one but as depending upon or proceeding from the other Consideration 6. That the Divine Nature may with all fair Accord to the Rules of Divinity and Philosophy be Considered as Prescinding or Abstracting though not as divided from the Divine Persons Consideration 7. That whatsoever is Essentially included in the Divine Nature thus Considered is equally Common and Communicable to all the Divine Persons Consideration 8. That whatsoever is the proper Formal Reason of Personality is utterly Incommunicable to any Thing or Person beyond or beside the Person to whom it belongs Consideration 9. That for any Absolute Perfection essentially included or implyed in the Divine Nature to be multiplyed in the Three Persons belonging to it is a manifest Multiplication of the Divine Nature it self in the said Persons By which we are given to understand the difference between the Multiplication and the Communication of the Divine Nature to those Persons These Rules I thought fit to draw up and lay down before-hand in order to the use which we shall have of them in the ensuing Disputation And so I proceed to my Arguments against this Author's New Notion of Self-Consciousness with reference to the Persons of the Blessed Trinity And the First is This Argument I. No Personal Act can be the formal Reason of Personality in the Person whose Act it is But Self-Consciousness is a Personal Act and therefore Self-Consciousness cannot be the formal Reason of Personality in the Person whose Act it is and to whom personally it belongs The Minor I suppose neither our Author Himself nor any one else can deny For if Self-Consciousness be not a Personal Act let any one assign what else it is or what it ought to pass for It is certainly an Act of
Communication of his Nature to his Son which Act as proceeding from him is called Generation and renders him Formally a Father and as Terminated in the Son is called Filiation and Constitutes him Formally a Son and in like manner the Holy Ghost Subsists personally by that Act of Procession by which he proceeds from and relates to both the Father and the Son So that that proper Mode of Subsistence by which in Conjunction with the Divine Essence always included in it each of them is rendred a Person is wholly Relative and so belongs to one of them that it also bears a Necessary reference to another From all which it undeniably follows That the Three Persons in the Blessed Trinity are in the Formal Constitution of them Relative to one another and consequently That the Three Personalities by which they become Formally Three Persons and are so denominated are Three Eternal Relations But now for the Minor Proposition in the first Syllogism viz. That Self-Consciousness is a Thing in the Nature of it Absolute and Irrelative that I think can need but little Proof it being that Act by which each Person intimately knows and is Conscious to himself of his own Being Acts Motions and every Thing personally belonging to him so that as such it terminates within and looks no further than that one Person whom it is an Entire Survey and Comprehension of And as it is an Absolute and Irrelative Term so it may be Conceived distinctly and fully without Conceiving or implying the Conception of any Thing or Person besides And now what Relation does or can such an Act of Self-Consciousness imply in it It is indeed on the contrary a direct Contradiction to all that is Relative For it incloses the Person wholly within himself neither pointing nor looking further nor referring to any one else If it be here said That each Person by an Act of Self-Consciousness intimately knows the Relation which he stands in to the other Two Persons To this I Answer Two Things 1. That to know a Thing or Person to be Relative or to be Conscious of the Relation belonging to it or him does not make that Act of Knowledge to be either a Relation or of a Relative Nature 2. I Answer That this very Thing proves Self-Consciousness not to be the Constituent Reason of Personality For if the Father knows himself to be a Father by an Act of Self-Consciousness it is evident That Self-Consciousness did not make him so but that he was a Father and had the Relation of a Father and thereby a Personality belonging to him as such in Order of Nature Antecedent to this Act of Self-Consciousness and therefore that this Self-Consciousness cannot be the Reason of the Relation nor of the Personality implyed in it Forasmuch as it is in several respects Posterior to the Person whom it belongs to as in the foregoing Argument we have abundantly shewn But to take a particular and distinct Account of this Notion in the several Persons of the Trinity Does the Father become a Father by being Conscious to himself that he is so or rather by that Act by which he Communicates his Nature to and thereby generates a Son Or does the Son's Relation to the Father consist in his being Conscious to himself of this Relation Or Lastly does the Holy Ghost proceed from the Father and the Son and so personally relate to both by that Act of Self-Consciousness by which he is Conscious to himself of this Procession All this is Absurd Unnatural and Impossible For no Person is related to another by that Act of Self-Consciousness by which he knows and reflects Personally upon himself And yet it is certain That to be a Father is a Relative Subsistence and to be a Son depending upon the Father by an Eternal Act of Generation perpetually begetting him is also to have a Relative Subsistence and lastly to be Eternally proceeding from Both as the Holy Ghost is must likewise import a Way or Mode of Subsisting altogether as Relative as the Two former In which three ways of Subsistence consist the Personalities of the Three Persons respectively and upon these Self-Consciousness can have no Constituting Influence at all as being an Act quite of another Nature to wit Absolute and Irrelative and resting wholly within the Person whom it belongs to From all which I conclude That Self-Consciousness neither is nor can be the Formal Reason of Personality in the Three Persons of the Blessed Trinity And this Argument I take to have the force and clearness of a Demonstration Argument III. The Third Argument is this If Self-Consciousness be the Formal Reason of Personality in the Three Divine Persons then there is no Repugnancy in the Nature and Reason of the Thing it self but that there might be Three Thousand Persons in the Deity as well as Three But this is Absurd and therefore so must that be likewise from which it follows The Consequence appears from this That there is no Repugnancy but that there might be so many Self-Consciousnesses or Self-Conscious Minds or Spirits for the Deity to Communicate it self to And therefore if Self-Consciousness be the Formal Reason of Personality there is no Repugnancy but that there might be Three Thousand Persons in the God-head as well as Three The Proposition is proved thus Because this Repugnancy if there be any must be either from the Nature of Self-Consciousness in the several Self-Conscious Minds or Spirits it belongs to or from the Nature of the God-head which is to be Communicated to them But it is from neither of them For First there is nothing in the Nature of Self-Consciousness to hinder its Multiplication into never so great a Number of Particulars but that there may be Three Thousand or Three Millions of Self-Conscious Minds or Spirits as well as Three Nor in the next place is there any Repugnancy on the Part of the God-head That Three Thousand Self-Conscious Spirits should subsist in it any more than that Three should For the Godhead considered precisely and abstractedly in it self and not as actually included in any Person is as able to Communicate it self to the greatest Number as to the smallest If it be here said That the Three Persons are not only Three Self-Conscious Spirits but also Three distinct Infinite Self-Conscious Spirits as our Author says they are and of which more in the next Chapter I Answer That there may be as well Three Thousand distinct infinite Spirits as Three For Infinity is as much inconsistent with the least Plurality of Infinites as with the greatest and therefore if it be no Repugnancy that there should be Three distinct Infinite Minds neither is there that there should be Three Thousand So that if Self-Consciousness be the Formal Reason of Personality there appears no Repugnancy either from the Nature of Self-Consciousness or the Number of the Spirits endued with it nor from the supposed Infinity of the said Spirits no nor yet from the Nature of
the God-head it self but that there might be Three Thousand Persons in it as well as Three But how then comes there to be only Three Why upon these grounds no other Reason can be assigned for it but only that it was God's free Determination that there should be Three and no more And then the Trinity of Persons must be an Effect of God's Will and not a Necessary Condition of the Divine Nature and the further Consequence of this must be that the three Persons are Three Created Beings as proceeding from the free Results of God's Will by vertue whereof they equally might or might not have been But on the contrary our Author himself holds Page 129. line 13. That the Three Persons are Essential to the Divine Nature and so Essential to it that they necessarily belong to it in this number and can be neither more nor fewer than Three And if this be so I am sure it is a Contradiction that it should be otherwise for it is a Contradiction that it should not be which necessarily is and cannot but be But now I have proved that there is no Repugnancy or Contradiction to the Nature of Things considered barely according to their Nature that three thousand Self-Conscious Minds or Spirits should subsist in the Godhead any more than that three such Spirits should so subsist And therefore if it be Absurd and Impossible as undoubtedly it is that so many Persons should belong to the Divine Nature then must the Reason of this Absurdity be fetched from some other Thing than either from Self-Consciousness with reference to the Divine Nature or from the Divine Nature considered in it self abstractedly from all Actual Personality for these as we have shewn afford no sufficient Proof of this Absurdity And therefore I say some other Reason must be found out and assigned against it And accordingly let this Author produce such an one whatsoever it be as shall solidly and conclusively prove That there cannot be Three Thousand Self-Conscious Persons belonging to the Godhead and that from the Nature of the Thing it self as several such Reasons may be brought and I will undertake to him to prove by the very same Reason and Argument as Conclusively That Self-Consciousness is not cannot be the Formal Reason of Personality in the Three Divine Persons of the Trinity In the mean time by that kind of Arguing which is called Deductio ad Absurdum I have sufficiently disproved it by shewing what an Intolerable Absurdity must follow the Asserting it Argument IV. The Fourth and Last Argument shall proceed thus If Three distinct Self-Conciousnesses Formally Constitute Three distinct Personalities then Three distinct Self-Complacencies will Constitute Three distinct Personalities too But our Author Isuppose will not allow of the latter and therefore neither ought he to assert the former The Consequence is plain Because there is no Reason alleagable according to our Author's Hypothesis why Self-Complacency may not found a Personality as well as Sels-Consciousness For they are both of them equally distinct Internal Acts in the Person whom they belong to and as to the Formal Effect of each an Act of Self-Complacency seems to have the Preheminence since it is a greater Perfection to be United to an Infinite Good that is to the Deity by way of Love and Adhesion than barely by way of knowledge and Intellection And Self-Complacency is the former whereas Self-Consciousness rises no higher than the latter And consequently since Self-Complacency is the more Perfective Act of the two knowledge of good being still in order to the Love of it and since withall Personality is the most perfect way of Subsisting which any Nature is capable of it seems most rational to derive the perfectest way of Subsistence belonging to an Intelligent Being from the most Perfective Act of that Being if from any Act at all And now if this Author should Object That Self-Complacency is in Order of Nature Subsequent to Self-Consciousness and so that there cannot be the same ground to make it the Formal Reason of Personality that there is to make Self-Consciousness so I Answer That according to my Principle whereby I deny Self-Consciousness to be the Reason of Personality because it is postnate to Self-Subsistence it is indeed a good Reason but according to our Author's Hypothesis it is none at all For if the Priority of Self-Subsistence to Self-Consciousness according to him hinders not but that Self-Consciousness may nevertheless be the Principle or Reason of Personality why should the precedency of Self-Consciousness to Self-Complacency hinder Self-Complacency from being as proper a Reason or Principle to found Personality upon as the other All this I alledge only as an Argument ad Hominem and desire this Author to consider if any one should borrow some of that Boldness of him by which he dissents from all Antiquity and confidently averr That Self-Complacency is the Proper formal Reason of Personality in each and every one of the Divine Persons I would have him I say consider by what Reason or Argument consistent with his New Opinion he could Confute this other New Assertion For my own part since I think as much may be said for the one as for the other I am ready to set up for Self-Complacency against his Self-Consciousness when he pleases and will undertake to give as good Reasons for my Notion as he can sor his and perhaps better let him begin and enter into the Dispute as soon as he will And as I shall oppose my Self-Complacency to his Self-Consciousness so I shall find out a Mutual-Complacency to Vye against his Mutual-Consciousness too And if any one should here object That this and the like Disputes are of that Nature that the World is not like to be much Edified by them I perhaps think so as much as he But that is no great matter since our Author is of so very Benign a Temper That he does not always Write only for the Reader 's Edification but sometimes for his Diversion too Having thus given my Reasons against this Author's New Notion of Self-Consciousness both with reference to Persons Create and Uncreate and proved That it neither is nor can be the Formal Reason of Personality in either of them I shall now pass to his other New Notion of Mutual-Consciousness whereby those Persons who were distinguished from one another by their respective Self-Consciousnesses are United and made one in Nature by vertue of this Mutual-Consciousness Concerning which Notion also I must profess my self in the number of those who are by no means satisfied with it as of any such peculiar Efficacy to the use and purpose it is here brought for And there are sufficient Reasons against it In giving of which as I must acknowledge That that one Consideration of the Priority of Being whether Essentially or Personally considered together with the first Modes and Affections of it to any Act of Knowledge Attributable to the said Being is the Fundamental
Principle upon which I impugn this Author's New Hypothesis so it does and must as I have noted run through all or most of the parts of this Disputation both about Self-Consciousness and Mutual-Consciousness too And accordingly in the first place I Argue against it thus Argument I. No Act of Knowledge can be the Formal Reason of an Unity of Nature in the Persons of the Blessed Trinity But an Act of Mutual-Consciousness is an Act of Knowledge And therefore no Act of Mutual-Consciousness can be the Formal Reason of an Unity of Nature in the Three Divine Persons The Major I prove thus Every Act of Knowledge supposes the Unity of a Thing or Being from which that Act flows as Antecedent to it and therefore cannot be the Formal Reason of the said Being For still I affirm that Being and consequently Unity of Being which is the first Affection of it must in Order of Nature precede Knowledge and all other the like Attributes of Being And if so no Attribute Subsequent to a Thing can be the Formal Reason of that Thing which it is thus in Order of Nature Subsequent to For neither can Omniscience it self one of the greatest and most acknowledged Attributes of the Divine Nature be said to be the Reason either of the Being or of the Unity of the said Nature And therefore neither can any Act of Knowledge whatsoever be so This is my first Argument which I think sufficient fairly to propose without any farther Amplification Argument II. If Unity of Nature in the Divine Persons be the Cause Reason or Principle of Mutual-Consciousness in the said Persons then their Mutual-Consciousness is not the Cause or Reason of the Unity of their Nature But the former is true and therefore the latter is so too As for the Consequence of the Major Proposition it is as evident as that Nothing can be the Cause and Effect of the same Thing And for the Minor That Unity of Nature or Essence in the Divine Persons is the Cause Reason or Principle of Mutual-Consciousness is proved from this That we can no otherwise conceive of Mutual-Consciousness than as of an Essential Property equally belonging to all the Three Persons And all Properties or Internal Attributes are accounted to issue and result from the Essence or Nature of the Things which they belong to and therefore can have no Antecedent Causal Influx upon the said Nature so as to Constitute either the Being or the Unity thereof But the Divine Nature or Essence being one and the same in all the Three Persons there is upon this Account one and the same Knowledge in them also And they are not one in Nature by vertue of their Mutual-Consciousness but they are therefore Mutually Conscious because the perfect Unity and Identity of their Nature makes them so And to Assert the contrary is of the like import still allowing for the Disproportion of an Infinite and Finite Nature as if we should make Risibility in a Man the Principle of his Individuation and affirm That Peter's having this Property is that which Constitutes him this particular Individual Man which is egregiously absurd in all the Philosophy I ever yet met with whatsoever it may be in this Author's Argument III. To affirm Mutual-Consciousness to be the Cause of the Union of the Three Divine Persons in the same Nature is to confound the Union and Communion of the said Persons together But such a confusion ought by no means to be allowed of and therefore neither ought that to be Asserted from whence it follows Now certain it is That all Acts of several Persons upon one another as all that are Mutual must needs be are properly Acts of Communion by which the said Persons have an Intercourse amongst themselves as acting interchangeably one upon the other But then no doubt both their Essence and Personality must still go before this Mutual-Consciousness since the Three Persons must needs be really one in Nature before they can know themselves to be so And therefore Union of Knowledge as I think Mutual-Consciousness may properly be called cannot give an Union of Nature It may indeed suppose it it may result from it and upon the same Account may infer and prove it but it can never give or cause it nor be that Thing or Act wherein an Unity of Nature does properly consist whatsoever this Author Asserts to the contrary But the Truth is all that he has said both of Self-Consciousness and Mutual-Consciousness and he has no more than said it as never offering at the Proof of any Thing is founded in a manifest Perversion of that Natural Order in which Humane Reason Conceives and Discourses of Things Which Order to give an Instance of it in our discoursing of any particular Person or Complete Being proceeds by these steps First we conceive of this Person as possessed of a certain Essence or Nature Constituting or rendring him what he is Then we conceive of this Nature as one which is the first Affection resulting from Being After this we consider this Being as stepping forth or exerting it self in some Acts whether of Intellection Volition Power or the like In which whole process the Order of these Conceptions is such That it cannot with any Accord to Reason be transposed so as to have the second or third put into the place of the first But now let us see how contrary to this Order our Author's Hypothesis proceeds For whereas Nature or Being should be first Unity next and the Acts issuing from thence obtain the Third place and then those Acts stand in their due Order amongst themselves This Author on the contrary makes Mutual-Consciousness which is by two Degrees or Removes posterior to Unity of Nature in the Persons whom it belongs to to be the Cause or Formal Reason of the said Unity For first Self-Consciousness is posterior to this Unity and then Mutual-Consciousness is posterior to Self-Consciousness as being an Act supervening upon it For Mutual-Consciousness is that Act by which each Person comprehends or is Conscious of the Self-Consciousness of the other two and therefore must needs presuppose them as the Act must needs do its Object And therefore to make as this Author does Mutual-Consciousness the Constituent Reason of the Unity of the Three Persons when this Unity is by two degrees in Order of Nature before it runs so plainly counter to all the Methods of true Reasoning that it would be but time lost to pursue it with any further Confutation Argument IV. Our 4th and last Argument proceeds equally against Mutual-Consciousness and Self-Consciousness too and is taken from that known Maxime in Philosophy That Entities or Beings are not to be multiplied without manifest Necessity That is we are not to admit of New Things nor to coin new Notions where such as are known and long received are sufficient to give us a true and full Account of the Nature of the Things we discourse of and to answer all the Ends and
for representing the vanity of his Hypothesis by the forementioned Example and Comparison But I hope the World will give me leave to distinguish between Things Sacred and his Absurd Phantastick way of treating of them which I can by no means look upon as Sacred nor indeed any Thing else in his whole Book but the bare Subject it treats of and the Scriptures there quoted by him For to speak my thoughts plainly I believe this Sacred Mystery of the Trinity was never so ridiculed and exposed to the Contempt of the Profane Scoffers at it as it has been by this New-fashioned Defence of it And so I dismiss his two so much Admired Terms by himself I mean as in no degree answering the Expectation he raised of them For I cannot find That they have either heightned or strength'ned Men's Intellectual Faculties or cast a greater light and clearness upon that Object which has so long exercised them but that a Trinity in Unity is as Mysterious as ever and the Mind of Man as unable to grasp and comprehend it as it has been from the beginning of Christianity to this day In a word Self-Consciousness and Mutual-Consciousness have rendred nothing about the Divine Nature and Persons plainer easier and more Intelligible nor indeed after such a mighty stress so irrationally laid upon two slight empty words have they made any thing but the Author himself better understood than it was before CHAP. V. In which is proved against this Author That the Three Persons of the Blessed Trinity are not Three Distinct Infinite Minds or Spirits IT being certain both from Philosophy and Religion that there is but one only God or God-head in which Christian Religion has taught us That there are Three Persons Many Eminent Professors of it have attempted to shew how one and the same Nature might Subsist in Three Persons and how the said Three Persons might meet in one and make no more than one simple undivided Nature It had been to be wished I confess that Divines had rested in the bare Expressions delivered in Scripture concerning this Mystery and ventured no further by any particular and bold Explications of it But since the Nature or rather Humour of Man has been still too strong for his Duty and his Curiosity especially in things Sacred been apt to carry him too far those however have been all along the most pardonable who have ventured least and proceeded upon the surest grounds both of Scripture it self and of Reason discoursing upon it And such I affirm the Ancient Writers and Fathers of the Church and after them the School-men to have been who with all their Faults or rather Infelicities caused by the Times and Circumstances they lived in are better Divines and Soberer Reasoners than any of those Pert Confident Raw Men who are much better at Despising and Carping at them than at Reading and Understanding them Though Wise Men Despise nothing but they will know it first and for that Cause very rationally despise them But among those who leaving the Common Road of the Church have took a By-way to themselves none of late Years especially have ventured so boldly and so far as this Author who pretending to be more happy forsooth in his Explication of this Mystery than all before him as who would not believe a Man in his own Commendation and to give a more satisfactory Account of this long received and Revered Article by Terms perfectly New and peculiarly his own has advanced quite different Notions about this Mystery from any that our Church was ever yet acquainted with Affirming as he does That the Three Persons in the God-head are Three Distinct Infinite Minds or Spirits as will appear from the several places of his Book where he declares his Thoughts upon this great Subject As First in Page 50. he says The Three Divine Persons Father Son and Holy Ghost are Three Infinite Minds really distinct from each other Again in Page 66. The Persons says he are perfectly distinct for they are Three distinct and Infinite Minds and therefore Three distinct Persons For a Person is an Intelligent Being and to say they are Three Divine Persons and not Three distinct Infinite Minds is both Heresie and Nonsense For which extraordinary Complement passed upon the whole Body of the Church of England and perhaps all the Churches of Christendom besides as I have paid him part of my thanks already so I will not fail yet further to account with him before I put an end to this Chapter In the mean time he goes on in Page 102. I plainly assert says he That as the Father is an Eternal and Infinite Mind so the Son is an Eternal and Infinite Mind distinct from the Father and the Holy Ghost is an Eternal and Infinite Mind distinct both from Father and Son Adding withall these words Which says he every Body can understand without any skill in Logick or Metaphysicks And this I confess is most truly and seasonably remarked by him For the want of this Qualification is so far from being any hindrance in the Case mentioned that I dare undertake that nothing but want of skill in Logick and Metaphysicks can bring any Man living who acknowledges the Trinity to own this Assertion I need repeat no more of his Expressions to this purpose these being sufficient to declare his Opinion save only that in Page 119. where he says That Three Minds or Spirits which have no other difference are yet distinguish'd by Self-Consciousness and are Three distinct Spirits And that other in Page 258. where speaking of the Three Persons I grant says he that they are Three Holy Spirits By the same Token that he there very Learnedly distinguishes between Ghost and Spirit allowing the said Three Persons as we have shewn to be Three Holy Spirits but at the same time denying them to be Three Holy Ghosts and this with great scorn of those who should hold or speak otherwise To which at present I shall say no more but this That he would do well to turn these two Propositions into Greek or Latin and that will presently shew him what difference and distinction there is between a Ghost and a Spirit and why the very same things which are affirmed of the one notwithstanding the difference of those words in English may not with the same Truth be affirmed of the other also But the Examination of this odd Assertion will fall in more naturally towards the latter end of this Chapter where it shall be particularly considered I have now shewn this Author's Judgment in the Point and in opposition to what he has so boldly Asserted and laid down I do here deny That the Three Persons in the Blessed Trinity are Three distinct Infinite Minds or Three distinct Infinite Spirits And to overthrow his Assertion and evince the Truth of mine I shall trouble neither my Reader nor my self with many Arguments But of those which I shall make use of the first is this
always alledged it one or perhaps sometimes both of these two ways First By way of Allusion or Illustration as I have already noted in the foregoing Chapter and as it is the nearest Resemblance of and Approach to this Divine Unity of any that could be found in Created Beings For still their Argument proceeds only by the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 on the one side and the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 on the other as appears from that place quoted out of Maximus P. 107. which Terms surely do not of necessity import an Identity of the Case but only some Similitude in the parts of the Comparison Secondly The Fathers used the forementioned Example as an Argument à minore ad majus viz. That if several Individual Men could not properly be said to have more than one Nature upon which Nyssen's who le Argument turns much less could this be said of the Three Divine Persons Forasmuch as it is not only certain but evident That Persons merely distinguished from one another and no more must have a greater Unity of Nature than such as are not only distinguished but also divided from one another by a separate Existence And let any one stretch this Argument of the Fathers further if he can I do not in the least deny but several Expressions may have dropped from the Fathers which if we look'd no further might be drawn to a very inconvenient sense But then also it is as little to be denied That the same Fathers professedly and designedly treating of the same Points have declared themselves in such Terms as are very hardly if at all reconcileable to those Occasional and Accidental Expressions And therefore since their meaning cannot be taken from both it ought much rather to be taken from what was Asserted by them designedly than what was Asserted only occasionally To which I shall add this further Remark That a due consideration of the Circumstances under which those Fathers wrote may very well Apologize for the Deseâ—â—s of some of their Arguments For the Grand Controversie which exercised the Orthodox Writers of the fourth and part of the fifth Century was that with the Arians So that we have the less cause to wonder if some of their Reasonings about the Trinity seem to look no further than the proof of a Specifick Unity of Nature in the Divine Persons while they had to deal with Adversaries who would not allow so much as this between the Father and the Son but instead of an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Sameness held only an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Likeness of Nature between them which together with the foregoing Considerations may serve as a Key to let us into the true Explication of several Passages of the Fathers about the meaning of which we might otherwise possibly be something at a loss And the same likewise may serve to give a fair Account of what has been alledged by Petavius and mistook by this Author upon the present Subject For to traverse and examine all Petavius's Allegations particularly would require a full and distinct Work by it self But still our Author seems extremely set upon making good his first step of a Specifick Unity of the Divine Nature from the Fathers and to that purpose he tells us Page 107. Line 23. That one thing wherein the Fathers place the Unity of the Godhead is that all the Three Persons have the same Nature by which he means as shall be shewn presently Specifically the same Nature and a few Lines after he tells us again That some of the Fathers went further than this and plac'd the Essential Unity of the Divine Nature in the Sameness of Essence Lines 30 31 32 of the same Page Now here I would desire this Author to inform me of Two Things First By what Rule of speaking or upon what Principle of Divinity Logick or Philosophy Sameness of Nature ought to signifie one Thing and Sameness of Essence to signifie another and withal to be so contra-distinguished to each other that in the degrees of Unity this latter must be a step beyond the former For the Fathers I am sure make no such distinction but use the words Sameness of Nature and Sameness of Essence as well as the words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 themselves promiscuously so that neither by their Native signification nor yet by their use do they import any more than one sort of Unity Secondly Whereas in Page 106. Lines 23 24. he makes the first step towards this Unity to consist in the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Coessentiality which also in the next Page Line 23. c. he explains by Sameness of Nature And whereas in Page 121. he makes a Numerical Unity of the Divine Essence the next step introducing it with the word Secondly and telling us That the Fathers added it to the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which he had before made the first step And whereas notwithstanding this having in Page 107. told us That Sameness of Nature was one Thing wherein the Fathers placed the Unity of the Divine Nature within seven Lines after he tells us That some of the Fathers went further and placed it in the Sameness of Essence which yet it is manifest all along that he reckons not the same Thing with Numerical Unity of Essence I desire to know of him whether there be Two second steps in this Unity or whether there be one between the first and the second For he makes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Sameness of Nature one step Page 106 107. And Sameness of Essence a further step Page 107. Line 30. c. And then Numerical Unity of Nature another step calling it also the Second Page 121. Line 5. These Things I must confess I am utterly unable to give any Consistent Account of and I shrewdly suspect that our Author himself is not able to give a much better But it is still his way to forget in one place what he has said in another and how kind soever he may be to himself I should think it very hard for another Man to forget himself so often and to forgive himself too Nevertheless our Author without mincing the Matter roundly Asserts a Specifick Unity of Nature in the Divine Persons telling us Line 23. c. of the fore-cited Page 107. That this is absolutely necessary to make the Three Persons one God and that it is impossible that they should be so without it where it is evident that he means a Specifick Unity both from this that it was the Subject which he had been there treating of as also from this that immediately after he mentions another sort or degree of Unity as a step further than this which since nothing can be but a Numerical Unity it follows That that which was one step short of a Numerical must needs be a Specifical And now is it not strange that in Page 109. which is but the next
if not absolutely Notional and depends upon the Operation of the Intellect drawing one common Notion from the agreement which it observes in several Individuals is by no means necessary to make the Three Divine Persons One God nor can any way properly belong to them But a Specifick Unity is such an one And therefore it neither is nor can be necessary to the making the Three Divine Persons One God as this Author most absurdly Asserts p. 107. Line 23 24. The Major is evident For that if such an Unity could be necessary upon that Account then there would be some sort or degree of Unity in the Divine Nature so depending upon the Operation of some Intellect or other forming one common Notion out of several Particulars that had not such an Operation passed upon the said Particulars such an Unity could not have been nor consequently could the Three Divine Persons have been one God without it which to affirm would certainly be both a Monstrous and Blasphemous Assertion Fifthly and lastly If a Specifick Unity of Nature consists with and indeed implies a Multiplication of the said Nature in every one of the Particulars to which it belongs then such a Specifick Unity can by no means be admitted in the Divine Nature But a Specifick Unity of Nature imports a Multiplication of the said Nature in every one of the Particulars to which it belongs And therefore such an Unity cannot be admitted in the Divine Nature The Reason of the Consequence is evident because the Divine Nature is uncapable of any Multiplication And herein consists the difference of the Divine Nature's belonging to the Divine Persons and of any other Nature's belonging to its proper Individuals That this latter is by a Multiplication of it self in them and the other by a bare Communication of it self to them so as that the same Numerical Nature exists in and becomes thereby common to all the Three Persons As for the Minor Proposition That a Specifick Unity of Nature consists with and implies a Multiplication of the said Nature in the several Individuals which it belongs to I referr him to all the Logicians and Metaphysicians who have wrote of Species and Specifick Unity of Idem Diversum whether they do not give this Account of it But I fancy this Author has a reach of Cunning tho' but a short one in the case For that having made the Three Divine Persons Three distinct Infinite Minds or Spirits which can never be One by a Numerical Unity he is willing to provide them a Specifical Unity and to see whether that will serve the turn but as the Nature of the Thing unhappily falls out to be that will not do it neither These are the Considerations which I thought fit to advance against the Admission of a Specifick Unity in the Divine Nature with reference to the Divine Persons And the Conclusion which I draw from them all is this That since the Fathers and that even by this Authors own Confession held a Numerical Unity of Nature in the Three Divine Persons we can by no means grant that the said Fathers admitted also a Specifick Unity in the same without making them guilty of a gross Absurdity and Contradiction Forasmuch as these Two sorts or degrees of Unity are utterly incompatible in the Divine Nature I hope by this time the Judicious Reader sees how fit this Man is to be trusted with the Fathers whose Judgment about so weighty an Article he dares misrepresent in such a manner For to sum up briefly what he has said upon this Point First he tells us That the Fathers agree very well in the Account they give of a Trinity in Unity Page 106. and the four first Lines Next he tells us That the Nicene Fathers asserted a Specifick Unity of the Divine Nature in the Persons of the Blessed Trinity and understood the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 only of such an Unity and not of a Numerical Page 106. and the five last Lines And Thirdly That this Specifick Unity or Sameness of Nature was absolutely Necessary to make the Three Divine Persons One God and that it was impossible they should be so without it Page 107. Lines 23 24. And Fourthly That the other Fathers of which he there names four never so much as Dream'd of a Specifick Unity of the Divine Nature Page 109. lines 22 23. And Lastly That the Fathers do not stop in this Specifick Unity and Identity of Nature but proceed to shew how the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 proves a true Numerical and Essential Unity of the Godhead in the Three Divine Persons Page 114. Lines 30 31 32 33. From all which Assertions which lie plain and open in the forecited Pages I desire this Author to resolve me these following Queries 1. Whether those Fathers who Assert a Specifick Unity of the Divine Nature and those who never Dreamt of such an Unity And those again who by the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 understood only a Specifick and not a Numerical Unity of Nature and those who by the same 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 proceed to prove a Numerical Unity of Nature in the Divine Persons can be said to agree so very well in the Account they give of a Trinity in Unity 2. Whether those could give a true and right Account of a Trinity in Unity who never so much as Dreamt of that which was so absolutely necessary to make the Three Divine Persons One God that they could not possibly be so without it 3. Whether a Specifick Unity or Sameness of Nature in several Persons is or can be a direct and proper proof of a Numerical Unity and Identity of Nature in the said Persons These Questions I say being the Natural and Immediate Results of this Author 's Positions I hope he will graciously vouchsafe sometime or other to give the World a satisfactory Resolution of In the mean time I will tell him what it was that imposed upon him so as to make him talk thus Absurdly and Unphilosophically of a Specifick Unity of the Divine Nature and traduce the Fathers also as if they held the same And that in one word is That in the Subject before us he takes Specifick Nature and Common Nature to signifie one and the same Thing whereas though every Specifick Nature be a Common Nature yet every Common Nature is not a Specifick Nature no nor a Generical neither And that this was his mistake appears from those words of his in Page 106. where he says That Petavius and Dr. Cudworth have abundantly proved That the Nicene Fathers did not understand the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of a Numerical but of a Specifical Sameness of Nature or the agreement of Things Numerically differing from one another in the same Common Nature In which words it is evident That he makes Specifick Sameness of Nature and the Agreement of Things numerically different in one and the same Common Nature to signifie Convertibly the same Thing and
Numerical Nature or Essence nor that they are Mutually Conscious to one another of whatsoever each of them is or knows no nor yet that this Mutual-Consciousness inferrs an Unity of Nature in them as a Thing inseparable from it But he is to prove That this Unity of Nature and this Mutual-Consciousness are Convertibly one and the some Thing or that this latter is to the former what the Essence or Form of any Thing is to that Thing That is to say That the Unity of the Divine Nature formally Consists in and is what it is by that Mutual-Consciousness which belongs to the Three Divine Persons This I say is the Thing to be proved by Him And so I proceed to his Arguments which I assure the Reader he shall find very strange ones nevertheless to give him as easie and distinct a view of them as I can I will set down the several Heads of them before I particularly discuss them 1. The First of them is from the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ascribed by the Fathers to all the Three Divine Persons joyntly 2. The Second from the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 3. The Third from the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Circumincession attributed likewise by the Fathers to them 4. The Fourth from the Representation which St. Austin makes of the Trinity by the Mind and its Three distinct Faculties of Understanding Memory and Will And 5. The Fifth and Last from the Unity of the Original Principle or Fountain of the Deity or rather say I of the second and third Persons of the Trinity All which I shall examine distinctly and in their order But before I do so I think fit to give the Reader an Account in one word of this Author 's whole design in all the Particulars above specified And that is to prove that the Unity of the Divine Nature consists in Unity of Operation and then to suppose for he does not so much as to go about to prove it that this Unity of Operation is Mutual-Consciousness This is the Sum Total of the Business but I now come to Particulars And First for the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 quoted by him out of Greg. Nyssen Where before we see how far it may be formed into an Argument I think it requisite to give some Account how this Author Discourses of it I must confess I have sometimes wondred what design he could have in so zealously exploding those commonly received Terms of Substance Essence and Nature from any application of them to God which here he does again afresh telling us in Page 115. lines 24 25 26 27. That it confounds our minds when we talk of the Numerical Unity of the God-head to have the least Conception or Thought about the Distinction and Union of Natures and Essences And that therefore we are to speak of God only in words importing Energy or Operation And accordingly for this reason Gr. Nyssen expresses God by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 words not signifying Nature or Essence but only Sight and Inspection Nay and this Author has gone a step much beyond this plainly telling us That the Father and the Son are Energy or Operation Page 132. Line 13. And that Nature and Energy are the same in God P. 133. L. 20. and consequently That we are to entertain no other Conception of God but as of a pure simple Operation And thus when we have degraded the Divine Nature from Substance to Operation it is but one step more to degrade it to bare Notion This conceit of this Author I say at first I could not but wonder at but am since pretty well aware of what he drives at by it And that is in short That he thinks it a much easier Matter to make Action or Operation than Substance Essence or Nature pass for Mutual Consciousness And this upon good Reason I am satisfied is the Thing he designs But I believe he will fall short of fetching his Mutual-Consciousness out of either of them And therefore first to Correct that Crude Notion of his That we must not speak of God in Terms importing Nature but Operation I desire this Bold Man as I urged before in Chap. 2 to tell me whether the Names of Iah and Iehovah and I am that I am by which God revealed himself to his People were not Names of Nature and Essence and whether God revealed them for any other purpose than that he might be known and understood by them But for all this he will have us to know from Gr. Nyssen That the Divine Nature is quid 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Thing above Name or Expression And it is so I confess as to an adequate complete Conception or Description of it But then I ask him are not the Divine Operations so too Are we able to comprehend them perfectly and to the utmost of what and how they are When the Psalmist tells us that God has put darkness under his feet Psal. 18. 9. and that his footsteps are not known Psal. 77. 19. And the Apostle in Rom. 11. 33. That his judgments are unsearchable and his ways past finding out And are not these passages an Account of his Dealings and Operations in the Government of the World And yet surely notwithstanding all this we may have some true though imperfect Conceptions both of his Nature and of his Operations also And I desire this Assuming Man to inform me What should hinder but that so much as we Conceive of God we may likewise express and what is more prove too For though Gregory Nyssen has told us That the Divine Nature is unexpressible yet I hope a Thing may be proved though the Nature of it cannot always be throughly expressed But the Truth is he makes this Father Argue at a very odd rate For he tells us Page 115. That one way by which Gregory Nyssen undertakes to prove That the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Specifick Sameness of Nature as this Man understands it proves a Numerical Unity of Nature in the Divine Persons is because the Name God does not so properly signifie the Divine Nature as something relating to it Which is a rare Proof indeed it being as much as to say that the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Sameness of Nature proves one God because God does not signifie Nature But St. Gregory is far from arguing so which besides the Absurdity of it is only denying instead of proving but he proves Sameness and Unity of Nature by Sameness or Unity of Operation and that surely he might very well do without making Unity of Nature only an Unity of Operation And no less absurd is it to represent St. Gregory making Unity of Operation one way whereby the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Specifick Sameness of Nature proves a Numerical Unity of Nature For though Unity of Operation it self proves this yet surely it is not a Medium whereby a Specifick Unity of the said Nature does or can prove it But
case abundantly sufficient St. Cyril of Alexandria says expresly Christ's saying that he is in the Father and the Father in him shews the Indentity of the Deity and the Unity of the Substance or Essence And so likewise Athanasius Accordingly therefore says he Christ having said before I and my Father are one He adds I am in the Father and the Father in me that he might shew both the Identity of the Divinity and the Unity of Essence And so again St. Hilary The Father is in the Son and the Son in the Father by the Unity of an inseparable Undivided Nature By which Passages I suppose any Man of sense will perceive That the thing which the Fathers meant and gathered from those words of our Saviour since expressed by this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was no Unity of Mutual Consciousness which they never mention but an Unity of Essence or Nature which they expresly and constantly do Nor does this very Author deny it as appears from his own words though he quite perverts the sence of the Fathers by a very senceless Remark upon them Page 125. lines 20 21. This Sameness or Unity of Nature says he might be the Cause of this Union in the Divine Persons viz by a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but not explain what this Intimate Union is Now this Author has been already told That the Question here is not what explains this Union but what this Union is But besides this his mistake of the Question I desire him to declare what he means by the Cause of this Union as he here expresses himself For will he make an Union as he calls an Unity in the Divine Persons by Sameness of Nature a Cause of their Intimate Union by a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Mutual In-being of them in each other and affirm also this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be the same thing with Mutual Consciousness If he does so he makes the same thing the Cause of it self For the Sameness of Nature in the three Persons and their Mutual In-being or Indwelling are the very same thing and the same Unity though differently expressed But however if we take him at his own word it will effectually overthrow his Hypothesis For if the Sameness of the Divine Nature in the three Persons be as he says the cause of this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 be the same with Mutual Consciousness it will and must follow That this Sameness or Unity of Nature can no more consist in Mutual Consciousness than the Cause can consist in its Effect or the Antecedent in its Consequent And this Inference stands firm and unanswerable against him But as to the Truth of the Thing it self though we allow and grant the Unity of the Divine Nature in the Three Persons and the Mutual In-being or In-dwelling of the said Persons in each other to be the same Thing yet we deny That this their Mutual In-being is the same with their Mutual Consciousness But that their Mutual Consciousness follows and results from it and for that cause cannot be formally the same with it And so I have done with his 3d. Argument which he has drawn from the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and is indeed nothing else but a bold down-right Perversion of Scripture and a gross Abuse of the Fathers 4. His fourth Argument is from an Allegation out of St. Austin who though he does not as our Author confesses Name this Mutual Consciousness yet he explains a Trinity in Unity as he would perswade us by Examples of Mutual Consciousness particularly by the Unity of three Faculties of Understanding Memory and Will in the same Soul all of them Mutually Conscious to one another of the several Acts belonging to each of them And his 9th Book is spent upon this Argument In which he makes the mind considered with its knowledge of it self and its love of it self all three of them as he says but one and the same Thing a faint Resemblance of the Trinity in Unity And this is what he Argues from St. Austin To which I Answer First That Faint Resemblances are far from being solid Proofs of any Thing and that although similitudes may serve to illustrate a thing otherwise proved yet they prove and conclude nothing The Fathers indeed are full of them both upon this and several other Subjects but still they use them for Illustration only and nothing else And it is a scurvy sign that Proofs and Arguments run very low with this Author when he passes over those Principal Places in which the Fathers have plainly openly and professedly declared their Judgment upon this great Article and endeavours to gather their sence of it only from Similitudes and Allusions which looks like a design of putting his Reader off with something like an Argument and not an Argument and of which the Tail stands where the Head should For according to the true Method of proving things the Reason should always go first and the Similitude come after but by no means ought the Similitude ever to be put instead of the Reason But Secondly To make it yet clearer how unconclusive this Author's Allegation from St. Austin is I shall demonstrate That this Father does not here make use of an Example of Mutual Consciousness by shewing the great disparity between the thing alledged and the thing which it is applyed to and that as to the very Case which it is alledged for For we must observe That the Mutual Consciousness of the Persons of the Blessed Trinity is such as is fully and entirely in each Person so that by virtue thereof every one of them is truly and properly Conscious of all that belongs to the other Two But it is by no means so in those three Faculties of the Soul Understanding Memory and Will For though the Understanding indeed be Conscious to all that passes in the Will yet I deny the Will to be Conscious to any Thing or Act that passes either in the Understanding or the Memory and it is impossible it should be so without exerting an Act of Knowledge or Intellection which to ascribe to the Faculty of the Will would be infinitely absurd It is true indeed That one and the same Soul is Conscious to it self of the Acts of all these three Faculties But still it is by virtue of its Intellectual Faculty alone that it is so And the like is to be said of its Knowledge and of its Love of it self For though it be the same Soul which both Knows and Loves it self yet it neither knows it self by an Act of Love nor loves it self by an Act of Knowledge any more than it can Will by an Act of the Memory or Remember by an Act of the Will which is impossible and amongst other proofs that it is so it seems to me a very considerable one That if a Man could remember by his Will this Author in all likelyhood would not forget
himself so often as he does It is clear therefore on the one side That the Acts of Understanding Memory and Will neither are nor can be Acts of Mutual Consciousness and on the other that Father Son and Holy Ghost do every one of them Exert Acts of Mutual Consciousness upon one another and consequently that as to this thing there is a total entire difference between both sides of the Comparison For which cause it is to be hoped that this Author himself will henceforth Consult the Credit of his own Reason so far as to give over proving That the Unity of the Divine Nature in the three Blessed Persons consists wholly and solely in the Mutual Consciousness of the said Persons by Examples taken from such Created Things as are by no means Mutually Conscious to one another But to manifest yet further the Vanity of this his Allegation out of St. Austin I shall plainly shew wherein this Father placed the Unity of the Three Divine Persons And that in short is in the Unity of their Nature Essence and Substance This is the Catholick Faith says he that we believe Father Son and Holy Ghost to be of one and the same Substance And again Let us believe in the Father Son and Holy Ghost These are Eternal and Unchangeable that is One God of one Substance the Eternal Trinity And moreover speaking of such as would have Three Gods to be Worshipped he adds That they know not what is the meaning of one and the same Substance and are deceived by their own Fancies and because they see Three Bodies separate in three Places they think the Substance of God is so to be understood I think it very needless to add the like Testimonies from other Fathers how numerous and full soever they may be for our Author having here quoted only St. Austin I shall confine my Answer to his Quotation and think it enough for me to over-rule an Inference from a Similitude taken out of St. Austin by a Plain Literal Unexceptionable Declaration of St. Austin's Opinion The Sum of the whole Matter is this That the thing to be proved by this Author is That the Three Divine Persons are One only by an Unity of Mutual Consciousness And to prove this he produces only a Similitude out of St. Austin and that also a Similitude taken from things in which no such thing as Mutual Consciousness is to be found By which it appears that his Argument is manifestly lame of both Legs and as such I leave it to shift for it self 5. In the fifth and last place He tells us That the Fathers also resolved the Unity of the God head in the three Divine Persons into the Unity of Principle meaning thereby that though there be three Divine Persons in the God-head Father Son and Holy Ghost yet the Father is the Original and Fountain of the Deity who begets the Son of his own Substance and from whom and the Son the Holy Ghost eternally proceeds of the same Substance with the Father and Son so that there is but one Principle and Fountain of the Deity and therefore but one God Page 128. line 6. Now all this is very true but how will our Author bring it to his purpose Why thus or not at all viz. That the Numerical Unity of Nature in the three Divine Persons by being founded in and resolved into this Unity of Principle does therefore properly consist in Mutual Consciousness This I say must be his Inference and it is a large step I confess and larger than any of the Fathers ever made Nevertheless without making it this Author must sit down short of his Point And yet if he really thinks that his Point may be concluded from hence why in the Name of Sence and Reason might he not as well have argued from Gen. 1. 1. That God created the Heavens and the Earth and that therefore the Three Divine Persons are and must be one only by an Unity of Mutual Consciousness For it would have followed every whit as well from this as from the other But since the Creation of both I believe never Man disputed as this Man does while he pretends to prove his Mutual Consciousness from the Unity of Principle in the Oeconomy of the Divine Persons And yet if he does not design to prove it from thence to what purpose is this Unity of Principle here alledged where the only Point to be proved is That the Unity of the Divine Nature in the three Persons is only an Unity of Mutual Consciousness But to come a little closer to him If this Author can make it out that the Father Communicates his Substance to the Son and the Father and the Son together Communicate the same to the Holy Ghost by one Eternal Act of Mutual Consciousness common to all three Persons then his Argument from Unity of Principle to an Unity of Nature consisting in Mutual Consciousness may signifie and conclude something but this he attempts not nor if he should would he or any Man living be ever able to prove it But he is for coming over this Argument again and tells us That as Petavius well observes it does not of it self prove the Unity that is to say the Numerical Unity of the God-head but only the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Sameness of Nature i. e. as he elsewhere explains himself the Specifick Sameness of Nature And that therefore the Fathers thought fit to add That God begets a Son not without but within Himself Page 128. line 17 c. In Answer to which Observation though it affects the Point of Mutual Consciousness the only thing now in hand no more than what he had alledged before yet in vindication both of the Fathers and of Petavius himself I must needs tell this Author That it is equally an Abuse to both For as to the Fathers it has been sufficiently proved to him That neither is there any such thing as a Specifick Unity or Sameness of Nature in the Divine Persons nor that the Fathers ever owned any such but still by the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 held only a Numerical Unity of Nature and no other so that their saying That God begot a Son within himself was rather a further Explication of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 than any Addition at all to it And as for Petavius whereas this Man says That he has observed That this Argumentation of the Fathers does not of it self prove the Numerical Unity of the God-head in the three Persons I averr That Petavius observes no such thing He says indeed If this Reasoning viz. from Unity of Principle were considered Absolutely and Universally it would prove rather a Specifick than a Numerical Unity of Nature and gives a Reason for it from Humane Generation But then he does by no means say That the Fathers Arguments in this Case ought to be so considered but plainly limits them to the Divine Generation as of a peculiar kind
Author to the same Sarcastical Irony which he passed upon his Socinian Adversary Page 92. line 17 c. Right very Right Sir a plain Demonstration But still there is one half of his Promise to be yet accounted for viz. The proving his Opinion to have been the constant Doctrine of the Schools And how does he acquit himself as to this Why in a very extraordinary manner too For first instead of alledging the Authority of the School-men he tells us Page 138. That they are of no Authority at all but as they fall in with the Fathers And withall That instead of doing so They use to mistake and clog the sence of the Fathers with some peculiar Niceties and Distinctions of their own And that the Truth is the vain Endeavours of reducing this Mystery to Terms of Art such as Nature Essence Substance Subsistence Hypostasis Person and the like which he says some of the Fathers used in a very different sence from each other have wholly confounded this Mystery And here I cannot but desire the Reader to judge whether this be not a new and wonderful way of procuring Credit to an Hypothesis upon the score of its being the constant Doctrine of the Schools by telling the World as this Man here does that the School-men are a Company of Impertinent Fellows of little or no Authority in themselves and who have by their useless absurd Niceties consounded this whole Mystery For if they are of no Authority but what they derive from the Fathers as he avers why does he quote them upon the same level with the Fathers and plead them both as two distinct Authorities And if they do nothing but pervert and confound this Mystery why instead of alledging them does he not earnestly caution his Reader against them and disswade him from having any thing to do with their dangerous and absurd Writings This certainly is a way of proving a Point by Testimony and Authority so beyond all Example ridiculous that unless the Reader will vouchsafe to read these Passages in the Author himself and so take his Conviction from his own Eyes I can hardly blame him if he refuses to believe my bare Affirmation in a thing so Incredible As for the Terms Essence Substance Subsistence Person and the like which he so explodes I hope I have given my Reader a satisfactory Account both of their usefulness and of the uselesness of such as this Author would substitute in their room in Chap. 2. at large to which I referr him And whereas he says Page 139. line 25. c. That the Deity is above Nature and above Terms of Art and that there is nothing like this Mysterious Distinction and Unity and therefore no wonder if we want proper words to express it by at least that such Names as signifie the Distinction and Unity of Creatures should not reach it It by all this he means that there are no Terms of Art Comprehensive and fully expressive of the Divine Nature and the Mysterious Distinction and Unity of the Persons belonging to it none that I know of thinks otherwise But if he means that no Terms of Art can be of any use to aid us in our inadequate imperfect Conceptions of those great things so as thereby we may conceive of them in some better degree and clearer manner than we could without such Terms pray then of what use are his Self-Consciousness and Mutual Consciousness in this Matter For I suppose he will allow these to be Terms of Art too and such I am sure as he has promised the World no small wonders from But if he will allow any usefulness in those two Terms of Art of his own Inventing towards our better Apprehension of the Divine Nature and Persons the same and greater has the constant use of all Church-Writers proved to be in the Terms Essence Substance Hypostasis Person c. as the properest and most significant the fittest and most accommodate to help and methodize Men's thoughts in discoursing of God and Immaterial Beings of all or any other Terms of Art which the Wit of Man ever yet invented or pitched upon for that purpose And I hope the known avowed use and experience of such great Men and those in so great a number is an abundant overpoise to the contrary Affirmation of this or any other Novel Author whatsoever But all this it seems he endeavours to overthrow and dash with Three Terrible confounding Questions Page 139. Lines 22 23 c. Which yet I can by no means think so very formidable but that they may be very safely Encountered and fairly Answered too As Qu. 1. What says our Author is the Substance or Nature of God I Answer It is a Being existing of and by it self Incorporeal Infinite Eternal Omniscient Omnipotent c. Qu. 2. How can Three distinct Persons have but One Numerical Substance I Answer Every whit as well as they can be said to have but one Numerical God-head or Divine Nature or as they can have one Numerical Mutual Consciousness common to them all Qu. 3. What is the Distinction between Essence and Personality and Subsistence I Answer The same that is between a Thing or Being and the Modes of it And he who neither knows nor admits of a difference between these is much fitter to go to School himself than to sit and pass judgment upon the Schoolmen And as for the Terms Subsistence and Personality they import the last and utmost Completion of the Existence of Things by vertue whereof they exist by themselves so as neither to be Supported by nor Communicable to any Subject Of which two Modes Personality belongs only to Intelligent Beings but Subsistence to all others to whom the aforesaid Definition does agree And this is the True Proper Difference and Distinction between these Two And this Author may take Notice of it if he pleases However having thus answered his Questions tho' to what purpose he proposed them I cannot imagine yet that he may see how ambitious I am to follow his great Example I shall in requital of his three Questions propose these four to him As First Since in Page 139. he affirms the Deity to be above Nature and all Terms of Art so that we want proper Words and Names to express the Distinction and Unity of the Divine Persons by and that such as signifie the Distinction and Unity of Creatures cannot reach it I desire to know of him upon what ground of Reason it is That speaking of this same Mysterious Unity and Distinction in Page 106. lines 11 12 c. He says That the Fathers used several Examples and alluded to several kinds of Union thereby to form an adequate Notion of the Unity of the God-head For if the Deity be so far above Nature and all Terms of Art that there is an utter want of words or Names to express the Unity of it by How could any Examples or Allusions drawn from Nature though never so many form
were far from being Sabellians so they very well knew both what to assert and how to express themselves without giving any ground for their being thought so From all which it follows That for this very cause that Modes of Subsistence import the least Real difference that can be they are therefore the fittest to state the Distinction of the Divine Persons upon So that our Author here relapses into a fault which he has been guilty of more than once viz. In alledging that as an Argument against a Thing which is indeed a most Effectual Reason for it And so I come to his Third and Last Objection against our making these Modes of Subsistence the ground or Formal Reason of the Distinction between the Persons of the Blessed Trinity which is That it makes the Three Divine Persons only Three Modes of the Deity or only Modally distinguished whereas according to his Doctrine there are no Modes in the Deity and much less can a Mode be God And that As all must grant that the Father is not a Mode of the Deity but Essentially God so no Man can think that the Father begot only a Modus and called it his Son whereas a Son signifies a Real Person of the same Nature but distinct from the Father Thus he discourses pag. 83. 84. And is not this close and profound reasoning But as profound as it is if it be at all to his Purpose his Argument must lie in this That all the forementioned Absurdities unavoidably follow from deriving the Distinction of the Three Divine Persons from Three distinct Modes of Subsistence belonging to one and the same Divine Nature But this consequence I utterly deny and to make out the Reason of this denial I shall consider what he has said particularly And here first of all I would fain know Whether this Man will never leave confounding things perfectly different and taking them for the very same For to affirm the Three Divine Persons to be only Three Modes of the Deity is one Thing and to affirm them to be only Modally distinguished is quite another The former we absolutely deny and as positively hold the latter And yet this wretched Fallacy would he impose upon his Reader all along viz. That the Assertors of these Modes of Subsistence in the Trinity make a Person to be only a Modus Subsistendi But that is his own Blunder For we do not say That a Person is only a Modus but that it is the Divine Nature or Godhead Subsisting under such a Modus so that the Godhead is still included in it joyned to it and distinguished by it This is what we affirm and abide by and what sufficiently overthrows his pitiful Objection And as for his Absurd Denial of all Modes in God that has been throughly confuted already so that we have nothing more to do but to admire that Invincible and Glorious Ratiocination of his in these Words p. 84. No Man says he can think that the Father begot only a Modus and called it his Son No good Sir No none that I know of is in any danger of thinking or saying so no more than that Socrates begot only the Shape and Figure of a Man and then called it his Son or to turn your own blunt Weapon upon your self no more than God the Father begot another Self-Consciousness besides his own and called that his Son Nevertheless I hope it will be granted me That Socrates might beget one of such a Shape and Figure and by Xantippe's and this Author 's good leave call that his Son and that God the Father might beget a Person endued with such a Self-Consciousness amongst other Attributes and call that his Son too But I perceive this Author and the Fallacy of the Accident are such fast Friends that it is in vain to think of parting them In the mean time as I told him what we do not hold concerning the Father's Generation of the Son so for his better Information I shall tell him what the Assertors of these Modes of Subsistence do hold concerning it viz. We do hold and affirm That the Father Communicates his Nature under a different Mode of Subsisting from what it has in himself to another and that such a Communication of it in such a peculiar way is properly called his begetting of a Son In which we do not say That the Father begets a Modus no nor yet an Essence or Nature but that he Communicates his own Essence or Nature under such a distinct Modus to another and by so doing begets a Person which Person is properly his Son This Sir is the true Account of what the Assertors of the Personal Modes of Subsistence hold concerning the Eternal generation And if you have any thing to except against it produce your Exceptions and they shall not fail of an Answer I am now come to a close of this Chapter and indeed of the whole Argument undertook by me against this Author In which I have Asserted the commonly received Doctrine about this great Article of the Trinity both from the Ancient Writers of the Church and against this Author's particular Objections and in both fully shewn That the Three Persons of the Blessed Trinity are one and the same undivided Essence Nature or Godhead diversified only by Three distinct Modes of Subsistence which are sometimes called Properties and sometimes Relations So that a Divine Person is formally and properly the Divine Nature Essence or Godhead with and under such a distinct Mode Property or Relation And this I averr to be the common current generally received Doctrine of the Church concerning the Trinity For Councils and Fathers hold it the School-men teach it the Confessions of Churches where they are any thing particular upon this Subject declare it and all Divines both Papist and Protestant in the several Bodies of Divinity wrote by them do Assert it only this Author who yet forsooth owns himself a Protestant of the Church of England denies and explodes it To whom therefore if he were not too great in his own Eyes to be Counselled and Advised I would give this Charitable piece of Counsel for once viz. That for the future he would not presume at such a rate to contradict the whole World till he has learn'd not to contradict himself CHAP. IX In which this Author's Paradoxes hoth Philosophical and Theological as they occurr in this his Discourse are drawn together Examined and Confuted I Am sensible that I am now engaged in a Subject that would threaten the Reader with a very long Chapter should I follow it as far as it would carry me For I am entered into a large Field Viz. this Author 's Paradoxical Assertions In the traversing of which I shall observe no other Method but just to take them in that order in which they offer themselves throughout his Book save only that I shall give my Reader this premonition That such of them as I have particularly
Similitude besides it self to allude to and yet afterwards producing several Similitudes Allusions and Metaphors out of the Fathers to explain both this In-being and this Mutual-Consciousness by God give him a better Memory for as these things represent him no Man living would he but impart his skill could be so fit to teach the Art of Forgetfulness as himself But after all I must not omit to give the Reader notice of another of his Absurdities though of a lower rate viz. That all along Page 57. he takes a Pattern or Example and a Similitude or Metaphor for Terms equivalent whereas a Pattern or Example imports a perfect entire Resemblance between it self and the thing of which it is the Pattern and indeed approaches next to a Parallel Instance while on the other side an Agreement in any one respect or degree is sufficient to found a Metaphor or Similitude upon And therefore tho it may easily be granted this Author That there is no Pattern or Example of such an Union as is between the Father and the Son yet that does not infer that there is nothing in Nature that bears any similitude to it since this may very well be without the other as that place in Iohn 17. 11. and 21. has already proved And now I should here have finished my Remarks upon this particular Head but that there is a certain Passage in order to his proving that there is nothing in Nature like the Unity between the Father and the Son and it is this That in Substantial Unions that which comprehends is greater than that which is comprehended So that if Two Substances should be United by a Mutual-Comprehension of one another the same would be both greater and lesser than the other viz. greater as it comprehended it and less as it was comprehended by it P. 57. Now this Proposition I will neither note as Paradoxical nor absolutely affirm to be false But so much I will affirm viz. That it is nothing at all to his Purpose and that he can never prove it to be True For besides that he still confounds an Example or Parallel Case with a Similitude I would have him take notice First That this Maxim Omne continens est majus contento upon which he founds a Majority of the thing comprehending to the thing comprehended is wholly drawn from and founded upon the Observations made by the Mind of Man about Corporeal Substances endued with Quantity and Dimensions in which the Substance comprehending is and must be of a greater Dimension than the Substance comprehended But what is this to Spiritual Substances Concerning which I demand of this Author a solid Reason Why Two such Substances may not be intimately united by a Mutual-Permeation or Penetration of one another For all that can hinder such a Penetration or Permeation as far as we know is Quantity which in Spiritual Substances has no place and then if such a Mutual-Penetration be admitted these Substances will be mutually in one another and United to one another not indeed by a Comprehension of one another of which there is no need if such a thing could be but by a Mutual-Adequation or exact Coequation of one to the other so that nothing of one Substance shall exist or reach beyond or without the other but the whole of both by such a Permeation mutually exist in each other This I say I neither do nor will affirm to be actually so but I challenge this Author to prove that it cannot be so and till he can it may become him to be less confident In the next place I have one thing more to suggest to him about Substantial Unions which he talks so much of viz. That the Term is Ambiguous and may signifie either First The Union of two or more Substances together and so the Father and the Son who are not two Substances but only two Persons as has been shewn in the foregoing Chapter can never be substantially United Or Secondly It may signifie the Union of Two or more Persons in one and the same Substance which is truly and properly the Union of the Persons of the Blessed Trinity And thus though there is no Instance in Nature of Persons so united yet by way of Allusion and Similitude the Union of the three fore-mentioned Faculties of Understanding Memory and Will in one and the same Soul alledged by St. Austin may pass for a small or as this Author himself calls it Page 126. Line 28. A faint Resemblance of the Union of the said Three Divine Persons in the same Nature or Substance which according to his excellent Talent of Self-Contradiction he positively denies here in Page 57. and as positively affirms in that other now pointed at In fine this Assertion That the Father and the Son cannot possibly be One or in One another which is here the same but by Mutual-Consciousness Page 57. Line 23 24 25. unavoidably infers and implies That they are not One by Unity of Substance Unity of Essence or Unity of Nature For I am sure neither Substance Essence or Nature are Mutual-Consciousness And if the Church will endure a Man asserting this I can but deplore its Condition PARADOX If we seek for any other Essence or Substance in God says this Author but Infinite Wisdom Power and Goodness the Essence of God though considered but as one Numerical Person is as perfectly unintelligible to us as one Numerical Essence or Substance of Three Persons in the Blessed Trinity Page 69 70. Answer This Proposition is False and Absurd and to prove it so I shall lay down these following Assertions First That it is certainly much easier for Humane Reason to conceive one and the same Divine Nature or Deity as Subsisting in one single Person than in Three distinct Persons Secondly That Essence Substance Wisdom Power and Goodness are in the Divine Nature which is a pure simple Act all but one and the same Thing or Being Thirdly That notwithstanding this Essence or Substance and Wisdom Power and Goodness are formally distinct from one another That is to say The Conceptus Objectivus or proper Essential Conception of one does not imply or involve in it the proper Conception of the other Upon which Account one of them cannot properly be said to be the other Now these Three Things thus laid down it is readily granted to this Man That Essence or Substance Wisdom Power and Goodness are really one and the same Being and that therefore it is vain and foolish to seek for any Essence or Substance in God which is not also Wisdom Power and Goodness But this by his favour is not the point For if he will nevertheless say That the Divine Nature expressed by one Infinite Essence or Substance Subsisting in One Person is as unintelligible as the same Subsisting in Three distinct Persons Nay that One and the same Numerical Wisdom Power and Goodness consider'd as Subsisting only in one Person is not more Intelligible than the same
Men of whom alone we now speak both an Act of Knowledge and of Self-reflection too may be without an Act of Love consequent thereupon And if the former may be without the latter then they are not inseparably united as this Author here says they are PARADOX He says That Love is a distinct Act and therefore in God must be a Person P. 133. Answ. If this be a true and good Consequence then the Ground and Reason of it must be This That every distinct Act in God is and must be a distinct Person And if so then every Decree in God whether it be his Decree of Election or of Reprobation if there be such an one or of creating the World and sending Christ into it and at last of destroying it and the like are each of them so many Persons For every Divine Decree is an Act of God and an Immanent Act too as resting within him and as such not passing forth to any Thing without Him that Maxim of the Schools being most true that Decreta nihil ponunt in esse Nor is this all but most of the Divine Acts are free also so that there was nothing in the Nature of them to hinder but that they equally might or might not have been which applied to the Divine Persons would make strange work in Divinity In the mean time if this Author will maintain this Doctrin viz. That Acts and Persons are the same in God as I think he ought in all Reason to maintain the immediate consequences of his own Assertion I dare undertake that here he will stand alone again and that he is the only Divine who ever owned or defended such wretched Stuff PARADOX These three Powers of Understanding Self-reflection and Self-Love are one Mind viz. in Created Spirits of which alone he here speaks adding in the very next words What are mere Faculties and Powers in Created Spirits are Persons in the Godhead c. Pag. 135. at the latter end Answer This is a very gross Absurdity and to make it appear so I do here tell him That the Three foremention'd Powers are no more one Mind than three Qualities are one Substance and that very Term Powers might have taught him as much Potentia and Impotentia making one Species of Quality under which all Powers and Faculties are placed So that his three powers of Understanding Self-Reflection and Self-Love are one only Unitate Subjecti as being subjected in one and the same Mind but not unitate Essentiae as Essentially differing both from one another and from the Mind it self too in which they are Certainly if this Man did not look upon himself as above all Rules of Logick and Philosophy he would never venture upon such absurd Assertions PARADOX He tells us That the Son and Holy Ghost Will and Act with the Father not the Father with the Son and the Holy Ghost Pag. 169. Line 13 14 c. Answ. This is a direct Contradiction For if the Son and Holy Ghost Will and Act with the Father the Father must Will and Act with the Son and the Holy Ghost And he who can find a distinct sense in these two Propositions and much more affirm the first and deny the latter has a better Faculty at distinguishing than any Mortal Man using his Sense and Reason will pretend to It being all one as if I should say I saw Thomas William and John together of whom William and John were in the Company of Thomas but Thomas was not in the Company of William and John And I challenge any sensible thinking Man to make better sense of this Author 's fore-mention'd Assertion if he can But this must not go alone without a further cast of his Nature by heightning it with another Contradiction too which you shall find by comparing it with pag. 188. line 4. where he affirms That Father Son and Holy Ghost act together having before expresly told us here That the Father does not will and act with the Son and Holy Ghost which very Assertion also to shew him the further fatal Consequences of it absolutely blows up and destroys his whole Hypothesis of Mutual Consciousness by destroying that upon which he had built it For if the Father may and does Will and Act without the Son and Holy Ghost then farewel to the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for they must never be alledged in this Cause more PARADOX Nothing can make God visible but a personal Union to a visible Nature Page 234. Line 22 23. Answer This is a most false Assertion and directly contrary to Scripture And to prove it so I shall lay down these Four Conclusions First That the Godhead or Divine Nature neither is nor can be visible to a Corporeal Eye by an immediate sight or Intuition of the Godhead it self Secondly That God is visible to such an Eye only by the special Signs or Symbols of his Presence Thirdly That God is visible by a Body personally united to him only as the said Body is such a Sign or Symbol of his peculiar Presence And Fourthly and Lastly That a Body actually assumed by God for a Time is during that Time as true and visible a Symbol of his Presence as a Body or Nature personally united to him can be And thus it was that God appeared visibly to the Patriarchs in Old Time and particularly to Abraham to Gideon and to the Father and Mother of Sampson who thereupon thought that they should Die for having seen God Face to Face For generally all Interpreters hold the Person who thus appeared to have been the Second Person of the blessed Trinity the Eternal Son of the Father though sometimes called simply the Angel and sometimes the Angel of the Covenant from the Office he was then actually imployed in by his Father as the extraordinary Messenger and Reporter of his Mind to holy Men upon some great Occasions This supposed I desire this bold Author to tell me Whether the second Person of the Trinity God equal with the Father was personally united to the Body which he then appeared in or not If not then the forementioned Assertion That nothing can make God visible but a personal Union to a visible Nature falls shamefully to the Ground as utterly false But if he was personally united to it then these Paradoxes must follow 1. That he either laid down that assumed Body afterwards or he did not if he did then an Hypostatical Union with God may be dissolv'd and not only so but there may be also a thousand personal Unions one after another if God shall think fit to assume a Body and appear in it so often which would be contrary to the sense of all Divines and to all Principles of sound Divinity which own but one hypostatical Union and no more Or 2. He still retains an Union to that assumed Body and then there is a double hypostatical Union viz. One to the visible Body assumed by him in
which he appeared of old and the other to that Body which he was Born with in the World All which Positions are horrid and monstrous but unavoidably consequent from the foregoing Assertion But for the further Illustration of the Case I do here affirm to this Author That God is as visible in an assumed Body whether of Air or Aether or whatsoever other Materials it might be formed of as in a Body of Flesh and Blood personally united to him I say as visible For notwithstanding the great difference of these Bodies and the difference of their Union and Relation to God One being by a temporary Assumption and the other by a personal Incarnation yet no Corporeal Eye could discern this Difference during the Appearance but that one was for the time as visible as the other and therefore since both of them were truly Symbols of God's peculiar Presence the only way by which the Divine Nature becomes visible to a Mortal Eye it demonstratively overthrows that positive false Assertion of this Author That nothing can make God visible but a personal Union to a visible Nature PARADOX All the Circumstances of our Saviour's Birth and Life and Death were so punctually foretold by the Prophets and so peremptorily decreed by God that after he was come into the World there was no place for his Choice and Election And he could not shew either his Love or his Humility by choosing Poverty Death c. Page 242. Line 5. Answer This is False Absurd and Dangerous and indeed next to Blasphemous as overthrowing the whole Oeconomy of Man's Redemption by the Merits of Christ. For that which leaves no place for Choice leaves no possibility for Merit For all Merit is founded in freedom of Action and that in Choice And if Christ after his Incarnation had not this he could not Merit And whereas the Author says That Christ chose all this as the second Person of the Trinity antecedently to his Incarnation I Answer That this is indeed true but reaches not the present Case For what he did before he was Incarnate was the Act of him purely as God but a meritorious Action must still be an humane Action which could not proceed from the second Person before his Assumption of an humane Nature I readily grant and hold That the Actions of Christ's humane Nature received a peculiar Worth and Value from its Union with his Divine Person yet still I affirm that this Worth and Value was subjected and inherent in his humane Actions as such and thereby qualified them with so high a degree of Merit So that whencesoever this Merit might flow they were only his humane Actions viz. such as proceeded from him as a Man that were properly and formally meritorious And whereas this Author states the Reason of this his horrid Assertion upon the Predictions of the Prophets and the peremptory Decrees of God concerning all that belonged to or befell Christ I do here tell him That neither Predictions nor Decrees though never so punctual and peremptory do or can infringe or take away the freedom of Man's Choice or Election about the things so decreed or foretold how difficult soever it may be for humane Reason to reconcile them and if this Man will affirm the contrary he must either banish all Choice and Freedom of Action or all certain Predictions and peremptory Decrees out of the World let him choose which of these two Rocks he will run himself against for he will be assuredly split upon either This vile Assertion really deserves the Censure of a Convocation and it is pity for the Church's sake but in due time it should find it PARADOX Concerning Person and Personality he has these following Assertions which I have here drawn together from several parts of his Book viz. The Mind is a Person Page 191. Line 21 22. A Soul without a Vital Union to a Body is a Person Page 262. Line 17. And the Soul is the Person because it is the Superiour governing power and Constitutes the Person Page 268. Line 28. A Beast which has no Reasonable Soul but only an Animal Life is a Person c. Page 262. Line 18 19 20. And again We may find the Reasonable and Animal Life subsisting apart and when they do so they are Two Persons and but One Person when United Page the same at the end of it And lastly One Agent is One Person Page 268. Line 2. Answer In all these Propositions so confidently laid down by this Man there are almost as many Absurdities and Falsities as there are Words I have already shewn this of some of them in Chap. 3. and therefore I shall be the briefer in my Remarks upon them here And first for that Assertion That the Mind is a Person To this I Answer That the Mind may be taken Two ways First Either for that Intellectual Power or Faculty by which the Soul understands and Reasons Or Secondly For the Rational Soul it self In the former Sense it is but an Accident and particularly a Quality In the second it is an Essential part of the whole Man and therefore upon neither of these Accounts can be a Person For neither an Accident nor a Part can be a Person which as such must be both a Substance and a compleat Substance too And secondly Whereas he says That a Soul without a vital Union to the Body is a Person I tell him That the Soul without such an Union is still an incomplete Being as being originally and naturally designed for the Completion and Composition of the whole Man and therefore for that reason cannot be a Person And then Thirdly whereas he adds That the Soul is the Person because it is the Superiour governing Power and Constitutes the Person I answer That it is the former and does the latter only as it is the prime essential part of the whole Man and for that very cause is an incomplete Being as every part is and must be and consequently cannot be a Person In the next place for an Answer to his saying That a Beast is a Person I refer him to his own positive Affirmation pag. 69. line 18. That a Person and an Intelligent Substance are reciprocal Terms And the same may serve for an Answer to his next Absurdity That when the Reasonable and the Animal Life subsist apart they are Two Persons For the Animal Life separate from the Rational is void of all Reason and the very Definition of a Person is That it is Suppositum Rationale aut Intelligens In the last place By his saying That One Agent is One Person which I am sure he affirms universally of every single Agent he makes every Living Creature under Heaven a Person For every such Creature is endued with a Principle of Life and Action and accordingly acts by it and by so acting is properly an Agent From all which it follows That this Author as great as his Retinue may be has many more Persons in his Family
Reason why he pitches upon Truth Wisdom and Goodness rather than upon Eternity Omnipotence and Omnipresence For these in their proportion express the Divine Nature as much as the other but neither the one nor the other can grasp in the whole Compass of the Divine Perfections so as to be properly denominable from all and every one of them as Substance and Essence and such other Terms as barely import Being are found to 〈◊〉 I conclude therefore that in our Discourses of God Essence Substance Nature and the like are so far from being necessary to be laid aside as disposing our Minds to gross and unfit Apprehensions of the Deity that they are much fitter to express and guide our thoughts about this great Subject than Truth Wisdom or Power or all of them together as importing in them both a Priority and a greater Simplicity and larger Comprehensiveness of Notion than belong to any of them and these surely are Considerations most peculiarly suted to and worthy of the Perfections of the Divine Nature I have now done with my Third Proposition and so proceed to the Fourth and last viz That the Difficulty of our Conceiving rightly of the Deity and the Divine Persons does really proceed from other Causes than those alledged by this Author I shall assign Three As First The Spirituality of the Divine Nature For God is a Spirit Joh. 4. 14. And it is certain that we have no clear explicit and distinct Idea of a Spirit And if so must we not needs find a great difficulty in knowing it For we know Things directly by the Idea's the Species Intelligibiles or Resemblances of them imprinted upon the Intellect and these are refined and drawn off from the Species Sensibiles and sensible Resemblances of the same imprinted upon the Imagination And how can a Spirit incur directly into that Indeed not at all For we can have no knowledge of a Spirit by any direct Apprehension or Intuition of it but all that we know of such Beings is what we gather by Inference Discourse and Ratiocination And that is sufficient But 2. The Second Reason of our Short and Imperfect Notions of the Deity is The Infinity of it For this we must observe That we can perfectly know and comprehend nothing but as it is represented to us under some certain Bounds and Limitations And therefore one of the chief Instruments of our Knowledge of a Thing is the Definition of it And what does that signifie but the bringing or representing a Thing under certain Bounds and Limitations as the Geeek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 manifestly imports Upon which Account what a loss must we needs be at in understanding or knowing the Divine Nature when the very way of our knowing seems to carry in it something opposite to the thing known For the way of knowing is by Desining Limiting and Determining and the Thing known is that of which there neither are nor can be any Bounds Limits Definitions or Determinations And this I think is not only a sufficient but something more than a sufficient Reason why we stumble and fail when we would either have or give a distinct Account of the Deity 3. A Third Reason of the same especially with reference to the Trinity of Persons belonging to the Divine Nature is The utter want of all Instances and Examples of this kind For when a long and constant course of Observation has still took notice that every numerically distinct Person and every Suppositum has a numerically distinct Nature appropriate to it and Religion comes afterwards and calls upon us to apprehend the same Numerical Nature as subsisting in three Numerically distinct Persons we are extreamly at a loss how to conform our Notions to it and to conceive how that can be in three Persons which we never saw before or in any thing else to be but onely in One. For humane Nature which originally proceeds by the Observations of Sense does very hardly frame to it self any Notions or Conceptions of Things but what it has drawn from thence Nay I am of Opinion That the Mind is so far governed by what it sees and observes that I verily believe that had we never actually seen the beginning or end of any Thing the generality of Men would hardly so much as have imagined That the World had ever had any beginning at all Since with the greatest part of Mankind what appears and what does not appear determines what can and what cannot be in their Opinion And thus I have shewn Three Causes which I take to be the True Causes why we are so much to seek in our Apprehensions of and Discourses about the Divine Nature and the Three Glorious Persons belonging to it And the Reason of them all is founded upon the Essential Disparity which the Mind of Man bears to so disproportionate and so transcendent an Object So that it is a vain thing to quarrel at Words and Terms especially such as the best Reason of Mankind has pitched upon as the fittest and properest and most significant to express these great Things by And I question not but in the Issue of all wise Men will find That it is not the defect of the Terms we use but the vast Incomprehensibility of the Thing we apply them to which is the True Cause of all our Failures as to a clear and distinct Apprehension and Declaration of what relates to the Godhead From all which I conclude That the Terms Essence Substance Nature c. have had nothing yet objected against them but that they may still claim the place and continue in the use which the Learned'st Men the Christian Church hath hitherto had have allotted them in all their Discourses and Disputes about the Divine Nature and the Divine Persons which are confessedly the greatest and most Sacred Mysteries in the Christian Religion But as in my time I have observed it a practice at Court That when any one is turned out of a considerable Place there it is always first resolved and that out of merit foreseen no doubt who shall succeed him in it So all this ado in dismounting the Terms Essence Substance Nature c. from their ancient Post I perceive is only to make way for these two so highly useful and wonder-working Terms Self-Consciousness and Mutual-Consciousness And therefore let us with all due and awful Reverence as becomes us expect their August appearance and for a while suffer the Mountain to swell and heave up its Belly and look big upon us and all in good time no doubt we shall have the happiness to see and admire and take our measures of the Mouse But before I close this Chapter to shew how like a Judge upon life and Death this Man sits over all the formerly received Terms by which Men were wont to discourse of God Sentencing and Condemning them as he pleases not content to have cashiered the words Essence Substance and Nature from being used about this
much at present That the Greek Writers in expressing the Godhead or Divine Nature whensoever they do not use the Words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 constantly express it by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and sometimes by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 while 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 were commonly used in the same sense And likewise the Latins where they express not the same by Deitas or Divinitas do as constantly express it by Natura and Substantia which words stand now particularly condemned by this Presuming Man and that not only in Defiance of all the Ancients but also of the Church of England Her Self which has set her Authorizing Stamp upon those Two Words Substance and Person by applying them to this Subject both in her Articles and Liturgy In the first of them teaching us That in the Unity of the Godhead there are three Persons of one Substance Power and Eternity Artic. 1. And in her Liturgy rendring the Athanasian Creed by the same words Neither confounding the Persons nor dividing the Substance As likewise that Passage in the Nicene Creed by the Son 's being of one Substance with the Father And again in the Doxology at the Communion on Trinity Sunday it gives us these full and notable words One God one Lord not one onely Person but three Persons in one Substance After all which with what face can this strange Anomalar Son of the Church while he is sucking her Breasts and at the same time poysoning the Milk with which she should feed her Children I say with what Face can he aver to the World That this word Substance thus embraced owned and used by her ought to be thrown away as the Direct Cause of all the Errours Men are apt to fall into about this great Mystery And that we can have no Notion of Substance but what implies in it something gross and material Which were it so can any one imagine that the Church of England would ever have made use of such a word as could serve for nothing but a Snare and a Trap to betray the Understandings and Consciences of Men into such Errours as may cost them their Souls This is so fouly Reflexive upon her that I would have any Man living give me a good Reason Why this Author should not be call'd upon by Publick Authority to give the Church satisfaction for the Scandal given to all the Orthodox Members of it by the Contumely and Reproach which he has passed upon those Terms and Words which She has thought fit so solemnly to express her Faith and her Devotions by But some Men such is the Regard had to her Laws and Discipline will venture to utter and write any Thing that the Bookseller will pay them for though they throw their Conscience and Religion into the Bargain But God himself who resisteth the Proud seems to have took the Matter into his own Hands and to shew his Controlling Providence over the Minds and Hearts of Men has at length brought this Scornful Man to eat his own words the hardest Diet certainly that a proud Person can be put to and after all the black Dirt thrown by him upon the School-men and their Terms to lick it off again with his own Tongue So that after he had passed such a Terrible Killing Doom upon these words Essence Substance Subsistence Suppositum Person and the like here in his Vindication all on a suddain in a relenting Fit he graciously reaches out his Golden Scepter of Self-Contradiction and Restores them to Life again in his Apology And that the Reader may behold both sides of the Contradiction the more clearly I think it the best and fairest way to give him the Sense of this Author if it may be so call'd in his own Words Vindication I Have not troubled my Reader with the different signification of Essence Hypostasis Subsistence Persons Existence Nature c. which are Terms very differently used by the Greek and Latin Fathers and have very much obscured this Doctrine instead of explaining it P. 101. l. 12. The School-men have no Authority where they leave the Fathers whose sense they sometimes seem to mistake or to clog it with some peculiar Niceties and Distinctions of their own P. 138. l. 28. The Truth is that which has confounded this Mystery viz. of the Trinity has been the vain endeavour to reduce it to Terms of Art such as Nature Essence Substance Subsistence Hypostasis and the like Pag. 138. l. the last P. 139. l. 1. And speaking of the Ancient Fathers in the same Page he tells us They nicely distinguished between Person and Hypostasis and Nature and Essence and Substance that they were three Persons but one Nature Essence and Substance But that when Men curiously examined the signification of these words they found that upon some account or other They were very unapplicable to this Mystery Hereupon he asks the following Questions in an upbraiding manner viz. What is the Substance and Nature of God How can three distinct Persons have but one Numerical Substance And What is the distinction between Essence and Personality and Subsistence And Lastly At the end of the same Page He confesses that some tolerable Account of the School-Terms and Distinctions might be given but that it would be a work of more difficulty than use Apology HE viz. the melancholy Stander-by is very angry with the School-Doctors as worse Enemies to Christianity than either Heathen Philosophers or Persecuting Emperours Pray what hurt have they done I suppose he means the corruption of Christianity with those barbarous terms of Person Nature Essence Subsistence Consubstantiality c. which will not suffer Hereticks to lie concealed under Scripture-Phrases But why must the School-men bear all the blame of this Why does he not accuse the Ancient Fathers and Councils from whom the School-men learn'd these Terms Why does he let St. Austin escape from whom the Master of the Sentences borrowed most of his Distinctions and Subtleties But suppose these unlucky Wits had used some new Terms have they taught any new Faith about the Trinity in Unity which the Church did not teach And if they have only guarded the Christian Faith with an Hedge of Thorns which disguised Hereticks cannot break through is this to wound Christianity in its very Vitals No no They will only prick the Fingers of Hereticks and secure Christianity from being wounded and this is one great Cause why some Men are so angry with the School-Doctors tho' the more General Cause is because they have notIndustry enough to Read or understand them Apology P. 4 5. I have to prevent all exceptions given the Reader the whole Paragraph in which the last Clause strikes Home indeed tho' in such Cases some think this Author would do well to take heed of striking too Home and Hard for fear the Blow should rebound back again and do execution where
when he has done so he opposes them Both to a Numerical Sameness of Nature as appears from the Adversative Particle But placed between them In which let me tell him he is guilty of a very great mistake both by making those Things the same which are not the same and by making an Opposition where there is a real Coincidence For by his favour one and the same Numerical Divine Nature is a Common Nature too forasmuch as without any Division or Multiplication of it self it belongs in Common to the Three Divine Persons The Term Deus indeed is neither a Genus nor a Species Nevertheless all Divines and School-men allow it to be a Terminus Communis as properly predicable of and Common to Father Son and Holy Ghost and in this very Thing consists the Mystery of the Trinity That one and the same Numerical Nature should be Common to and Exist in Three Numerically distinct Persons And therefore for one who pretends to teach the whole World Divinity while he is Discoursing of the Divine Nature and Persons to oppose Common Nature to Nature Numerically One and from the Commonness of it to make the Fathers Argue against its Numericalness whereas the same Divine Nature may be and really is both it is a shrewd sign of the want of something or other in that Man that must needs render him extremely unfit to prescribe and dictate in these Matters In fine the sole Point driven at all along by the Fathers as to the Question about the Unity of the Divine Nature for their Arguments to prove the Coequality of the Three Divine Persons against the Arians are not now before us is an Assertion of a Real Numerical Existing Unity of the said Nature in the said Persons I say a Numerical Unity without making any more steps or degrees in it than One or owning any distinction between Sameness of Nature and Sameness of Essence And much less by making as this Author does a Specifick Sameness of Nature one thing wherein they place the Unity of the Divine Nature and then making Sameness of Essence another and further degree in the Unity of the said Nature and when they have done so by a return back explaining this Sameness of Essence by the Sameness of Nature newly mentioned as he says they do in these words immediately following by way of Exegesis of the former viz. That there is but one God because all the Three Divine Persons have the same Nature Page 107. and the two last Lines All which is a Ridiculous Circle and a Contradiction to boot making Sameness of Nature one step and Sameness of Essence another and then making this Sameness of Essence no more than a Sameness of Nature again so that according to him the Fathers must be said to go further by resting in the very same step which they first made Which way of Reasoning I confess may serve well enough for one who can forget in one Page what he had said in the other just before But by his favour the Fathers were a little more Consistent and understood themselves better than to run Divisions in such a senseless manner upon a Thing that admitted none And thus having shewn how he has dealt with the Fathers in the Account given by him of their Opinion about the Unity of the Divine Nature in the Persons of the Blessed Trinity which was the first Head under which I reduced his Allegations from them I come now in the 2d Place to the other and Principal Head under which he undertakes to prove the chief and more peculiar part of his Hypothesis from the said Fathérs viz. That the Unity and Identity of Nature belonging to the Three Divine Persons consists in the Mutual-Consciousness which is between them That is in Truth That they are therefore One God because they are Conscious to themselves that they are so And here I shall begin with shewing how this Author overthrows the Point undertook by him before he produces any Arguments from the Fathers for it And to this Purpose I shall resume those words of his before cited by me out of Page 106. In which he reminds his Reader That Trinity in Unity being so great a Mystery and of which we have no Example in Nature it is no wonder if it cannot be explained by any one kind of Natural Union and that therefore it was necessary to use several Examples and to allude to several kinds of Union to form an adequate Notion of the Unity of the God-head Now here since our Author's Notion and the Fathers too as he says of this Unity is nothing else but Mutual-Consciousness I desire to Learn of him what necessity there was or is of using several Examples and alluding to several kinds of Union to explain or form an adequate Notion of that And I wonder what kind of Thing he would make of his Mutual-Consciousness should he come to explain and describe it by several Examples and several Kinds of Union But this is not all for he tells us likewise as we also observed before that there are several steps to be taken towards the Explication of this Mystery Whereupon I would again learn of him how many steps are necessary to explain Mutual-Conciousness for one would imagine one single step sufficient to represent and declare a Thing which every Body understands This Author indeed confidently enough Asserts That the Fathers give no other Account of a Trinity in Unity than the same which he gives of it Pag. 101. Line 2. But certainly if the Fathers thought several Examples Steps and Kinds of Union absolutely necessary to explain the Notion they had of this Unity and if these cannot be necessary to explain the Notion of Mutual-Consciousness then it must follow That the Fathers neither did nor possibly could by that Unity mean Mutual-Consciousness And if this Author doubts of the force of this Reasoning let him try his skill and see what Learned stuff he is like to make of it when he comes to explain his Notion of Mutual-Consciousness by several Examples Steps and Sorts of Union and out of them all to form one adequate Notion of this so much admired Thing Wherefore I conclude and I think unanswerably That the Fathers by this Unity between the Divine Persons mean one Thing and this Man quite another and consequently that they have given a very different Account of it from what he gives contrary to his equally bold and false Asseveration affirming it to be the very same And now I am ready to see what he has to offer us from the Fathers in behalf of his Mutual-Consciousness but because I am extremely desirous that the Reader should keep him close to the Point and not suffer him to wander from it which in dispute he is as apt to do as any Man living I shall presume to hint this to him That the Point to be proved by this Author is not that the Three Divine Persons have one and the same
make an Explication of it superfluous this Author having quoted Peter Lombard in such or such a sence ought in all Reason to have produced the Major and more eminent part of the School-men and Writers upon him and shewn their Unanimous Concurrence in the same Sence and Notion which he took him in and quoted him for And this indeed would have been to his Purpose and look'd like proving his Opinion to have been the Doctrine of the Schools Otherwise I cannot see how the Master of the Sentences can be called or pass for all the School men any more than the Master of the Temple can pass for all the Divines of the Church of England Unless we should imagine that this Peter Lombard had by a kind of Mutual Consciousness gathered all his Numerous Brood into Himself and so united them all into one Author So that the Sum of all is this That this Author having declared his Opinion the constant Doctrine both of the Fathers and the Schools to make his words good has produced for it Three or Four Greek Fathers and Two Latin though even these no more to his purpose than if he had quoted Dod and Cleaver or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 out of Homer and lastly One Sentence out of one School-man Which if it be allowed to pass for a good just and sufficient Proof of any Controverted Conclusion let it for the future by all means for this our Author's sake be an Established Rule in Logick from a Particular to infer an Universal And now that I am bringing my Reader towards a close of this long Chapter I must desire him to look a little back towards the beginning of the foregoing Chapter wherein upon this Man 's Confident Affirmation That his Opinion was the constant Doctrine both of the Fathers and the Schools I thought it necessary to state what his Opinion was and accordingly I shew'd that it consisted of Four Heads 1st That the three Persons of the Blessed Trinity were three distinct infinite Minds or Spirits which how far he was from being able to prove from the Authority of any of the Fathers cited by him was sufficiently shewn by us in the preceding Chapter The 2d Was That Self Consciousness was the formal Reason of Personality in the said three Persons and consequently That whereby they were distinguished from each other which in the same Chapter I shew'd he was so far from proving from the Authority of those Ancient Writers that he did not alledge one Tittle out of any of them for it nor indeed so much as mention it in any of the Quotations there made by him And as for the 3d. Member of his said Hypothesis viz. That the Unity of the Divine Nature in the three Blessed Persons Consisted in the Mutual Consciousness belonging to them This we have Examined at large and confuted in this Chapter But still there remains the 4th And last to be spoken to as completeing his whole Hypothesis and resulting by direct Consequence from the other Three viz. That a Trinity in Unity and Unity in Trinity explained by the three forementioned Terms or Principles is a very plain easie and intelligible Notion which having been in a most Confident Peremptory manner affirmed by him all along as I shew in Chap. 1. and upon that Score making so great a part of his Hypothesis ought in all reason to be proved to have been the Sence and Doctrine of the Fathers concerning this Article But not one word does he produce upon this Head neither Nor for my own part do I expect ever to find the least Sentence or Syllable in any Ancient Writer tending this way And I challenge this Author to produce so much as one to this purpose In the mean time how and with what kind of words I find these Ancient Writers expressing themselves about this venerable Mystery I shall here set down Only I shall premise a Sentence or two out of this Author himself and which I have had occasion to quote more than once before from Page 106. line 7. viz. That the Unity in Trinity being as he confesses so great a Mystery that we have no Example of it in Nature it is no wonder if it cannot be explained by any one kind of Natural Union and that therefore it was necessary to use several Examples and to allude to several kinds of Union to form an Adequate Notion of the God head and moreover Page 139. line 26. c. That there is nothing like this Mysterious Distinction and Unity and that we want proper words to express it by All which Passages lying clear open and express in the fore-cited places of this Author I must needs ask him Whether all these are used by him to prove the Unity in Trinity a plain easie and intelligible Notion as he has frequently elsewhere asserted it to be As to go over each of the Particulars First Whether we must account it plain because he says It is a great Mystery of which we have no Example in Nature And Secondly Whether we must reckon it easie because he says That it cannot be Explained by any one kind of Natural Union but that several Examples must be used and several sorts of Union alluded to for this purpose And Lastly Whether it must pass for Intelligible because he tells us That we want proper Words to express it by that is in other Terms to make it Intelligible since to express a Thing and to make it Intelligible I take to be Terms equivalent In fine I here appeal to the Reader Whether we ought from the forementioned Passages of this Author to take the Unity in Trinity and Trinity in Unity for a plain easie Intelligible Notion according to the same Author's affirmation so frequently inculcated in so many Parts of his Book But I shall now proceed to shew as I promised how the Fathers speak and declare themselves upon this great Point And here we will begin first with Iustin Martyr A Singularity or Unity says he is understood by us and a Trinity in Unity is acknowledged But how it is thus I am neither willing to ask others nor can I perswade my self with my Muddy Tongue and Polluted Flesh to attempt a Declaration of such Ineffable Matters And again speaking of the Oeconomy of the blessed Trinity the nature and manner says he of this Oeconomy is unutterable And yet again speaking of this Mysterious Oeconomy of the Deity and the Trinity as one of the greatest Mysteries of the Christian Faith I cry out says he O wonderful For that the Principles and Articles of our Religion surpass and transcend the Understanding Reason and Comprehension of a Created Nature In the next place Dionysius the Areopagite or some very Ancient Writer under that Name calls it the Transcendent Superessential and Superlatively Divine Trinity In like manner Gregory Nyssen we apprehend says he in these viz. the three Divine Persons a certain Inexpressible Inconceivable
it must be either from some distinct Substance or some Accident or some Mode of Being for I defie him or any Mortal breathing to assign a fourth Thing besides these But it cannot be from any distinct Substance for that would make a manifest Composition in the Divine Nature nor yet from any Accident for that would make a worse Composition And therefore it follows That this Distinction must unavoidably proceed from one or more distinct Modes of Being This I affirm and according to my promise made to this Author in the foregoing Chapter I shall be ready to defend the Truth of this Assertion against him whensoever he shall think fit to engage in the Dispute Secondly In the next place for the proof of this from Authority I affirm that all Metaphysicians School-men and Divines at least all that I have yet met with do unanimously concurr in these Two Things 1. That they utterly deny any Accidents in God And 2. That they do as universally affirm Modes of Being to be in God and to belong to him Nay and which is more That they do in these very Modes state the Ground and Reason of the Personalities and the distinction thereof respectively belonging to the Three Persons of the Godhead And for a further proof of what I have here affirmed and withal to shew how unable this Man's Memory is to keep pace with his Confidence whereas in the forementioned page 47. He affirms That all Men mark this Word deny Accidents Qualities and Mâ—des to be in God He himself afterwards in page 48. Owns That the School-men hold these different Modos Subsistendi in the Godhead and accordingly there sets himself as well as he is able to confute them for it Now how shall we reconcile these blind Assertions that so cruelly buâ—t and run their Heads against one another For will he say That the School-men do not grant such Modes to be in God after he himself has done his poor utmost to confute them for holding it Or having said That all Men deny these Modes to be in God and yet that the School men grant and hold it will he say That the School-men are not Men and so come not under that Universal Appellative What the School-men hold and assert in this Matter has been sufficiently shewn already But I must needs tell this Author upon this occasion That he seems to have something a bad Memory and withal to have more than ordinary need of a very good one There is one Thing more which I think fit to observe and it is something pleasant viz. That our Author having exploded all Modos Subsistendi in God and Chastised the School-men for holding them even to a forfeiture of their very Humanity he yet vouchsafes afterwards by a kind of Correctory Explication to allow them in this sence viz. That the same Numerical Essence is whole and entire in each Divine Person but in a different Manner P. 84. Lines 12 13 14. By which Words it appearing that he grants that of the Manner which he had before denied of the Modus it is a shrewd Temptation to me to think That certainly this Acute Author takes Modus for one Thing and Manner for another In fine I appeal to the Judicious and Impartial Reader Whether a Man could well give a more convincing Argument of his utter Unacquaintance with the True Principles of Philosophy and Theology than by a Confident Assertion of these Two Positions 1. That Accidents and Modes of Being are the same Things And 2. That such Modes are not at all to be allowed of or admitted in God Secondly His Second Objection against our stating the distinction of the Divine Persons upon Three different Modes of Subsistence is That these Modes are little better than Three Names of One God Which was the Heresie of Sabellius P. 83. To which I Answer Two Things First In direct and absolute Contradiction to what he asserts I affirm That the difference between Three Modes of Subsistence in the Godhead and only Three distinct Names applyed to it is very great For Names and Words depend only upon the Will and Pleasure of the Imposer and not upon the Nature of the Thing it self upon which they are imposed and for that cause neither do nor can Internally affect it But on the contrary all Modes of Subsistence spring from the Nature of the Thing or Being which they affect both antecedently to and by consequence independently upon the Apprehension or Will of any one So that altho neither Man nor Angel had ever considered or thought of or so much as known that there were such or such things yet the Modes of Subsistence proper to them would have belonged to them as really and as much as they do now And if this Author cannot by this see a vast difference between these and so many bare Names thanks be to God others can both see and defend it too But Secondly Whereas he says That these Three Modes are but little better than Three Names I answer That his very saying so is Concession that they are something at least more and better To which I add further That this something as small a Difference as it makes is yet sufficient to discriminate things which are only Distinguishable and no more For separable or divisible from one another I am sure they are not Nay this is so far from being a just and rational Exception against placing the difference of the Divine Persons in so many different Modes of Subsistence that in the Judgment of very Great and Learned Men it is no small Argument for it For St. Cyril says That the difference between the Divine Persons by reason of the perfect Unity of their Nature as it were blotting out or taking away all Diversity between them is so very small as but just to distinguish them and no more and to cause that One of them cannot be called the other the Father not the Son nor the Son upon any Account the Father c. I thought fit to Transcribe the whole Passage tho' the latter part viz. from the Words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. is most immediately and directly to the Purpose which I here alledge the whole for And Thomas Aquinas tells us That the Divine Persons ought to be distinguished by that which makes the least distinction In like manner Durandus affirms That the first Instance of Plurality or remove from Unity ought to be the least And therefore that the distinction of the Divine Persons since it is the first ought to be by distinct Relations compatible in the same Essence Which for that cause is a less distinction than any that can be made by Things Absolute And Lastly Bellarmine averrs pofitively That the distinction of the Divine Persons ought to be the least that is Possible Supposing all along that it must still be Real and not barely Nominal or Imaginary This was the Judgment of these Learned Men who as they
height of Impudence and Ignorance too to say That that Word confounds our Thoughts Notions and Conceptions of God which all Divines and Philosophers in all Places and Ages have constantly express'd the Nature of God by And which after the Notion of his bare Existence does next in order offer it self to the Mind of Man in its Speculations of this Great Object PARADOX We know not says he how far Infinite Wisdom and Goodness and Power reaches but then we certainly know that they have their Bounds and that the Divine Nature is the utmost Bounds of them p. 79. To which I Answer That for an Infinite Wisdom to have Bounds and the Bounds of it to be the Divine Nature which it self has no Bounds is in ipsis Terminis an express downright and shameless Contradiction See this further laid open in my Second Chapter PARADOX This Creed says he speaking of the Athanastan does not speak of the Three Divine Persons as distinguished from one another P. 88. Line 21. In reply to which I am amazed to read an Assertion so manifestly false and yet so positively uttered For will this Author put out the Eyes of his Reader He tells us here that Athanasius or whosoever else might be the Author of this Creed does not herein speak of the Three Divine Persons as distinguish'd from one another But I demand of him does Athanasius here speak of them as of Three Persons or no If the first then he does and must speak of them as distinguished from one another for that without such a Distinction they are not so much as Three But if he does not speak of them as of Three and as of Three thus distinguished What then mean those Words of the Creed There is one Person of the Father another of the Son and another of the Holy Ghost Do these Words speak of these Persons as distinguished or do they not If they do then what this Man has here said of the Creed is shamelesly false and if they do not express the said Persons as distinct I defie all the Wit of Man to find out any Words that can PARADOX He tells us That the Title of the one Only true God cannot be so properly attributed to any one Person but only to the Father p. 89. Answer This I have already shewn in Chap. 5. p. 137. to be both false and dangerous as by direct consequence either making several sorts of Gods or excluding both the Son and the Holy Ghost from the one true Godhead At present I shall only say thus much That the One only true God and the true God are Terms perfectly equivalent and not only Commensurate but Identical in their signification and withal That this very Author himself affirms Page 186. Line the last That the Son must be included in the Character of the only True God which how he can be without having this Character properly affirmed and predicated of him and his sustaining thereby the Denomination of the only True God let this Confident Self-contradicting Man declare if he can In the mean time let me tell him further That these Terms the True God and the only True God do both of them import an Attribute or Denomination purely Essential and by no means Personal or Oeconomical And moreover that every such Attribute does and must agree to all the Three Persons equally and whatsoever equally agrees to them all may with equal Propriety be affirmed of all and each of them and consequently that the Title of the One only True God may every whit as truly and properly be attributed to the Son and Holy Ghost as to the Father himself See more of this in my forementioned Chapter PARADOX I affirm says he that the Glory and Majesty and all the other perfections of the Three Divine Persons are as distinct as their Persons are And again These perfections are as distinct as the Persons and yet as Numerically one and the same as the Godhead is p. 91. Answer The first part of these Assertions is utterly inconsistent with and wholly overthrows the last And it is indeed very horrid as by inevitable consequence inferring a Tritheisme For if the essential Perfections of God which in truth are only the Divine Essence under several Conceptions and Denominations are as distinct as the Persons whom the Church acknowledges to be really distinct then it will and must follow That in the Trinity there are Three really distinct Essences or Godheads as well as Three really distinct Persons And if they are thus distinct it is impossible that the Three Persons should by virtue thereof either be or be truly said to be really one so that this Author we see has herein asserted a Trinity with a Witness but as for any Unity in it you may go look But I perceive he was driven to this false and absurd Assertion by that Argument of his Socinian Adversary urging him That if the Essential Glory and Majesty in Father Son and Holy Ghost be but One then it cannot be said that their Glory is equal their Majesty co-eternal forasmuch as Unity is not capable of Equality which must of necessity be between two or more This I say no doubt drove him to this Inconvenience In Answer to which Objection though I owe not this Author so much Service as I shall readily grant That where there is an Equality there must be also a Plurality of some sort or other whatsoever it be So I shall observe That the Divine Essence Glory or Majesty which I still affirm to be but different Names of the same thing falling under divers Conceptions and every other essential perfection of the Godhead may be considered two ways First Absolutely and Abstractedly in it self and as prescinding from all personal Determinations in which sense the Divine Nature Essence and every Essential Attribute included in it is and always must be taken whensoever in Discourse it is spoken of either as compared with or contra-distinguished to all or any of the Persons And accordingly in this sense being absolutely One it is incapable of any Relation of Equality Forasmuch as one Thing considered but as One cannot be said to be equal to it self Or Secondly This Glory Majesty or any other Essential perfection of the Godhead may be considered as sustaining Three several Modes of Subsistence in Three distinct Persons which said Modes as they found a plurality in this Essential Glory or Majesty though by no means of it so this Plurality founds a Capacity of Equality by virtue whereof the same Glory according to its peculiar way of Subsisting in the Father may be said to be equal to it self as Subsisting after another way in the Son and after a third in the Holy Ghost so that immediately and strictly this Equality is between the Three several Modes of Subsistence which this Essential Glory or Majesty sustains or if you will belongs to the said Glory for and by reason of them And this is the true Answer
is an act of Intellection and so must issue from an Intellective Faculty which the Body is not endued with and therefore cannot act by and withal every act of the Will is only an Intelligible and not a sensible Object and consequently cannot be otherwise apprehended and perceived than intellectually And as for the Commands of it a Command operates and moves only by way of moral Causation viz. by being first known by the Thing or Agent which it is directed to which thereupon by such a Knowledge of it is induced to move or Act accordingly But now the Will does not thus Act upon the Body the Body having no Principle whereby to know or understand what it Commands And therefore when we say That the Will Commands the Body in strictness of Truth it is only a Metaphorical Expression For the Will or Soul exerting an Act of Volition moves the Body not by Command but by Physical Impulse That is to say It does by its native Force Energy and Activity first move and impell the Spirits and by the instrumental Mediation of them so moved and impelled it moves and impells the Body and this by as real an Impulse as when I push or thrust a thing with my hand For though indeed a material Thing cannot actively or efficiently move or work upon an Immaterial yet Philosophers grant that an Immaterial as being of the nobler and more active Nature can move impell or work upon a Material and if we cannot form in our Minds an Idea of the Mechanism of this Motion it is because neither can we form in our Minds an Idea of a Spirit But nevertheless Reason and Discourse will Evince That the Thing must be so PARADOX He tells us That the Human Nature of Christ may be Ignorant of some things notwithstanding its personal Union to the Divine Word because it is an Inferiour and Subject Nature Page 270. Line 12 13 14. Answer These Words also are both absurd and false And First They are Absurd because no Rules of Speaking or Arguing permit us to say of any Thing or Person That it may be so or so when necessarily it is and must be so For the Term may imports an Indifference or at least a possibility to both sides of the Contradiction So that when a Man says That a Thing may be thus or thus he does by consequence say also That it may not be thus or thus And therefore to say That the Human Nature of Christ notwithstanding its personal Union to the Word may be ignorant of some Things when it cannot but be ignorant of some nay of very many Things is Absurd And in the next place also To make the Subjection of the Human Nature to the Divine the proper Cause of this Ignorance is false and the Assignation of a non causa pro causâ It being all one as if I should say That such an one cannot be a good Disputant because he has a blemish in his Eye For it is not this Subjection of it to the Divine Nature that makes it ignorant of many Things known by that Nature but the vast disparity that is between these Two Natures viz. That one of them is Infinite the other Finite which makes it impossible for the Infinite to communicate its whole Knowledge to the Finite Forasmuch as such a Knowledge exceeds its Capacity and cannot be received into it so as to exist or abide in it any more than Omnipotence or Omnipresence or any other Infinite Divine Perfection can be lodged in a Finite Being And besides this this very Author in the immediately foregoing Page had not only allowed but affirmed That the Body which certainly is both united to the Soul and of a Nature Subject and Inferiour to it was yet conscious to the Dictates and Commands of the Soul Wherefore where Two Natures are united the bare Subjection of one to the other is not the proper Cause that the Nature which is Subject is ignorant of what is known by the Nature which it is subject to For if Subjection were the sole and proper Cause of this Ignorance the Inferiour Nature would be equally ignorant of every Thing known by the Superiour which yet according to this Man 's own Doctrine of the Consciousness of the Body to the Soul is not so This Consideration I alledge only as an Argument ad hominem having already by the former Argument sufficiently proved the falseness of his Assertion But I shall detain my Reader no longer upon this Subject though I must assure him that I have given him but a Modicum and as it were an handful or two out of that full heap which I had before me and from which I had actually collected several more Particulars which I have not here presented him with being unwilling to swell my Work to too great a Bulk Nevertheless I look upon this Head of Discourse as so very useful to place this Author in a true Light that if I might be so bold with my Reader I could wish that he would vouchsafe this Chapter of all the rest a second Perusal upon which I dare undertake that it will leave in him such Impressions concerning this Man's fitness to Write about the Trinity as will not wear out of his Mind in haste And yet after all this I will not presume to derogate from this Author's Abilities how insolently soever he has trampled upon other Mens but content my self that I have fairly laid that before the Reader by which he may take a just and true measure of them And so I shall conclude this Chapter with an Observation which I have upon several occasions had cause to make viz. That Divinity and Philosophy are certainly the worst Things in the World for any One to be Magisterial in who does not understand them CHAP. X. In which the Author 's Grammatical and such like Mistakes as they are found here and there in his Writings are set down and remarked upon COuld this Author have carried himself with any or dinary degree of Candor and Civility towards those whom he wrote against he had never had the least Trouble given him by me upon this Head of Discourse But when I find him treating Learned Men with so much Disdain and Insolence and much liker a rough ill-bred School-Master domineering over his Boys than a fair Opponent entring the Lists with an Ingenuous Antagonist I must confess I cannot think my self obliged to treat him upon such Terms as I would an Adversary of a contrary Temper and Behaviour One Man and a very Learned one too he flirts at as if he could not distinguish between Conjunctive and Disjunctive Particles Vindication of his Case of Allegiance pag. 76. the Two last Lines Another he Scoffs or rather Spits at as neither understanding Greek nor Latine Vindic. Trin. Pag. 95. Line 25. and thereby I suppose would bear himself to the World as no small Critick in both As for the Socinians of which number this latter is