intention but rather with a charitable design to aid them in their streights for since they have so weak a Faith that they cannot believe Gods word without relief from the evidence of Reason I hope I have sufficiently shewed them that they may be most strictly Catholick Christians and yet most rigorously Rational Men. For if they will reason warily enough I see not how they can use reason too much about the Christian Religion And it will ever be found most reasonable that Christian Men should imploy all the Reason that God hath given them not to spie out incongruities in the Language which he uses with his Church but rather to maintain the verity of all those things which he has with perspicuity and great veracity ef expressions asserted in the Holy Scripture which I shall presently shew he has done on the Subject in hand Indeed the Papists of late by a sly Artifice would have had us account the Trinity a sensless Doctrine that it might make a fit Prologue as they used it to introduce the Monster of their Transubstantiation but we find it is no way accommodate to any such purpose For what the Christian Doctrine Teaches of the Trinity is exactly agreeable to the Reason and Nature of the Supream Spirit but Transubstantiation teaches nothing but what is repugnant to the Condition of the Corporeal Nature For first they tell us of a thing that has not at all the Nature of a Body as they describe it and then teach us that the Bread and Wine are turned into that Body It may indeed well enough beseem Persons that have Worldly Designs of their own to be served upon the Christian Religion to resolve Faith and all the Points of it into an obscurity of assent that other Men may take their Creeds from their mouths and believe as they would have them for their own turns but for such as intend no other end in their Faith than the Salvation of their own and others Souls I see not but reason if used with soberness is of great advantage and comfortable use to them in their Religion For my own part I like not the Catholick Doctrine of the Trinity ever the worse but rather much the better because I find that all the reason in the World which I can understand is in that Mystery on the Churches side CHAP. VIII The Scripture Evidence NAture teaches first what a thing is or is not in it self and having implanted in us self-love and other concerns thereby prompts us to consider the thing Comparatively with reference to our own interests So that the Natural account of the thing is best delivered in the most simple and bare terms But Prophetical institution passing through the Spirits of the Holy Men of God is to be delivered in terms that express both the things themselves and their devout regard to them conjunctly and therefore such an institution is at once adapted to instil Knowledge and Religion into the Hearers Minds for Religion is not naked speculation but that belief of things whereby we form the Councels of our Lives and Affections of our Hearts St. Paul assures us that this is eminently the Character of the Christian Institution which he therefore stiles the Doctrine and again the Truth which is according to Godliness and refers to this notion on so many several occasions that it is plain he looks upon it as one of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Christian Religion Therefore the Expressions wherein the Christian Doctrine is taught will accordingly be such as in the common use of words do bespeak reverence or Holy Fear and Love The Gospel Preaches Christ to be the Lord of all to whom Divine Honour is due on the account of the Excellency of his Person Now since the subsistence of things in conception as amongst Men is but weak as being only notional and in common use through pravity is extreamly subject to vanity had Christ been called the Divine conceptus the infinite distance betwixt Gods conceptions and ours being not obvious enough in common use this Style had not been so well accommodated to procure Reverence as is calling him the Son the only Begotten Son of God But the Religious Concern being set aside for the bare truth of the thing Nature more expeditely teacheth it by assuring us that God is a perfect Mind and therefore he perfectly conceives or has a perfect conception of his own Divine Nature for this is certain at the first sight from the Condition of the Mental Nature But if we say God is a perfect Mind therefore he begets his own Nature many things must be cleared before the necessity of this Consequence will be perceived whereby we see Nature teaches best in one set of Expressions and Prophets in another which by the way may take off offence if I have given any by using some terms in explication of the Trinity that are not Scriptural whilst the Argument led me not to consider the importance of it in Religion but precisely the Natural Evidence of its Truth 2. But when I consider that almost all words are inadequate to the significaâ—ion of any words in other Languages I easily believe that this Observation may be needful only for our Vulgar Tongues for so large is the signification of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 gigno c. That if we use any term significant of Breeding it is included within the comprehensiveness of these words which are the Scripture expressions most commonly used on this occasion For these words applyed to Corporeal Productions import the joint interest of both Sexes and the intire efficiency of either severally as likewise breeding by spiration by fusion by solar influence by the Earth as in Beasts Insects Fishes Plants c. So that they are not limited to any particular form of causation in breeding but signifie with the greatest latitude and are therefore to be rendred into the Modern Languages by such words as are in use upon particular occasions Whether then we say conceive or beget we are within the compass of the original significancy For whether we say well the Earth breeds or begets Grass we say well terra gignit herbas So homo herba nascitur is well said though it be neither well englished Man and Grass is born nor Man and Grass do grow 3. It is manifest both 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. signifie not only Coporeal Generation or Conception but likewise Mental and this with such indifference that I see no reason why they should be thought less proper or more metaphorical when they are applied to these than to the others for Proud Thoughts Humble Thoughts Love Joy Fear and Grief c. are all properly begotten in our minds by being conceived in our minds These indeed have only a Notional Subsistence but yet their Nature such as it is is begotten by the minds conceptive powers wherefore if a Substantial Nature is conceived in a mind by a Conception wherein
three really distinct II. If the Case really be that God does indeed subsist in Three Persons then he can no more subsist in one only than he can cease to Subsist at all For then the Condition of the Divine Nature is such that it comports not with it to Subsist in fewer than three real Subsistences but if on the contrary it really doth Subsist in one only then the Nature is such as admits no more This therefore is a natural Question and touches the Reason of the Divine Nature III. But which of these two is really the Case cannot be concluded from our absolute certainty of the single Subsistence of every and all other things for they bring all dependent Substences and â—od Self Originte The Trine-subsistence which is repugnant and contradictious to the Nature of such dependent Beings may be the only way of Subsistence competible to a self original Being Now all the Arguments of the Opposers of the Trinity do plainly rest upon a supposed Parity or Identity of reason in this Case for they turning off their Eye from the Reason of the very thing it self which they were reasoning about and looking round the World to pick up reasons as they could spy them lying scatter'd up and down elsewhere imagin'd those reasons which they were certain suited exactly with the Subsistence of all other things could not but be fit measures of their Judgment about the Subsistence of the Deity in this Inquiry Now this way of Arguing being manifestly Fallacious they are plainly unreasonable in charging the Church's Faith with contradictions and absurdities IV. Since the single Subsistence of all dependant Substences is no valu'd Argument of the single Subsistence of the independant Being the onely Question in reason that remains is whether we knowing many things of God are thereby able to discover from the Conditions and Perfections of the Divine Nature it self that it subsists in three Persons or on the other hand in one only For if we can do neither of these we cannot at all use reason in this Question for then all reasonings about it are Sophistical But we must quit all pretence to reason from the Nature of things and follow wholly the reason of speech in the Scripture V. But whatever can be thus discover'd this is certain that the reason of the Divine Nature it self does not shew that one of the three Divine Persons if three there be is become Man in the Person of Jesus Christ tâ—erefore the Christian Tradition as such is a mystery and is wholly of Scripture Revelation which according to the Reason of Speech even by the Confession of the Adversaries does deliver the Doctrine of the Catholick Faith The Proceedings therefore which Christians have ever used in its defence have been exactly conform to the Quality of this Question for they never pretended to build their Belief of this Mystery upon the Reason of the Divine Nature or any other but on the Testimony of the Divine Word VI. As the Christian Faith of this Mystery is not built upon Natural Reason so it also appears that it cannot be impugned from any Reasons unless they be such as are deducible from the peculiar Conditions and Perfections of the Deity it self Now all these I shall endeavour to shew are so far from opposing the Christian Mystery that they Argue that the God-head according to the Reason of that Blessed Nature does Subsist in three Natural Persons so far therefore as Reason hath any Vote it gives it for the Church's Faith VII This would not have been needful to us Christians but that the importunity of the Anti-Trinitarians without Reason's suffrage will not be satisfied with the fulness of Scripture Evidence nor yield our Saviour his due Honour For though by Christ's appointment they are Devoted to the Father the Son and the Holy Ghost yet after this Vow they will make Inquiry as if they were still in a state of deliberation and were to consult ex integro whether they should stand to their Vow or not It being certainly much better joyfully to bear than resistively to cast off a Yoak of Christ's Imposing I confess I know no better Service could be done to these Men than to bring them back into the Bond of their Violated Covenant But I shall not undertake such an Office because I fore-see that I cannot on this Subject speak to them for the just Honour of our Blessed Lord and Master but they will take it for an Obloquy cast upon them For if I say and mean as I say that all Men are to honour the Son John 5. even as they honour the Father they presently feel I am rubbing on their sore place and I know the Opinion of a Party is a sore which brooks well enough to be clawed but will not indure to be rubbed VIII To spare them therefore and comply somewhat with my own Genius which little likes to deal with the extream touchiness of a darling Doctrine I shall apply my Self to this Work directly as a Service of Christ and his Church from whom I hope for better acceptance leaving them to their beloved liberty of taking what they like for their own use Being nevertheless perswaded that if whilst they refuse to captivate their understandings to the Obebedience of the Faith they have not at the same time enslaved them to the Tenents of Arius Socinus and such other confident but unwary Reâ—sâ—â—ers they will find whilst I laboured to serve the Interâ—â—s of the Heâ—venly Kingdom I have done and that not unawares what may be useful and even satisfactory to the more moderâ—te amongst them IX That I may make then this Discourse the more Serviceable I shall first shew that the reason of â—â—e Divine Nature it self doth sufficienâ—â—y 〈◊〉 the Being of one Gâ—d and three Persons Secondly That the Holy Scripture does Tâ—ach the very same Doctrine with the Nature of the thing Thirdly Because we Believe from the Gospel Institution that Jesus Christ is one of the Three Persons I shall give an Account how Congruous that Revelation is to what we infer from the Reason of the Divine Nature Lastly since Christ does enter our belief of the Trinity into the Stipulation made in our Covenant of Life and Peace with God I shall explain that its Faederal use and if upon the whole we find that the Reasons of the thing in its self and in its accord with the Scripture and in what befel it by Christ's Incarnation and in its Baptismal use do all concur to assure us of the Truth of the Blessed Trinity I hope it will no longer remain amongst us in the state of a Question but all sober men will agree in the Faith and Worship of one God in Trinity and Trinity in Unity X. I am sensible that by my having ventured to blame other mens Reasonings I have imposed a Law upon my self which I shall think in the Rational Inquiry we sufficiently comply with if we transgress not
and Earth But whether they hold these Doctrines with an equal or different concern yet it seems plain enough they hold both the one and the other in Subordination to their Grand Principle That the reason of things is the Rule of interpreting Scripture So that all the concern they express for either being their supposed consonancy with reason if it may appear as I hope it will by the reason of the thing that the Deity is the Supream Spirit Aliusque idem nascitur Hor. Carm. 2 and that the reason of the Supream Spirit speaks it to be of such absolute perfections that it Conceives or Begets it self in a second Personal Subsistence as real as the first Then have they in this Doctrine as well as the other parties what they sought for in vain in their own way and find the reason for their Faith which there they missed Wherefore all the Theoretical interests of the several Contenders being thus fully and entirely secured remove the Spirit of opposition which all disclaim and we have an unity in these points without any use of a Syncritism which is but a Politick Engine to tye mens Tongues together when their Hearts are removed as far as before from one another Whose use is to work like death which so far as it takes away the power of doing evil mortifies likewise the power of doing good I would I loved moderation and gentleness better than I do but I would still retain my present sentiments so far as rather to be angred than killed Concord in these things is most desirable but if that cannot be had men ought to contend so much as is needful to preserve the Faith but no more and not stifle their Religion for fear there should be quarrels about it 2. But though all the Conscientious interests for which any are concerned as seekers of Truth be here provided for yet possibly some Pious Persons may fear that such an attempt as this suits not with some other things for which we ought to have a Religious regard Such are the incomprehensibleness of God the Modest and Humble Opinion of our own Vnderstandings the Mysticalness of the Christian Religion and the Practice of the Antient Fathers which all by inquiring into this Mystery by the Light of Nature seem to be treated with too much neglect Though much might be said to satisfie these indefinite fears yet my leisure permits me to say but little which yet I hope may be enough 3. For the Infinity or Incomprehensibleness of the Deity that signifies not that we can know nothing of him by the Light of Nature for then we were not to say he Subsists in an Incomprehensible Being but that if he be he is in utter darkness But it signifies that whatever Men or Angels can know of him though they knew it in fallibly yet no one knows all or the all of any Divine Perfection or hath an adequate Conception of any thing that is in the Divine Nature But we may for all this know many things of him and that certainly Though we can say he is a Good and not a Bad Being and he is Wise and not Foolish and so far determine of the condition of the Divine Being yet this argues not that God is ever the more comprehensible by us in that sense wherein incomprehensibleness is a Divine Perfection and to be revered by us We can discover that God has an Eternal Subsistence if the Subsistence of the Deity be one Personal Subsistence this one Personal Subsistence is as Incomprehensible as three Personal Subsistences are unless we comprehend not the difference betwixt an Vnite and the Number three which we are sure we do And if we can discover from the Divine Perfections that the Deity Subsists in three Persons not in one only we may be said to know something more of God but nothing with a comprehensive knowledge And therefore the more we know of the Divine Nature the more distinctly we perceive that God is incomprehensible Let us then use the same measures here that we are certain be right in like cases When we say that God knows and withal that knowledge in God is not the same that knowledge is in created minds yet we do not therefore say that Gods knowledge is no knowledge or less really knowledge but infinitely more really knowledge or has infinitely more the true nature of knowledge in it than we can conceive by the knowledge in the Creatures Thus we think of his Goodness Existence Power and the rest of the Divine attributes Proportionably we are to affirm of the Incomprehensibleness of the Trinity When we say the Deity is one in all and every one of the three Persons Incomprehensibly We mean not thereby that it is not one or less one but infinitely more one than we can conceive by any Vnity in a Creature And when we say the Subsistences of the Divine Nature are incomprehensibly three we mean not that they are not really three or less distinctly three but infinitely more than we can conceive by any diversity in the Creatures Tho' as the Unity of the Deity is not a Vnity of the same kind so neither is the diversity of the Persons a diversity of the same kind with that of the Creatures nor from the same reason nor manifest by the same evidence Thus the Infinity of God makes not our knowledge of God no knowledge nor deceives us in what we know of him but convinces us that we know but in part The Incomprehensibleness of God then hinders not our knowledge of the Trinity no more than it hinders the knowledge of his Wisdom Power Goodness which are all incomprehensible as well as the Trinity and yet are known by the things that are made 4. Modesty and Humility teach us not to think our Intellectual Capacities less than they are 't is enough in all reason to think them so very little as they are Scepticisme is neither Modesty therefore nor Humility but an affected Wildness that violates all the measures of these and all other vertues which require not a a man to deny his own perceptions and doubt everlastingly but only that he vouch not such perceptions more clear and certain than really they are If then by a wary process of thoughts we may perceive that the most absolute perfection of a Spirit argues three distinct Subsistences of whatsoever is in the Nature of that Spirit we may then without breach of modesty believe that the most rational conception of the Supream Spirit is the Being of one God and three Persons And if we have any suspicion remaining about the due conduct of our thoughts yet we must still confess that the best reason we have persuades and prompts to this conception For since we evidently perceive that the Deity cannot Subsist in three distinct real Subsistences unless it be of most absolute perfections and on the contrary we cannot conceive how such a most absolutely perfect Being can
save one that is God 12. Because this free Volition is a complacential Volition and is the Divine Moral goodness which is substantial Câ—p. 5.19 therefore the Divine Blessedness which is his being most highly pleased is also a substantial Blessedness and this also as such is an incommunicable Attribute 13. A Complacential Volition is Joy and Delight Now Mental Glory is the fulness oâ— Joy in the Mind exulting in the stability and compleatness of the Blessedness of its own Being Therefore the Divine Glory which is the same with the Divine Joy as the Divine Joy is the same with the Complacential Volition hath also a substantial Subsistence in God We confess that Goodness Blessedness Glory in God are substantial But unless there be three substantial Subsistences of the Godhead and the willed real Subsistence be the third I think we meerly say so but have no meaning 14. From hence we learn also that the Deity is a Being of the most absolute Liberty and that there is no necessity superiour to the Divine Will The Heathen Poetry and Mythology fastened their Deity as it were to a Stulp by the Chain of an uneluctable Fate Their Philosophers in pity let him loose from the Sculp but then the greater part of them taught him such a device of folding his hands and feet together himself semel dixit semper seqâ—itur that he had as little Liberty ever after as when he was bâ—und with the Chain But the Christians ever confessed their God to be most absolutely free believing that he is most freely what he is and does most freely what he does For he that worships one God in Trinity and Trinity in Unity in consequence he must not deny this absolute Freedom to be in God as may thus in short be seen There is no will but in a conscious life Cap. 2.11 Every Spirit is indued with a will Every will is naturally free Now no Subsistence of the Deity is it self unless in co-existence with the other two Cap. 2.9 Therefore since the third Subsistences of the Deity doth subsist by being freely willed all the Three Subsistences do freely subsist Cap. 6 5. Cap. 5.20 and so the Deity does wholly and eternally subsist and act by its own free choice 15. And yet there is no fear lest the Divine Nature should therefore become uncertain and contingent because it subsists wholly by its own free choice For seeing that Holiness in a Spirit is a plenary resolved unreserved complacential good will to the Supream Being and that God is most absolutely holy Cap. 5 1. he doth therefore with a Volition eternally unchanged and yet most absolutely free will the Subsistence of the Divine Being 16. From all which we must therefore conclude that the Universe of all being created and uncreated hath its sanction establishment sanctification preservation and persistence in the eternally inviolate Holiness of God To this sense do the Blessed Society sing continually Holy Holy Holy Lord God Omnipotent which was and is and is to come Thou art worthy O Lord to receive Glory and Honour and Power for thou hast created all things and foâ— thy will they are and they were created Such is the Worship such is the God of Christians CHAP. VII Of the Personalities in the Deity THE Adversaries Opposition rather than any thing else makes it needful to shew these Three distinct real Subsistences of the Deity are Three Personalities For they imagine if there be Three several Persons and every one God then there are Three several Gods Even as amongst us if there be Three several Persons and every one a Man then there are Three several Men. Both parts of this Argument are mistakes This matter therefore I shall expedite in three Considerations before we proceed to the Scripture Evidence 1. Whatsoever is to be said about Personages amongst Men no Solocism can be charged on the Language of the Church for styling the Father Son and Holy Ghost Three Persons For it matters not what the word Person signifies when spoken of any other Subject since it is certain that constant use for above a thousand years in the Church hath fixed it to signifie nothing else than one of these three when we speak of the Divine Being For what all Men mean by a Voice when they speak of any particular matter that is the true and genuine signification of the word when applied to that matter whatever they mean by it when they are speaking of another subject and were it not so all the Languages of the World must be modell'd almost quite anew Should a Sea-man having a Country Nail maker and a Taylor aboard with him tell them after he had turned his Ship that he had just then made a Tack either of them might tell him it was no such matter the one because it had neither head nor point as all Tacks have and the other because it had never a stitch in it But I think such refined Wit would qualifie neither of them for a Doctor whatever the Lord Mayor may think of it upon the next vacancy for a Clown For in good earnest to me they seem not to observe what is the reason of the proper significancy of words who cavil at this Whether then there be three such distinct Subsistences of the Deity may indeed be inquired but whether they are to be styled Personalities needs no further search than to know whether the Christian Church hath so used to call them and this is a matter of fact evident beyond all dispute 2. What they assume about the reason of Personalities amongst Men is likewise a mistake For Cicero who best knew the sense of persona Englished person after a long discourse to that purpose tells us the quite contrary Tâ—â— â—â—t â—â—â— 1. For says he Nature gives or as it were imposes upon every Man two persons and he himself assumes a third Here then is a Trinity of persons in every one Man from the condition of things in Nature wherefore whatever the Nature of a Personality is we are assured by the Soveraign Authority which this Man hath ever had in these matters that a single substance one rational Nature is not only capable of having but actually hath three Personalities and that every individual Man is no less than three persons and those three persons no more than one Man There is therefore no absurdity contradiction or the least incongruity in speech from the Nature of a Personage to affirm that one single Divine Nature or Substance is no more than One only God and that One God no less than Three Persons So that all the reproach that hath been cast upon the Church on this account has been owing not to its Doctrine but to the Scoptical Humour of the Adversaries ignorance or dissimulation For all Classical Latinists according with Cicero as is well known in this use of the word persona The Church for what concerns the expressions wherein she
delivers her Faith is justified by these the sole Authentick Judges of such Controversies and for the truth of the thing refers her self to the Authority of God in Nature and Scripture 3. Now though this be abundantly sufficient for this verbal Controversie yet we may observe that in accord with this sense of the word Person the Scripture it self teaches us in many cases to distinguish betwixt a Man and his Person as when it says both that God accepts no Man's Person yet that in every Nation he accepts the Man that feareth God and worketh Righteousness Whereby we learn that God accepts the righteous man yet accepts not the righteous man's person I observe then every Spiritual Nature is voluntary and no Nature whatsoever is capable of any Personal Subsistence at all that is not voluntary which being premised it is easie to observe that according to the Classical and Scriptural use a Person does not precisely signifie the Being of a voluntary Nature but a voluntary Nature subsisting with a Reciprocal Aspect upon somewhat as it were mutually fancying one another in which Reciprocal Aspect the voluntary Being is considered directly in no other than its voluntary Capacity Thus it is in all persons made by Prosopopaeia in all Mimical Histrionical Hypocritical and all other persons whose Personality is fictitious so it is in all real persons both necessary and arbitrary in Civil Political persons in Bodies Politick that is one person consisting of many Men in Moral and Natural persons Now the Three Persons of the Trinity are plainly of this last sort being persons from the nature of the thing in it self For the Divine Nature being spiritual that is a voluntary Being and subsisting as has been shewed in three real distinct subsistences it has in every one of these three subsistences a distinct reciprocal aspect upon it self in its other two real subsistences and therefore the Deity subsisting in any one of these real subsistences is a real Person and consequently the Deity is in himself three several distinct Persons in the propriety of the word Person Nor would it be otherwise were the account to be given not in the antient Native but in the present English use of the word Person wherein the reciprocal aspect always implyed in Personality is that of a thing upon it self as when we say every Mans Person is himself For according to this acception of the word if we should say the Father is himself the Son is himself and the Holy Ghost is himself then every ones self here is the Person of him whose self it is Therefore the same difference that is betwixt the Father himself and the Son himself and the Holy Ghost himself the same there is betwixt the three Persons but the Father is not the Son but as has been shewed is really distinct therefore the Person of the Father which is himself is not the Person of the Son C. 5.9 10. consequently here are two really distinct Persons and the Holy Ghost by the like reason is the third 4. And the Course which the Latine Church took to establish the Ecclesiastical use of the word when it began to be questioned does very little if at all differ from this account Hypostasis englished Person Heb. 1. is of Divine Authority and Persona did intend the very same thing in the Latine Church For Hypostasis signifies the subsistence of a Nature or Being in its Station or State and since it is plainly apply'd Heb. 1. to a Voluntary Nature whose State is Personal the Divine Authority of the Greek warrants the use of the Latine as an Original does a Translation done with due allowance of Idioms This appears by the method used afterward on this occasion For to express the real subsistence of the Being in its state the Latine Schools used the term suppositum which hath in its make a manifest reference to the Family of the Greek Hypostasis And because this was the Hypostasis of a Spiritual Nature which is always Personal to answer that voluntariness of the suppositum they added rationale and so defined a Person suppositum rationale which as they understood rational was very allowable For the Schools intended their Definition of Person should reach not only Minds Incorporate but likewise Mind Coelestial And they likewise generally Taught that Angels had their knowledge not by ratiocination collecting from what they know already the perception of what they know not but by intuition therefore they here took rationale not in the imperfect sense for the faculty of reasoning but for the conscious perception of the formal reasons which are the very Nature or Essence of things And in this sense not only Angels are rational but likewise God himself is most eminently rational accordingly Cicero attributes to the Divine Nature Summa Ratio According to this intention the Schools definition of a Person agrees to every Being that is a Person and to none else Howbeit I have thought the Personal Capacity of any Being consists in its voluntariness more immediately than its rationality because the chief if not only consideration of a Person respects decent undecent praise dispraise right wrong merit demerit misery happiness now all these have their proximate aspect on the Will and not the Reason I confess when any of these are concerned in a Persons actions consideration uses to be had whether the actions were done wittingly or not but this is not enquired after for it self or directly but only as a sign of their being done willingly For should a Man contrary to all reason give away his Estate from his own most intirely Beloved Son to his greatest Enemy in the World the Right in Nature will pass by his meer Will though he declares that wittingly and without any reason and contrary to all reason but his own Will he so disposed of it I have therefore given the account of personality not from the rationality but voluntariness of the Suppositum though I know no inconvenience in the School Definition but that we cannot so expediently argue upon it and for my dissent in such a formality I presume that is enough In short the first Consideration does vindicate the Churches Right to the use of the Word the second proves that she used her Right well and the third that it is not now in the Power of the Church honestly to disuse it as being agreeable in its proper significancy to the reason of the thing and from all we learn that in the three distinct real Subsistences there are three distinct real Personalities I shall therefore conclude here the Natural Evidence whereby I suppose it is sufficiently manifest that the Churches acknowledgment of three Persons and one God is so far from being Contradictious to reason that the denial of it is repugnant to the condition and reason of the Divine Nature 5. And though by this means the Adversaries Artillery is turned upon themselves yet it is done with no hostile
it hath a Substantial Subsistence that Nature is very properly begotten in such a Subsistence by that Conception 4. Wherefore since it hath appeared by the Natural Reason of the Supream Being that the first Person is the Deity in its Parental Subsistence and the second in the Filial Chap. 5.14 And the Scripture teaches the first Person is the Father and the second the Son we are hereby assured that the Scriptural and the Natural Account of the Trinity are the same in the general only Nature teaches the bare thing as in it self and the Scripture in its Religious state Having said this to justifie the main of the process I shall now proceed to Evince that the particular Characters of the three Persons are the very same in Scripture with those I have delivered from the Light of Nature But I must first advise the Reader that I am not now so much to prove the Trinity from Scripture which has been done abundantly by many others but to compare the Natural Doctrine with the Scripture and shew their accord in all the branches of each which I shall do a briefly as I can 5. Reason taught us that the Divine mind in its first Subsistence does Subsist Conceiving the Divine Nature Chap 4.10 Cap. 5.10 this is confirmed by the Holy Oracles of the Father to the Son Thou art my Son this Day have I begotten thee We learn from the Divine Nature that the first Person is really distinct from the second Chap. 5.9 10 and we learn from the Scripture also that besides the Son that bears witness of himself there is another even the Father that bears witness of him and these are the two distinct witnesses But yet the reason of the thing assures us that it is one and the same Divine Nature that Subsists in these two distinct and real Subsistences Chap. 5.12 And accordingly Divine Revelation teaches us I and my Father are one ◠one nature or one thing 6. Natural Light instructs us that the second Subsistence of the God head is a Substantial Subsistence Chap. 5.9 10. The Holy Scriptures conformably affirms That in him dwelleth all the fulness of the God-head bodily that is Substantially The Son himself is Naturally God even God by himself and that by Nature Chap. 5.11 13. The Scripture attests the same styling him God even God blessed over all and warns us of the future appearance of the great God even our Saviour Jesus Christ That the Deity in its second Substantial Subsistence is the Son and that not by Adoptive Reputation but Real Generation appeared from the nature of the thing Chap. 5.14 and this is confirmed by the Testimony of Gods word which says This day have I begotten thee That the Son conceives his own Divine Nature is a Natural Document and likewise that this is neither more nor less than his own Essential Subsistence Chap. 5.15 Both these the Sacred Dialect teaches declaring that he Lives in him is Life And as the Father hath Life in himself so hath he given the Son to have Life in himself The Son begotten of the Father is one and Eternally the same as reason teaches Chap. 5.16 and the Religious institution stiles him therefore the only begotten of the Father The Son Conceives the Divine Nature but with a Conception that do's not Procreate another Subsistence of the Deity as was shewed Cap. 5.15 And accordingly as the Scripture teaches that there is but one which is therefore the only begotten of the Father so it teaches there is but one the same that is the only begoten Son of God confirming the Natural Doctrine that there is but one only Substantial Subsistence of the Divine Nature by any Conception of it whatsoever But yet nevertheless the Fathers Conception and the Sons Conception are equally creative of all other things as is taught Chap. 5.17 which the Scripture witnesses For the Father worketh hitherto and I work and whatsoever the Father doth the same the Son doth also All things are of the Father and by the Son all things were made that were made and without him was not any thing made that was made He laid the Foundations of the Earth and the Heavens are the work of his hands and in him all things consist Thus we see in all points the Principles of Natural Truth and Instituted Religion do harmoniously accord But let us with the like brevity touch the other Scriptural Characters of the Son and observe how exactly they are conform to the natural condition of his Person for since the Essence of any Being as conceived is properly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Word of God The Word therefore the Deity subsisting in Conception is properly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and consequently this second Subsistence of the Divine Nature both according to the reason of its Nature and of the Religious Style will either be turned 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and Emphatically the WORD or else Explicitely the WORD OF GOD because Reason teaches that this is the Divine Nature in a Substantial Subsistence Cap. 5.10 This will be properly signified by affirming the Word it self to be God and that in it is Life all which St. John distinctly takes notice of 1 John 1.23 Telling us likewise Explicitly Rev. 19.15 That THE WORD OF GOD is his Name or the Character given him from the condition of his Person 2. TRUTH The reality of the Divine Nature Subsisting in the second Person consists in the Essential truth of the Divine minds Conception as was shewed Cap. 5.10 This person is therefore with peculiar respect to this condition of his Being to be called the TURTH as we read he is I am the TRVTH THY Word is TRUTH And St. John inculcates this so vehemently that it 's manifest he puts a special remark upon it that we might not omit to take particular notice of it 1 Joh. 5.20 We know that the Son of God is come and hath given unto us an understanding that we might know him that is TRUE and we are in him that is TRUE even in his Son Jesus Christ he is the TRUE GOD and Eternal Life 3. For the like cause this person will be styled the Light as he oft is that is the intellectual Light of a Conscious Life seeing his Subsistence is in the perspicacious Conception of the Divine Mind as the Nature of the thing teaches Cap. 5.10 4. And because what is perfectly conceived is thereby thoroughly understood and it is an infinite wisdom to understand all the perfections of the Divine Nature and their true excellencies for God is all in all Therefore this Wisdom conceiving is the personal Wisdom of the Father but then this Wisdom Subsisting Substantially by being conceived is the Son or it is Sapientia nata as St. Austine speaks distinguishingly after an Elaborate disquisition of this matter And as I have shewed the Reason if the Supream Spirit does teach this Cap. 5.10 11 12 13 14. so it is
Nature tells us ch 6.14 and the Scripture affirms it Psal 51.12 Establish me with thy free Spirit which Spirit is the Fountain of all liberty Natural and Moral for where the Spirit of the Lord is there is liberty When the Scripture teaches that God swears by his own Life we are sure he therein doth no more than what he had a right to do and therefore he has his life in the disposal of his own will which he gages as he pleases and so all things stand in the infinite holiness of the most absolute free-will of God both by Natural and Supernatural Evidence 10. Lastly Nature teaches these three real distinct Subsistences are really Personal ch 7. and the Scripture owns it for Christ acknowledges the Holy Ghost hath Personal Rights but that he should not speak of himself but should take of that which was the Sons and shew it to the Disciples and presently thereupon informs us of the distinct Personal Rights of the Father and the Son all things that the Father hath are mine says the Son where we see though they all have right to the same things yet each hath his own distinct right here asserted according to that all thine are mine and mine are thine and therefore each of the three is a Person When St. Paul teaches that the Spirit does act dispose of and bestow things by the disposition of his own will this is what nothing but a Person can do nor can any other Person do so justly but the Owner or Lord of the things so disposed or bestowed I have thought for a Heathen Hierocles guess'd ingenuously that God did Create all the material substance of which the World was made or else he could not justly have framed the World because he would have medled with what was none of his own 11. Thus Nature by the reason of things and Scripture by the reason of speech do both teach the same Trinity in all Points the one by natural the other by instituted significancy Gods Works and Gods Word conspiring to assure us there is one God and three Persons For the Coincidence of the Rational and Scriptural account in all particulars I take to be the proper evidence of this truth because had the account been given upon an Hypothesis the coincidence of it with the Scripture had been only a proof of the good contrivance of its Maker but being all deduced from the very first Principles of Sense and Reason the Coincidence proves the truth of the thing it self and demonstrates there is no contrivance in it for where Nature leads there if no room left for invention but things must be taken as they are found in themselves The Arians begged a Days or a Minutes time for the making of their second and third God in this was a blunder in the device it self for a God cannot be made in less time than a Triangular Circle But I am not exposing their pretence in point of ingenuity but observing that when they say there are such made Gods without the evidence of Nature or Scripture this is Hypothesis and Fiction and therefore it will then be time enough to write serious Confutations of such imaginary Beings when it is become fashionable gravely to prove at large that Romances are not Histories 12. To the Divine Revelation of this Doctrine I might subjoyn the Authority of the Catholick Church whose Faith is delivered in our common Creeds and evince that these are perfectly conform to the Doctrine of the preceding Discourse but these being so well known I shall seem in the judgment of the intelligent Reader to write the same things over again out of meer formality Yet because the Adversaries do boast of their late attempts against the Athanasian Creed with such an insolence of glorying it is not amiss to remark particularly that there is no expression in all that Creed about the matter of the Trinity but what hath been above distinctly accounted for from Reason and Scripture what there concerns Christs Incarnation I shall consider afterwards I might also observe that the common Institusion of the Christian Schools giving an account of the Second Person from the Divine Wisdom and of the third from the Divine Love or Benevolence cannot be understood to differ from the main reason of what has here been taught So that besides the Divine Evidence Natural and Supernatural we have all that can be accounted Ecclesiastical Authority to confirm us in this Belief And as the Creeds and their Expositors so the form of Baptism in the Name of the Father of the Son and of the Holy Ghost which is the very Text that all the Creeds themselves were purely designed to expound and is of Divine Appointment and irrefragable Authority does as a foederal Rite give further confirmation of the Truth of this Doctrine But being to give an account of the Mystery of the Trinity what concerns the nature of the Trinity in that Stipulation shall be there considered with its Covenant-use in the Christian State CHAP. IX The Adversaries Interpretations of the Scriptures IN the mean time having before shewed how the Unitarians have dealt with the Evidence of Reason I must here observe how they use that of Authority For having resolved all the General Councils and the Christian Doctors and Schools into the number of Adversaries they disclaim all Ecclesiastical Authority and assume to themselves the right of being their own Judges which Office so assumed in consequence they are to execute without a deference to the Judgment of the main body of Christians and if they be haughty with defiance to it Their demur to the Authority of the Christian Church being somewhat extraneous to the Merits of this Cause I need not examine Though Protestants indeed allow it not to be a proper jurisdiction yet all sober Christians must confess that it hath an argumentative force next to that which is Divine But since these Men had rather want so great a confirmation of their Faith then not to please themselves even to themselves be it the Rights of God and of his Church cannot be vacated by such Judges as Create their own Office 2. Though these men do not formally disown the Divine Authority of the Bible yet they treat all the Scripture proofs of the Trinity with great contempt and that they might seen to do so with less absurdity they take no notice of the great accession which that sacred Evidence acquires by the concurrence of so many circumstances in such a great number of Testimonies and variety of Expressions which adds a mighty force to what they would have if they were only to be considered asunder as we experience in all sorts of Evidence which is given us of the Existence of things And yet even against the single Texts they have nothing to alledge but some Evasions which are manifestly so far fetched that if charity did not bid us hope better they would tempt us to suspect instead of a serious Paraphrase
under his feet yea in all he is the Fathers Servant but this is only until the Mystery be finished and then the Son shall be glorified with the Father with the same glory which he had with him before the World was 13. I need but note the Constitution of the Divine Kingdom being thus far changed in the Mystical State that the Laws and Priviledges the Rights and State of its Subjects its Provisions and Defences its Power and Administration are all altered so as shall comport therewith for these are plain enough in the Scripture to observant Readers and for our own particular it is sufficient to remark That Repentance toward God Acts 20.21 and Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ which had no place in the Primitive Institution of God's Kingdom are now the sum of the Articles in the Fundamental Contract of this Mystical Kingdom CHAP. XIII Of the Covenant of Gods Kingdom MOSES designing to teach the Church in the Wilderness that it was Jehovah that is the only God and their God which Created the World as we read Geâ— 2.4 â—e so introduces that Conclusion Chap. 1. That it appears their God by the saying of his Word and the operation of his Spirit did make all things which with the Psalmists exposition does sufficiently insinuate that God his Word and his Spirit was the maker of the World Psal 33.6 When therefore St. John informs us there are Three in Heaven the Father the Word and the Holy Ghost 1 Joh. 5.7 and these three are one he therein teaches no other than the Doctrine of Paradise It cannot be doubted but mens apprehensions of this as well as other things were very much darkned by the fall but God not sealing up Mankind irrevocâ—bly for Hell did continue to his People in the succeeding Ages some sufficient knowledge of this as well as of other saving Truths For in the Old Testament there are such attributions to the Word of God as could not belong to a verbal significancy of what God means nor yet to the Works of God as indications to men of what was in Gods mind Those Holy Men therefore that attributed such things to Gods Word did conceive in it a more Vital Substantial Subsistence as hath been asserted by many Doctors not only in the Christian Church but also amongst the Jews 2. But though Gods People of old had believed the Doctrine of the Trinity most distinctly yet the Reasons of State in the Divine Government did not then call for their express acknowledgment of it in that stipulation whereby they held their Rights in Gods Kingdom For 1. The most proper form of Covenant against the defection by Anarchy is the acknowledgment of the Divine Government And 2. Against the defection by Polytheism the acknowledgment of the Divine Monarchy And 3. Against the defection by Sophistry depraving the Divine Nature the acknowledgment of the Trinity as being Sacraments most accommodate to List men on Gods side in direct opposition to these respective Apostacies as they did arise in the World 3. For first Before the Flood were the Violent the Ungodly that thought not on Heaven would do what they Listed Gen. 6.11 2 Pet. 2.5 Mat. 24.37 Gen. 6.5 12. and were Ungovernable and these acknowledged therefore no Superiour Power Governing the World And therefore Josephus as I remember somewhere calls them the Anarchical The acknowledgment of Subjection to the Divine Government as was then the most apposite form of Covenant which Men were to enter into and they that took it were called the Sons of God in the sense that Subjects in opposition to Strangers or Aliens are called the Children of the King Gen. 6.2 Mat. 17.25 Mat. 8.12 Gen. 4.26 and the Children of the Kingdom In the days of Enos Men began to be called the Lords as making such a Publick Profession for so many interpret that Expression Gen. 4.26 Somewhat like that of Jacobs Gen. 48.16 But more parallel to that of St. Paul Of whom the whole Family of Heaven and Earth is called Eph. 3.15 Jude 14. 2 Pet. 2.5 Enoch's denouncing vengeance asserts the Divine Rights of Government and Noah's Preaching Righteousness Proclaims the Divine Judicature But Wickedness and Irreligion prevailing against the methods of Governing Grace and Wisdom God destroys them bringing in the Flood upon the Ungodly but saving Noah and his House Yet soon after the same Anarchical Impiety sprung up again for at Babel God complains of the Children of Men Gen. 11.6 the style of their Predecessors in the Old World that they were all one and would do what they listed and would not be restrained or governed And the Divine Vengeance which destroyed the Error leaving the Men alive on Earth was peculiarly adapted to their Case for the Dividing of their Tongues being a stroak immediately upon their own Mental Nature by confounding their Conceptions either of Things or Words did so throughly convince them that there was a Superiour Being which exercised a Power over their minds that we meet not with one Atheist for many Hundred years after nor with any Nation of Atheists ever since this very Day So far then did the acknowledgment of the Divine Government obtain 4. But shortly after there grew up another Error alike pernicious for we find in Abraham's days Polytheism did spread very far Against this God calls forth Abraham Jâ—s 24.2 3 â—â— 15 and afterwards Isaac and Jacob and charges them with the care of his Truth appearing to them by the Name of God Almighty Exod. 6.3 which is that style that infallibly asserts the Unity of the Deity for as much as two or more Almighties is a plain contradiction So that now the fundamental Covenant in opposition to Polytheism required an explicite acknowledgment of one God only and of the Divine Monarchy To this Josephus refers in many places For however it was before not only the Anarchical but the Antimonarchical were now all Aliens and Traytors to God But when this one God Almighty upon his delivering Israel out of Egypt did assume to himself the style of the God of Abraham the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob as his Everlasting Memorial This was an introduction to the Covenant of peculiarity which he made expresly with his Church as separate from all other Nations Exod. 3.15 When God therefore as Jehovah the God of Israel indents with them that they should have no other God beside himself thereupon he takes that Nation to be to him a Nation of Priests Exod. 20. whereby as Philo Judaeus rightly asserts the Nation of Israel became the Priest of all Mankind Exod. 19.5 6. and consequently of all this lower World But alas this National Priesthood was so far from bringing the blessing of Abraham upon the Gentiles contained either in the Monarchical Covenant of the one true God or in the Covenant of peculiarity to Proselites of the gates or of Righteousness that they themselves did