my self my Being is absolutely necessary every way perfect altogether pure single and infinite I do therefore conclude as Hierome That the very nature of God is being it selfe and therefore he ever was and cannot cease to be he cannot borrow his Being from any thing who gives Being and wel-being to all things The absolute and independent necessity of the Divine-Being doth demonstrate its eternity and therefore all the differences of time are untied by the Talmudists to connote the Eternity of God in that text Exod. 3. 14. according to that excellent Commentary made by the Apostle Rev. 1. 8. God is the Almighty which is and which was and which is to come Hence it is that some have thought fit to translate that text Exod. 3. 14. according to the full scope of the Future amongst the Hebrews I am that I am that I was and that I will be For the Future amongst the Hebrews points at all differences of time past present and to come but others observing the strict and proper signification of the Future translate it thus I will be that I will be The Angel of the waters doth unite all differences of time in that gratefull acknowledgement Rev. 16. 5. Thou art righteous O Lord which art and wast and shalt be because thou hast judged thus And Iesus Christ who is one and the same God with his father is the same yesterday and to day and for ever Heb. 3. 8. The Rabbines upon Exod. 3. 14. expresse themselves after this manner The blessed God said unto Moses say unto them I that have been and I the same now and I the same for time to come c. or as others more agreeable to the Chaldee Paraphrase I he that is and was and hereafter will be hath sent me unto you But enough of that it is now time to conclude that this first and independent Being cannot be measured in it self because it is infinite nor in its causes for it hath no causes but is from it self of it self by it self and for it self for as the Apostle saith All things are of him and through him and to him to him be glory for ever Amen CHAP. III. God hath sufficiently and graciously revealed himself in his holy word for our edification and salvation THis incomprensible God who is of himself and for himself cannot be made known to his creatures but by himselfe Men and Angels cannot know him any further then he is pleased to reveale himself unto them The word of God is pure and perfect it doth fully discover Gods mind and our duty The Scriptures direct us in all points of faith in all parts of worship and in all passages of our life and conversation there is the whole body of Religion and the only right way to salvation sufficiently and graciously revealed unto us by God himself for God is the Author Object End of true Religion and is the only happinesse and salvation of his chosen People and therefore God alone can direct us how to serve and enjoy his own blessed self in an acceptable and comfortable way for his glory and our own everlasting satisfaction The Jesuites tell us that the Scriptures are but a partiall Rule and that we must be beholding to some unwritten word or tradition for the proofe of some points which are necessary to be known and beleeved for our everlasting salvation Some instance in the Doctrine of the Trinity others in the Worship of the Holy Ghost The Papists do generally acknowledge that it is necessary for the attainment oâ— salvation to beleeve the number of the Persons of the Trinity and their consubstantiality because no man can be saved who doth not believe in the Father Son and Holy Ghost in all three as in the only true God one and the self same God blessed for ever but some of them deny that this mystery is sufficiently revealed in the written word and therefore I shall make it my businesse to confute them and all that adhere unto them in the following Treatise The saving knowledge of God in Christ is revealed by the Spirit speaking in the Scriptures of truth nay Father Son and Holy Ghost do all joyne in revealing to us the saving mystery of faith and godlinesse that by the grace of Christ the love of God and Communion of the Holy Ghost we may have a glorious fellowship with all three as one God the only true God whom to know is life eternall John 17. 3. we are taught by the father to come to Christ for salvation John 6. 45. we are taught by the son Iohn 1. 18. Heb. 1. 2. we are taught by the Spirit Heb. 3. 7. Rev. 2. 29. and 1 Iohn 5. 6. the Spirit doth beare witnesse after an especiall manner to this saving truth it is the spirit that beareth witnesse because the Spirit is truth yet all three and therefore the whole Trinity the Father the Son and the Holy Spirit do joyn in bearing record and their record is written for it stands upon Record in the Gospel and their Record is a saving Record and there can be no other Record produced to prove that Christ is our Saviour 1 Iohn 5. 7 11 12 13 20. Iohn 20 31. if we study the Scriptures beleeve apply them worship and act according to them we shall be saved by our faith in the written Trinity in Father Son and Holy Ghost without the help of any unwritten tradition whatsoever for the holy Scriptures are able to furnish the Man of God unto Perfection and make the simple wise unto salvation 2 Tim. 3. 15 16 17. Cyrill in his Book of the Trinity and Person of Christ put forth not long since by Wegeline saith that he would not speak or think any thing of God but what is written in his Word Clemens Alexandrinus saith that we ought to make good every point in question by the Word of God because that is the surest nay that 's the only Demonstration he speaks of Theologicall Demonstration nothing can be embraced with a divine faith but that which is delivered to us upon Divine Testimony and we are to seek for the Testimony of God nowhere but in the written Word of God and therefore Basil disputes after this manner Whatsoever is not in the written Word of God is not of faith and whatsoever is not of faith is sin and therefore it is a sin to obtrude any Doctrine upon the conscience as an Article of faith which is not written in the Word of God Putean is bold to say that if Basil his meaning was according to his words he was a Hugonot that is as we use to say a Puritane When I read what the Papists write on this Argument I stand amazed at their blasphemies and am unwilling to stain my paper with the repetition of them they who have read Canus Hosius Costerus Eckius Gautierus Charronaeus Stapleton and the rest of that
rabble will not wonder that the Socinians call the Doctrine of 3. Persons and one God into question when the Papists who were baptized in the name of the Trinity professe that they beleeve the equality of three distinct Subsistences in the same divine Essence do yet notwithstanding in their writings grant as much as the Socinians need prove namely that the Doctrine of the distinction and equality of Persons in the same Divine Essence cannot be proved but by unwritten Traditions by the testimony of the Church of Rome c. and yet diverse Papists undertake to defend the doctrine of the Trinity against the Socinians though they know that the Socinians do not at all value traditions or the testimony of the Church of Rome and therefore though divers Papists write against the Socinians yet they do promote Socinianisme by their vaine doctrine of unwritten traditions Stapleton is not ashamed to deny that it can be proved out of Scripture that the Holy Ghost is God or that he is to be worshipped But Salmeron deserves commendation in this point The Scriptures saith he are therefore said to be written by divine inspiration because they instruct us in divine mysteries concerning the Vnity of God and Trinity of Persons Photius in his Bibliotheca shews that Ephraeni did not dispute of the consubstantiall Trinity out of the Testimonies of Fathers but out of the Holy Scriptures Iustin Martyr Athanasius Basil Irenaeus Cyrill Cyprian Tertullian Epiphanius Theodoret and many other of the Fathers did assert the doctrine of the Trinity and some of them did confute the Valentinians Eunomians Sabellians Photinians Arrians Macedonians Samosatenians c. out of the Holy Scriptures The Nicene Synod did urge Scripture for the maintenance of the truth which they declared in the Confession of their Faith and the Synod which met at Constantinople did the like as is most evident to such as have perused those learned and ancient Records Athanasius confounded the Arians by cleare Testimonies of Scripture and in his Book of the Decrees of the Nicene Synod he saith that the true disciples of Christ do clearly understand the doctrine of the Holy Trinity preached by divine Scripture I shall not trouble or amuse the Reader by quotations out of Cyrill Ambrose Hilary Augustine Nyssen Nazianzen or any of those Worthies but now mentioned whose labours have been ever famous in the Church of God yet I must not omit one pregnant proofe out of Augustine who appealed from the Nicene and Ariminensian Synods and challenged Maximinus to dispute with him about the great point of consubstantiality out of the Scriptures Bellarmine himself is forced to confesse that Augustine had good reason to do so because that point is cleare by Scripture but then we must likewise consider what Augustine saith upon this Argument that the thing or sense of any word may be in Scripture though the word it self be not to be found there though the words Trinity Trin-unity Consubstantial are not found in Scripture yet that which is signified by those words may be clearly proved by the holy Scriptures These three are one I and my Father are one Behold a Trinity Trin-unity Consubstantiality and all quickly proved That Rule is of great concernment and very pertinent to the point in hand which Augustine delivers in his third Book and third Chapter against Maximinus the Arian Out of those things which we read in Scripture we may collect some things which we do not read and so both understand and beleeve the thing which is delivered in other words in Scripture then those which we are now forced to use that we may confirme the Orthodox Christians and refute the gain-sayers But I am weary of this task and therefore call upon my Reader to joyne with me in searching the Scriptures that we may find out the truth for reason cannot demonstrate or comprehend these mysteries of faith and the Rule is Rationum fulcro dissoluto humana concidit authoritas CHAP. IV. This single and Eternall Godhead doth subsist in Father Son and holy Ghost without any multiplication of the Godhead WHen Gregory Nyssen undertook to confute the artificiall blasphemy of Eunomius he desired that the true God the Son of the true God and the Holy Spirit would direct him into all truth I have likewise implored the Divine assistance of the Father Son and Holy Ghost that I may open this Mystery of the single Godhead in three distinct Subsistences with faith and prudence perspicuity and reverence I consider that the Godhead is Spiritual and therefore I desire to avoid all carnal expressions in a Treatise of this nature There is a twofold knowledge of God Absolute and Relative the Absolute knowledge of the Eternal Power and Godhead is in part discovered by the works of God as hath been shewen in the first chapter but the Relative knowledge of God I speak of inward relations between the three Subsistences is not nay cannot be attained unto by the light of nature no example can illustrate no reason Angelical or humane comprehend the hidden excellency of this glorious Mystery but it is discovered to us by a Divine Revelation in the written word and therefore our faith must receive and our piety admire what our reason cannot comprehend It is fit therefore that this Grand Mystery of the Divine Trinunity should be soberly explained that it may be stedfastly beleeved and reverently applyed in all Evangelical administrations We read of the Godhead the Nature and Subsistence of God in the holy Scriptures 1. The Godhead 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Rom. 1. 20. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Coloss. 2. 9. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Acts 17. 29 I am not at leasure to play the Critique upon the words it is enough for my purpose simply to declare the truth in the most plaine and simple manner 2. The Nature of God is held forth to us in the holy Scriptures which forbid us to give Divine honour to any of those things which are not Gods by Nature Gal. 4. 8 For the Apostle in that place reproves their Idolatry and tels them that when they knew not God that is the only true God who is God by Nature because truly God they did service to them which by Nature are no Gods from whence it is easie to conclude that the only true God whom we ought to serve is God by nature and we read of the Divine Nature 2 Pet. 1. 4. of which all that are regenerate are said to be partakers because they bear his Image for else it is evident that there is an infinite distance between God grace which is not only finite but imperfect also and if it were perfected is but an accident Nay there is an infinite distance between the Nature of God and nature of man in respect of Excellency even then when the two natures are most intimately united as they are by an Hypostatical union in the person of the Lord Jesus 3.
some expressions that are negative The second person of the Trinity doth supply and performe all that an humane person can performe to the humane nature of Christ. Now to say that the Divine person of Christ doth supply the room of a Negation and do all that a Negation can do is to say it doth very little or nothing at all Finally some say that a person is completed by the Existence of its nature But it is cleare that a soule in the state of separation doth exist and yet that soule is not a Person nay never was a Person at the first instant of its creation or union And it will be most absurd to say that the humane nature was assumed by Christ and hypostatically united without or before the existence of that nature because it was united before it had any humane subsistence and consequently before it had any existence if that subsistence be nothing else but existence as these Discoursers suppose But it is high time to leave pursuing of these wanderers For it is cleare that Subsistence is a Positive and Substantial Mode because the most perfect manner of being which we expresse as well as we can when we say A Person doth subsist by it self without union unto or dependance upon any thing else for its sustentation nay that it is uncapable of any such union though it be for the present in a state of separation And therefore the Schoolmen usually say Quod subsistit per se nec est nec esse potest in alio ullo modo quia subsistere per se sumitur pro perfectissimo modo subsistendi per se. It is evident by what hath been said that even created persons are defined by their substance or nature which is in stead of a Genus when we define a Person in Concreto and when we speak oâ— the Formality of a Person we say it is a substantial mode and the most perfect manner of subsisting and therefore a created person is not completed by any quality or accident whatsoever Now if a created person be a substance and the Formality of a created person be substantial I have no ground to abstract a Divine Person from the Divine Substance or Essence because a Divine person cannot be separated from the Divine nature as the humane nature may be from an humane person and though a Praecisive abstraction doth not lay any ground either for a Rational negation or a reall separation yet if the Divine Nature be not considered and taken notice of in the description of every Divine Person men will be apt to conceive that the Divine Nature and Persons may be separated The Scripture doth not present any such abstract notion of the Father Son or Holy Ghost unto us but teaches us to consider them as Divine Persons that is Persons that have a Divine nature for else we should make a Trinity of Modes no Trinunity a Trinity without God or Godhead and give our adversaries cause to say what they have said without cause contrary to their own principles as well as ours Eâ— Trinitatem sine Deo for even they themselves acknowledge the first Person of the blessed Trinity to be God It is our wisest course therefore to describe every Person as a Divine Person as God and acknowledge all three Persons to be one and the same God according to the Scriptures For we must not only consider three Personalities but three Persons and the same single Godhead in all three Persons and all three Persons in the Godhead I must not treat of the first Person simply as a Father but as a Divine and Eternal Father as God the Father Rom. 15. 6. Ephes. 5. 20. Coloss. 2. 2. Joh. 17. 3. For God is to be so considered as he is to be worshipped by us and we are not to worship an abstract Personality without reference to the Godhead We must consider what is Common as well as what is Incommunicable we must treat of that which is Absolute as well as of that which is Relative and whilest we speak of a Trinity of Persons we must not forget the Vnity of the Essence that so we may not hold forth a Trinity of Modes without the Godhead or tempt weak heads to dream of a Trinity of Gods Judicious Mr. Calvin did not think fit to discourse much of Created Persons and therefore described none but a Divine Person and he would not adventure to abstract an uncreated Personality from the Divine nature in which every of the three uncreated Persons doth subsist In our most accurate definition of any created nature which we are best acquainted with we judge it reasonable to take in that which the nature defined hath common with other natures as well as that which is proper to it alone And certainly it is very fit in our description of every Divine Person to take in the Nature which is common to all three Persons and not only what is proper and peculiar to any one I call a Person saith Calvin a Subsistence in the Essence of God And then he descends to take notice of the Relation of a Divine Person to the rest of the co-essential Persons and his distinction from them by some incommunicable property It will be a very dangerous attempt then to treat of the Divine Persons in such abstract expressions as do only hold forth some curious notions about the relation of these persons to and distinction from one another without taking notice that all three Persons 〈◊〉 coeternall and coequall because coessential If we will discourse soberly of the Godhead we must speak of it as one single infinite perfection common to Father Son and Holy Ghost to all three and none other The single Godhead the whole Godhead is iâ— every single person and it is common to aâ— three in a singular and glorious way For the divine nature is not communicated to these Three as a Genus to its Species for it iâ— undivided and indivisible nor as a Speciâ—â— to its Individua for it is not multiplicable nor as a Totum or whole to its parts foâ— the Godhead hath no parts it is impartible and as hath been said indivisible nay the Godhead is not communicated so to any one Person as a created nature toâ— created person which may be separateâ— from a created subsistence for the Divinâ— Nature cannot possibly be separated from all or any one of the Divine Subsistenceâ— or Persons And therefore we must noâ— discourse of the Godhead in such a Notional way as if the Godhead did exist out oâ— the three Persons without any relative subsistence for that is clearly to dream of somâ— strange Absolute God who is neither Father Son nor Holy Ghost When we describe the Godhead according to our beâ— understanding we dare not abstract it from the three Persons but say that The Godhead is one single spiritual infinite Essence in which the Father Son and Holy Ghost
which keepeth truth for ever read and consider the six first verses of the 146. Psalme there is a great Emphasis in the sixth verse which keepeth truth for ever O let us declare it to the following generation that â—his God is our God for ever and ever and he will be our guide even unto death Psal. 48. 13 14. Happy it is for us that we are redeemed by the pretious bloud of Christ who offered up himself by by his eternall spirit his divine and eternal Nature Heb 9. 14. that he might bring in everlasting righteousnesse Dan. 9. 24. obtaine eternall redemption and purchase an eternall inheritance for us Heb. 9. 12. 15. Happy thrice happy it is for us that we are born of incorruptible seed which will abide in us for ever for we are born of the eternall spirit who will perfect his work in us and be our everlasting Comforter Finally all three uncreated Persons will be our all-sufficient and satisfactory portion and reward for ever-more IX Three Created persons have different actions and operations because they have different singular natures different powers c. as hath been shewen in this very chapter All actions of Father Son and Holy Ghost upon the creatures are undivided nay indivisible how Personall Actions ad infra differ I am to declare at large in the next chapter where I am to shew how these three glorious persons who cannot be divided are truly distinguished from one another onely before I conclude this chapter it will be requisite to note that though the Son cannot be said to beget himself yet he is not Passive in that eternall generation as hath been proved above the divine nature which is communicated to the Son by generation is the nature of the Son as well as of the Father the Father doth necessarily beget the Son in the power of that Nature and in the unity of that self-same single and indivisible Nature and that divine Nature which is communicated to the Son is not begotten by the Father but is of it self and therefore we say that Christ is God of himself though he be not a Son of himself but of the Father by eternall generation because the Father is the first principle of subsisting life I might proceed to treat of other differences that common Rule Actiones sunt suppositorum is true of divine actions and uncreated Persons but it is manifest that there are many actions of the soule of man both when it is in a state of union with and when it is in a state of separation from the body which cannot be properly and truly called actions of a person but I shall not descend so low as to take notice of such differences The nine differences which have been insisted on are all considerable And from them all we may safely conclude that the word Subsistence or Person cannot be attributed after the same maner to God Angels and men A divine Person is a Spirituall and Infinite Subsistent which must not be considered as abstracted from but as Subsisting in the Divine Nature and as related to those other Coessentiall persons from which he is sufficiently distinguished by some Personall and Incommunicable property And therefore Subsistence is attributed to God after the most excellent and glorious manner A Person signifies the most excellent kind of Subsistent an understanding subsistent as hath been shewen but then an uncreated person a divine person doth infinitely excell and transcend the person of the most glorious Angel in Heaven and therefore we must remove all those imperfections from our thoughts which are in created persons when we meditate or discouse of these divine and uncreated persons that we may think and speak according to the Analogy of faith CHAP. VII The three Vncreated Divine and Coessentiall Subsistents are sufficiently distinguished though they cannot be divided WE are now come to treat of that profound Mystery at which men and Angels stand amazed How can three be one saith the Disputer of this world or one be three Can one be distinguished again and again from himself O bold fools saith Athanasius Why do you not lay aside your curiosity and enquire no farther after a Trinity then to beleeve that there is a Trinity The Scripture saith there is but one God and the Scripture saith that the Father Son and Holy Ghost are this one God and yet the Scripture saith that the Father Son and Holy Ghost are three three and yet one three Persons and yet one God We have shewen above that the Godhead cannot be multiplyed now we are to shew that the Persons are distinguished and what kind of distinction there is between these three divine and uncreated Persons 1. These divine and uncreated Persons are sufficiently distinguished to our apprehension who ought to judge beleeve speak worship according to the Word of God 2. These uncreated Persons were truly distinguished from one another before there was any Scripture any world for the Coexistencie and distinction of these glorious Persons is eternall and therefore this distinction cannot be grounded upon the mere phrase of Scripture it is the true intent of God in severall plain expressions of Scripture to declare unto us the distinction of these divine and uncreated Persons I shall prove this point fully and clearly by certain steps and degrees 1. These uncreated Persons have distinct and proper names in the Word of God The Father the Son or the Word and the Holy-Ghost or Spirit Now that we may not be Tritheites or Sabellians let us consider that these three names do not signifie three different Natures and yet they do signifie three different Persons for it is evident that one Person cannot be praedicated of another the Father is not the Son nor is the Son the Father the Holy Ghost is not either of them nor is either of them the Holy Ghost and therefore they are three distinct Persons of the Godhead 2. These Uncreated Persons are Coequall and therefore they are distinct It is most absurd to say that the same Person is equall to himself But the Son is said to be equall to the Father Philip. 2. therefore the Son is not the Father We do usually say that the Father Son and Holy Ghost are equall in power to note a distinction of Persons but then when we speak strictly we do not say the power of the Persons is equall but we say the power of the Persons is the same to note the unity of their Essence We say the Persons are equall in power goodnesse wisdome c. to note that one person doth not exceed another in degrees of wisdom power c. because it is impossible that there should be any degrees in that which is infinite and the power wisdome c. of all the three Persons is the same infinite perfection because all three have the same infinite Essence And therefore when we look upon Power in a common notion
as referred to the divine Essence which is common to all three Persons we say it is the same power But when we look upon power in a singular notion as it is communicated after a singular manner to this or that person we say this person is equall to that in power the Father equall to the Son the Spirit equall to both to note the distinction of the Persons and not the distinction of the Power because the self-same Almighty Power is communicated to the severall persons in a severall way Power is in the Father of and from himself that is not from any other Person the same power is communicated to the Son but it is communicated to him by eternal generation and to the Spirit by eternal procession the â—ame power then is communicated to different coequall persons in a different way as we shall more fully declare before we conclude this seventh chapter 3. The Uncreated Persons are sufficiently distinguished by their number The nature of God is the first Entity the first Unity and therefore it is uncapable of number because it is most singularly single and actually infinite It is not proper if we speak strictly to say that God is one in Number we should rather say that God is one and an only one Deus non est unus Numero sed unicus But the Persons of the Godhead are three in number the Scripture speaks expressely of three These three 1 Iohn 5. 7. If any man in Athanasius his time asked how many persons subsist in the Godhead they were wont to send him to Iordan Go say they to Iordan and there you may hear and see the blessed Trinity or if you will beleeve the holy Scriptures read the third chapter of Matthew the 16 and 17. verses for there 1. The Father speaks in a voice from Heaven and owns his only begotten Son saying This is my beloved Son c. 2. The Son went down into the water and was baptized 3. The Holy Ghost did visibly descend upon Jesus Christ. In the fourteenth of Iohn we have a plain Demonstration of this truth I saith the Son will pray the Father and he shall give you another Comforter Iohn 14. 16 17. May we not safely conclude from hence that the Spirit is a distinct Person Another Person from the Father and the Son for the Text is cleare the Son will pray and the Father will give Another Comforter we know the Holy Ghost is not Another God he is the same God with the Father and the Son and therefore we must confesse that it is meant of Another Person he shall give you Another Comforter even the Spirit of truth verse 16 17. And againe in the 26. verse of the same Chapter But when the Comforter is come whom I will send unto you from the Father even the Spirit of truth What can there be more expresse or cleare The Scripture teaches us to reckon right and we see the divine Persons are reckoned three in Number One Person is not another there are diverse Persons there are three Persons the number numbred the Persons numbred are named by their distinct and proper names the number numbring is expressely set down in sacred Records We are not more exact in any accounts then we are in reckoning of witnesses whose testimony is produced in a businesse of great consequence and high concernment Now in the great question about the Messiah witnesses are produced to assure us that Iesus Christ the Son of the Virgin and the only begotten Son of God is the true Messiah the only all-sufficient Saviour of his people from their sins And there are three Witnesses named and produced for the proof of this weighty point Now one Person that hath three names or two Persons and an Attribute of one or both Persons cannot passe for three Witnesses in any fair and reasonable account we are sure God reckons right and he reckons Father Son and Holy Ghost for three Witnesses and he doth not reckon these three and the Godhead for foure as they do who dream of a Quaternity because these three are one and the same God blessed for ever Let us then be exact in observing since the Holy Ghost is so exact in making of the account In the eighth of Iohn the Pharisees object that our Saviour did bear record of himself and did conclude from thence that therefore his record was not true Iohn 8. 13. Our Saviour answers in the next verse Though I beare record of my self yet my record is true for I am not alone but I and the Father that sent me And it is written in your Law that the testimony of two men is true I am one that beare witnesse of my self and the Father that sent me beareth witnesse of me It is most clear and evident by this discourse that our blessed Lord did make a fair legall just account for he cites the Law concerning the validity of a testimony given in by two witnesses and then he reckons his Father for one witnesse and himself for another I am one saith he and my Father is Another I and my Father make two sufficient Witnesses in a just and legall account There is Another saith he that beareth witnesse of me and I know that the witnesse which he witnesseth of me is true Iohn 5 32. There is Another saith he he doth not meane another God for when he speaks of his power and Godhead he saith I and my Father are one Iohn 10. 30. Christ and his Father are one God but Christ and his Father are two distinct Persons for they are reckoned as two distinct witnesses and one Person must not be reckoned for two witnesses There is Another that bears witnesse Iohn 5. 32. and the Father himself v. 37. bears witnesse of me Well then Christ is one witness the Father is another and the Holy Ghost is a third witness 1 Iohn 5. 7. we see the Holy Ghost speaks as plainly in this point as we do when we teach a child to tell one two and three For there are three that bear record in Heaven the Father the Word and the Holy Ghost and these three are one If we peruse the Scriptures diligently as we ought we shall finde that these Witnesses are three Persons who are one and the same blessed God They are one in nature though three in subsistence to shew that these three Persons are not to be reckoned as three men are who have three distinct singular natures really divided and separated for these three glorious Persons subsist in one another and have one and the same single undivided and indivisible nature and they are three Witnesses three Persons truly distinct Iohn 1. 14 18. cap 5 3â— cap. 14 16. IV. The divine Persons are distinguished by their inward and personall actions The Father did from all Eternity communicate the living Essence of God to the Son in a
or Compulsion and yet we cannot say that the Father and the Son did Arbitrarily or freely breath forth the Spirit as all three persons did create the world for they did create the world with such liberty and freedome as that they might not have created it but they did Naturally and necessarily breath forth the Spirit and could not but breath him forth this inward and personall Act is Naturall such is the perfection of the Godhead that it must needs be communicated to all three persons and such is the coessentiall unity of the Father Son and Holy Ghost as that all three do necessarily and naturally subsist in the self-same entire and infinite Godhead True it is that the will of God is the Nature of God but nature is a more comprehensive Word and therefore according to our manner of apprehension and in strictnesse of speech it is more proper to say that the Father and the Son did breath forth the Spirit by the perfection of their Nature then to say they breathed him forth of their own will or by some Arbitrary Decree for then it will follow that there might have been but two persons of and in the Godhead that the holy Spirit doth exist and subsist Contingently and by consequent that the Spirit is no person of the Godhead The acute Samosatenian whom learned Iunius confutes desired to know whether the Holy Ghost was produced by an action of the Will Iunius answers If you oppose the will of God to the nature of God we cannot say that the Spirit doth proceed from the Father and the Son by their will but by their nature because the Father Son and Spirit are Coessentiall for as the Father did beget his Naturall Son by his Nature so do the Father and the Son breath forth the coessentiall Spirit by their nature nor is it safe to say saith Iunius that the nature of the Father doth breath forth the Spirit by an action of his will but rather according to that manner the infinite distance being observed between what is humane and divine after which the will doth proceed in man and this saith he is but a weak resemblance of the Schools which we are not bound to defend For the Nature of God is pure single infinite and therefore we must not follow those resemblances too farre which are grounded upon the distinction of the understanding and the will in creatures because even that point is very disputable and the most single and perfect nature of God doth infinitely transcend the perfection of Angels I beleeve you are as I am willing to get out of the dark But enough of that for we read that the Saints are begotten by the will of God Iames 1. 18. But we must not conceive that Christ is begotten or the Spirit breathed forth after the same manner as we are regenerated the Spirit is breathed forth in a Connaturall and Coessentiall way in the unity of the single and entire Godhead but we are regenerated by the graces of God The spirit doth proceed equally from the Father and the Son for the unity of the divine nature and equality of divine persons cannot be maintained if that principle be denyed Peter Lombard and his adherents did mince the point with a very dangerous distinction that the Spirit doth proceed principally from the Father and lesse principally from the Son But it is clear evident that the Holy Ghost being a Coessential person hath the self-same divine nature and essence entirely communicated unto him which is in the Father and the Son without any Alienation of it from them or Multiplication of it in him and therefore the Spirit doth not proceed from the Father and Son as they stand in Relative opposition but as they are essentially and naturally one and therefore the Spirit did proceed from both equally aequè primò ac per se as we use to say The Spirit doth receive from Christ Iohn 16. 14 15. but the Spirit being God could not receive any thing but subsistence from the Father or the Son The Spirit doth glorifie the Son Iohn 16. 14. no otherwise then the Son as God doth glorifie the Father because the Son did receive his subsistence from the Father as the Spirit receives his subsistence from the Father and the Son We must carefully distinguish 1. Between the generation of the Son and procession of the holy Spirit though as we have shewen above the Son doth proceed if you take that word in a general notion The most exact Criticks wil not take upon them to distinguish between 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Yet because we want words to expresse our selves the reverend Doctors of the Church thought fit to appropriate Procession to the Holy Ghost for distinction sake and the Scripture saith that Christ is the only begotten Son of God God the Father is never called the Father of the H. Ghost nor is the H. Ghost called the Son of God Moreover the Schoolmen have given advantage to the enemies of the Trinity by discoursing of Divine Processions at large in a generall notion and for these reasons I did endeavorto distinguish the Procession of the Son from the Spirit in this Chapter in respect of the Manner Principle and order of Procession 2. We must carefully distinguish between the Eternall Procession of the Spirit and the Temporal Mission of the Spirit but the Natural and Eternal Procession of the Spirit may be evinced by the Temporal Mission of the Spirit The Greek Church doth acknowledge 1. that the Holy Ghost is God and 2. that he is one and the same God with the Father and the Son and from hence we infer 1. That the Son did not send the Spirit by way of Command as if he were greater then the Spirit 2. That the Son did not send the Spirit by way of Counsel and Advice as if he were wiser then the Spirit and therefore the only reason why he did Temporally send him is because the Spirit did Naturally and Eternally proceed from him and receive his glorious subsistence of him I might discourse more largely upon this subject but I consider what Athanasius Damascen and divers other reverend Divines who did long study these mysterious points have after many perplexed debates acknowledged The Son say they was begotten and the Spirit proceeded this we are sure of because it is written if you enquire after the manner how the one was begotten and how the other did proceed we answer that the Son was begotten and the Spirit did proceed eternally unchangeably unspeakably Those places of Scripture which are spoken of God in the Old Testament are said to be spoken of the Son and the Spirit in the New Testament and therefore do by consent of both Testaments declare that the Father Son and Holy Ghost are one and the same God for instance The sixth of Isaiah is spoken of Jehovah the God of Israel whom the Mahumetans
Pet. 1. 21. Rom. 9. 1. Rev. 2. 23. The Holy Ghost is Omnipresent he dwels in all Saints as in a Temple he repaires adornes beautifies his Temple and acts in every single Saint as the spirit of disobedience acts in Children of wrath we cannot flie from the presence of the spirit because he is Omnipresent Psal. 139. 7. By what hath been already written it is evident that the Holy Ghost hath the titles and attributes of God he doth performe works proper to God and that devine Honour is due unto him I shall clearly prove because it is denyed by the blasphemous wits of this discoursing age The Holy Ghost who spake by Isaiah the Prophet is worshipped by the Angels of God as is most evident by comparing Isa. 6. 3. 9. with Acts 28. 25. 26 The whole Church of God is exhorted to worship the Holy Ghost as the Great God as Jehovah as our Make to how down and kneel before him that is to give him divine worship both inward and outward because he is our God as appears by comparing Psa. 95. 3. 6. 7. with Heb. 3. 7 8. 9. The Apostle gives divine Honour to the Holy Ghost when he appeals to him as to the searcher of hearts Rom. 9. 1. and the Holy Ghost who speaks to the Churches joynes with the son of God who speaks to them also in searching of the heart and reines Revel 2. 17. 18. 23. and all the Churches are commanded to hearken to both as unto God blessed for ever Our soules and bodies are said to be the Temples of God because they are the Temples of the Holy Ghost and therefore we are commanded to worship and glorify the holy Ghost with our souls and bodies for the spirit doth dwell in his Temple that he may be worshiped in his Temple The Temple is a profane place if there be no worship there and it is must be pure holy and spirituall worship and sacrifice such as the holy spirit delights in else the Temple will be defiled destroyed Compare 1 Cor. 3. 15. 16 17. 1 Cor. 6 19 20. 2 Cor. 6. 16. 18. and 2 Cor. 7. 1. The Church is blessed in the name of the Holy Ghost as in the name of God and the communion of the holy spirit is spirituall and saving as well as the speciall grace of Christ and love of the Father as appeares by that solemn Apostolicall benediction 2 Cor. 13. 14. and the beloved Disciple proclames the spirit to be the fountaine of grace and peace as well as the Father of Jesus Christ and therfore doth beg grace and peace of the Spirit of grace who doth purify and pacify our hearts for all the Churches Revel 1. 4. The holy Ghost doth regulate all Churches and Church-affaires Acts 13. 2. 4 Acts 15. 28. Acts 20 28. Baptisme is administred in the name and for the Honour of the holy Ghost Matth. 8 19 The holy Ghost doth bestow upon us and work in us those spirituall and glorious blessings which are sealed in or conveyed by Baptisme and therefore we are more especially Baptized by the holy Ghost Matth. 3. 11. Iohn 3. â— 6 for we are born of the spirit regenerated washed renewed by the spirit who purifies the soule as water doth the body Titus 3. 5 6. The violation of the Honour and worship of the Holy Ghost is most severely punished Mark 3. 29. Hebr. 6. 4 Hebr. 1â— 28. 29. and therefore there is speciall care taken in the holy Scriptures both for the preservation and vindication of the honour of the Holy Ghost we must not grieve vex resist quench the Holy Ghost that is we must not displease him we must not disobey him we must obey his dictates his motions we must be quickened taught led ruled governed by him we must attribute all the glorious Titles to the Holy Ghost given him in Scripture of which we have so largely discoursed we must acknowledge him to be the Spirit of Truth and therefore must beleeve in him the spirit of supplication the spirit of grace and holinesse and therefore love him and pray to him we must either renounce our Baptisme in his Name or else we must confesse that we are obliged to beleeve in him reverence love obey glorifie him with all inward and outward worship for we are debtours to the Spirit to live to the Spirit and glorifie the Spirit of regeneration who works in us the instrument of Justification that there may be an effectuall application of Christ to our souls though Christ make the purchase the Spirit of adoption makes the assurance he seals us up to the day of redemption and therefore good reason have we to offer up our souls and bodies in a spirituall sacrifice to him for these temples were made for sacrifice Rom. 12. 1 2. 1 Pet. 2. 5 Now if God who will not give his glory to another because he is true and just gives all this glory to the Holy Ghost it concerns us to glorifie him If there were not all this and a great deal more to be said for the honour of the Holy Ghost yet it were an invincible argument to me if I could only say that the Holy Ghost is God and therefore to be worshipped as God with Divine worship The Holy Ghost is one with the Father and the Son one God and therefore all three are to be worshipped with the same Divine worship It were enough for such men as have not so much as heard whether there be any Holy Ghost or no Acts 19. 2. to talk as the filthy dreamers and blasphemous Hereticks of this rotten age usually doe who belch out the language of Hell against the Spirit of Grace and I cannot but wonder that subtile Iesuites Arminians and Socinians who pretend to study and search the Scriptures should say that there is nothing to be found in Scripture concerning the worshipping of the Holy Ghost That the Spirit acts according to the Counsell of his Divine will hath been sufficiently proved only it must be considered that as Father Son and Spirit have but one Nature so they have but one Will. Concerning the Peculiar and Personall properties of the Holy Ghost I shall treat when I come to speak of the distinction of these subsistences For conclusion of this chapter I am to prove that the Godhead doth subsist in Father Son and Spirit all three without any multiplication of the Godhead The Father and the Son are but one God Iohn 10. 30. I and my Father are one The Father Son and Spirit all three are but one God 1 John 5. 7. There is but one God Ephes. 4. 6. Deut. 6. 4. Isa. 44. 6. 8. Isa. 45. 21. 22. Nay there can be but one God there can be but one most Perfect being one infinite Perfection the most perfect being is the most single being and therefore Father Son and Holy Ghost are all three
and dispensation to be observed amongst them as we shall hereafter prove But the intent of the Holy Ghost is to exclude all that are not Gods by nature as the Apostle speaks Gal. 4. 8. from the Godhead and from laying any claim to the naturall Attributes of God or pretending to do any work that is proper and peculiar to God The true and living God is opposed to Idols 1 Thes. 1 9. But Jesus Christ and the Holy Ghost are to be acknowledged and served as oneâ— rue and living God with the Father The living God the God of truth and King of eternity is opposed to those counterfeit Gods Jer 10 11 12. And therefore when the Apostle saith There is no other God but one 1 Cor. 8 4. He tells you whom he doth exclude such as are but conceited gods so called and so reputed equivocal gods v. 5 6. The Lord Jesus and the Holy Ghost are God by nature the same God with the Father and therefore they are not excluded In like manner when it is said that Iehovah alone did lead the people in the wildernesse and condâ—ct them unto Canaan that exclusive particle is put to exclude strange gods such as were then idolized but were indeed no Gods as is most evident Deut. 32. 12. So Iehovah alone did lead him and there was no strange god with him but these strange gods who are here excluded were no gods as is cleare by comparing the 16. and 21. verses of the same Chapter I have already proved that the title of Iehovah is given both to Christ and the Holy Spirit and therefore when it is said Iehovah alone did lead them in the wildernesse the Son and Spirit are not excluded for the Spirit did instruct and guide them in the wildernese Nehem. 9. 20. and the Spirit did instruct their teachers also but they rebelled against the Spirit Isa. 63. 10. And Iesus Christ the Angel of Gods presence was present with them to guide them Exod 23. 21. The Name of God and the Nature of God is in him for he is to pardon sin or punish as â—e pleases Our Saviour is called The onely Lord and The onely wise God Iude Epistle in the 4 and 25. verses but the Father is not thereby excluded from being God for he is the onely wise God also 1 â—im 1. 17 and therefore by the same reason the Father is the onley true God and the Son and Spirit are the very same onely true God also When our Saviour presses that Text Mat. 4. 10. Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God and him only shalt thou serve he doth not exclude himself or the Holy Ghost for both are to be worshipped with divine worship as hath been already proved at large in this very Chapter Many other proofs might be produced from other Scriptures and divers other arguments colleâ—ed from the 17. of Iohn to prove that Jesus Christ is not excluded from being the same only God with his Father To know Christ who is God and annointed of God Heb. 1 8 9 Psal. 45. To know Christ whom thou hast sent Eâ—go he was a divine Person before he was sent to take the humane nature and he had eternal glory with his Father before the world was Iohn 17. 5. Naâ— his calling of God Father makes him equall with God nay he is not only equall to but one with his Father Ioh. 5. 18. Ioh 10. 30. Moreover if the Father have not a divine and eternal Son how is he a divine and eternal Father Finally if the Father Son and Holy Ghost are not all three the same true God there is no God for these three are one and therefore all three are one God or else there is no God at all from whence it will follow that if we will be Socinians we must be Atheists The Son and Spirit have the same nature with the Father and therefore if his nature be divine so is theirs CHAP. V. The Manner of GOD'S Being or Subsisting in the Father Sonne and H. Ghost is the best manner of Being that is or can be and the single Godhead is thereby thrice illustrious throughout the woâ—ld HItherto we have contended for the truth of this Divine Being or Subsisting Now â—e shall demonstrate the excellency thereof God is made known to us as the everlasting Father of our Lord Iesus Christ and is to be adored worshipped as the Father of our Lord Iesus Rom. 15. 6. Ephes. 1. 3. 2 Cor. 1. 3 If God had been the Father of men and Father of Angels only and not the Father of our Lord Jesus he would not have been so exceeding glorious as now he is for Angles have but a sinite excellency but when he begets a Son equall to himself without any change in himself and the begetting of this glorious Person is as eternal as the divine nature it self This mysterie is exceeding glorious and admirable and like the Godhead incomprehensible Moreover the Lord Iesus Christ his own Son Rom. 8. 32. and his only Son begotten by eternal generation Ioh. 1. 14. being the illustrious brightnesse of the Fathers glory and the expresse character of his subsistence is so exceeding glorious that the most glorious Angels above are commanded to adore and worship him Heb. 1. 3 4 5 6. For to which of the Angels said God at any time Thou art my Son this day have I begotten thee And therefore when he brings his first-begotten and his only begotten Son into the world he saith And let all the Angels of God worship him Behold how the Godhead shines gloriously not only in one single Person but in Father and Son both by this manner of subsistence that every tongue may confesse Iesus Christ to be God and Lord to the glory of God the Father And therefore the Father is not lessened or robbed of his glory by the glory of his coequal Son Phil. 2. 6. 11. but there is a pious acknowledgment made of this glorious mysterie which doth very much redound to the glory of God the Father For by this meanes God the Father is acknowledged to be the First personall Principle subsisting of himself and by himself for he received not his subsistence from any other and he gives subsistence unto two glorious Persons equall with himâ—elf The Socinians seem to be very zealous for the glory of God the Father and therefore they deny the Godhead of Christ and the Holâ— Spirit to the glory of God the Father as they pretend but the Scripture teaches us the contrary namely to confesse the Godhead of Christ and the Holy Spirit to the glory of God the Father For it doth exceedingly redound to the glory of the Father that he gives subsistence unto two glorious Persons who are equall to himself and yet receives no subsistence from them or any other For as the Father hath life in himself so hath he given to the Son to have life in himself Joh
when it is used on this occasion upon this subject we may after so many disputes about this Argument easily understand the proper and consecrated importance of the word We may take warning by the mistakes of others and avoid those rocks on which others have suffered shipwrack Some who understand that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 did signifie essence were offended with such as said there were three Hypostases in God because according to that signification of the word to say that there are three Hypostases in God is to say that there are three Essences in God and consequently that there are three Gods It is readily acknowledged that the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 doth sometimes signifie the nature or essence of a thing not the generical or specifical nature in their latitude and abstract universality but the nature truly existing and subsisting in the world This acception of the word may all things duly considered and soberly expounded be admitted with some grains of allowance for the infinite difference which is between created and uncreated Subsistents For if Hypostasis be described in concreto for which we have with invincible reason contended all along this Chapter then Hypostasis doth connote the Divine Nature and signifies not an Abstract Subsistence but a Complete Subsistent When I say that Jesus Christ is the Character of his Fathers Subsistence I do not as I have formerly shewn understand it thus that Jesus Christ is the Character of his Fathers Abstract Personality but he is the Character of God the Father I take in the Divine Nature But you must then consider that the glory of the Trinunity must be preserved in this acception for there is not a new nature in every one of the Three but the Divine nature which is connoted in these three Hypostasâ—s is the very same there is the glory of the Mysterie which dazles the eye of carnal reason And therefore whatever we say on this argument must be taken cum granosalis and expounded 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because of the infinite difference between a finite and infinite nature and between created and uncreated persons as I shall God willing shew at large before I conclude this Chapter Three Persons may and do subsist in one and the same Infinite Nature and therefore though eâ—ery Hypostasis doth connote the Divine nature yet all â— here connote one and the same infinite nature in which all three Persons do subsist To subsist is as Aristotle the great Interpreter expounds it to have the most perfect manner of Being by it self that a Substance the best of Beings can attain to and it is very proper to say that the Father Son and Holy Ghost have the most perfect manner of Subsistence in the Divine nature that is or can be The Divine Nature considered with all Absolute Relative Perfection in Father Son and Holy Ghost doth most truly properly and perfectly subsist for there are three illustrious Subsistences in that one undivided infinite Nature and therefore the Godhead thus considered doth subsist 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Singular substances have the most perfect subsistence A Spirit is the most perfect Substance God is the most single and singular Substance and he is the only Infinite â—pirit the best of Spirits and therefore he must needs have the most perfect Subsistence Every single Person is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and therefore I will be bold to inferre that these three Persons only do perfectly subsist by themselves though in one another for they have one Independent Spiâ—itual Infinite Nature which is of it self and is complete in it self because Infinite in Perfection and therefore contains all absolute and Relative perfection in it self but when we speak of the Relative perfection we speak of three in one because the Relative properties are distinctive and when we treat of the Absolute perfection we speak of One in Three one Essence in three Persons who do all three subsist with their Relative and Incommunicable properties in that most perfect and single Essence This is that Divine Trinunity which contains all Absolute and Relative Perfection And therefore hath the most perfect and excellent Subsistence that is or can be Finally though these three Persons do mutually subsist in one another yet they are said to subsist by themselves 1. Because these Persons do not subsist in one another as Accidents do exist in a Subject for Accidents exist in another because of their imperfection but these subsist in one another because of their perfection because they have the same single infinite nature and are one infinite and omnipresent Spirit 2. They subsist mutually in one another the Father subsists in the Son Ioh. 14. 10 11. as well as the Son in the Father and therefore this subsisting in one another doth not argue any imperfection but doth demonstrate the infinite perfection of all Three Subsistents but there is no mutuall inexistence of an accident in a subject and a subject in that accident or any other 3. These three Subsistents have one and the same spirituall independent infinite nature which is complete of it self and in it self and the whole Creation doth not afford one Example to illustrate much lesse to parallel these three illustrious Subsistences in one undivided Nature And it is impossible it should for this one undivided Nature in which these three glorious Persons do subsist is an infinite nature and there can be but one Infinite and therefore the Socinians seem to have lost what they do so much idolize their Reason when they desire us to illustrate this Mysterie by an Example 4. These three Subsistents are Coequal because Coessential The Fathers upon some of these considerations did agree to use the phrase of three Hypostases and one Essence though the word Hypostasis was not so plain and familiar at first especially to Latine eares and therefore Hierome complains that some were too rigorous in imposing that word without expounding of it to such whose judgment was Orthodox though their skill but small in the Greek To conclude my discourse upon this word Subsistence be pleased to consider that we read of the Nature of God we read of the Subsistence of the Father and we read that these three Father Son and Holy Ghost are one having these two words Nature Subsistence in Scripture we are prompted by the Spirit speaking in the word to explain this Mystery thus The Father Son and Holy Ghost are three in Subsistence but one in Nature No Mystery can be explained with lesse Violence and more Sobriety for we are precise in keeping to the very words of Scripture in explaining this grand Mystery to the plainest of men and therefore they were sentenced of old that did not beleeve this plain truth IX We have no reason to be offended with the Vse of the word Person when we treat of this Argument if
we adde a fit Epithet and say the Father is a divine Person or an uncreated Person and say the same of the Son and Holy Ghost The word Person signifies the most excellent kind of Subsistent an understanding Subsistent as is acknowledged by all the Masters of Language sacred and prophane as hath been proved and that place 2 Cor. 1. 11. is very cleare of all the derivations of Persona that pleases me best Persona quasi per se una because it doth expresse the unity and excellency of a personall subsistence Per se notes the excellency because subsistere per se notes the most excellent kind of subsistence Nay the word Person doth expresse more excellency then the word subsistence alone doth import for it is proper to say that a Beast doth subsist but it is absurd to say that a Beast is a Person because a Person is an understanding subsistent But neither of these words doth expresse the excellency of that subsistence which the Father Son and Holy Ghost have in the Godhead And therefore we do not only say that these three are Persons or Subsistencâ—s but we say they are uncreated Persons Divine Subsistences Persons subsisting in the Divine Nature Persons of the Godhead that so we may take in all the excellency which these words Subsistence and Person do afford and then by other Epithets superadd that excellency which is proper to Father Son and Holy Ghost and leave out all that imperfection which is in created persons and subsistences The word Subsistence is in the Scripture Heb. 1. 3. The word Person is in Scripture applyed to men 2 Cor. 1. 11. who have a more excellent subsistence then beasts An understanding subsistence and therefore both Greek and Latine Fathers did at last agree to use the word Person because it signifies an understanding subsistent And if you adde divine or uncreated Person then there is no danger of any mistake unlesse men will be so vain as to say the word Person doth sometimes signifie a visible shape an outward form or appearance the countenance or gesture of a man or else some office relation or quality and say that we do make three shapes countenances c. in the Godhead as Sabellius Servetus and such bold Atheists as have sucked in their poyson are wont to say We do therefore vindicate the Church of God from these insolent and groundlesse aspersions and freely declare what we mean by Person namely an understanding Subsistent Every of the Three Divine Persons hath an office and hath a relation but no Divine person is an Office or a mere Relation but the Godhead doth contain all relative as well as absolute perfection within it self as hath been said God as represented to us in Scripture doth as it were take upon him the person of a displeased Father and sometimes of a well-pleased Father but we do not say there are three such Persons in the Godhead for one Divine Person may sustain the person of a well-pleased Father at one time and the person of a displeased Father at another And if any man will be so ridiculous us to conclude from thence that then one person may be two persons I hope he will see his own vanity and be sensible of the equivocation by considering what hath been said already in this very Chapter When we say God doth take upon him the Person of a well-pleased Father we speak 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 after the manner of men just as when we speak of the eyes and hands of God but we must be understood 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 after such a manner as becomes the infinite dignity and pure majesty of God If men do not wilfully mistake they may then know what we mean by Person when we say there are three uncreated Persons in the Godhead The word Person is in Scripture and if it were not yet as long as the thing signified by it is there we have no reason to account that word or any other such like an Exotick word because we find it very proper and pertinent to the point in hand in the sense which we have so often declared that there might be no mistake but a full agreement in such an high and weighty point It is out of question that we may expound the Scripture by words and phrases which are not in those very letters and syllables to be found in Scripture as long as we do not affect a needlesse curiosity in inventing new and obscure phrases a rigid superstition in defending them for that would not conduce to edification but beget or foment an endlesse contention Our expressions must be sober and plain grave and usefull such as may hold forth the godly and prudent simplicity of the Scripture That is al that needs be said for the use of such words and phrases as are fit and necessary to be used in this and divers other obscure points There are some that mistake the Attributes of God for Persons and they make more then three persons and therefore I shall not go about to reckon up the innumerable absurdities which follow upon that one mistake Vno absurdo dato mille sequuntur I read indeed that Sabellius conceived the Father Son and Holy Ghost to be different Attributes of God But the Orthodoxe Christians desired him to remember that there were more then three Divine â—ttributes and pressed him to acknowledge that A Trinity of persons do subsist in the unity of the nature of God and then they would close with him and give the right hand of fellowship unto him The fraud and subtilty of Arius Sabellius and the rest of the old Heretiques gave the reverend Doctors of the Chuâ—ch cause to use the words Trinity Coessential Consubstantial and the like that they might more clearly and fully manifest this profound and glorious mysterie And they who did wrangle about these Words did indeed deny the Mystery and thing it self and therefore did but manifest their pride fraud obstinacy for the maintenance of their damnable Heresie when they quarrelled with those eminent Writers for making use of unwritten words phrases upon so just and necessary occasion that the written truth might be more clearly explained and fully defended It is not in the judgement of any man any fault at all to make truth plain unlesse in the deluded judgement of such who are enemies to truth Now we have removed the rubbish we begin to build A Divine Person is a Spiritual and Infinit Subsistent related indeed to those other uncreated Persons which subsist in the same Divine Nature with it but distinguished from those Coessâ—ntial persons by its peculiar manner of subsistence order of subsisting singular relation and incommunicable propertie In these few line there is matter enough to fill many sheets and I am to treat of the distinction of persons at large in the next
which are two of the Affections of Ens are distinguished by their severall and peculiar relations Truth hath relation to the understanding and Goodnesse to the will The Father Son and Holy Ghost are known to be distinguished by their severall and peculiar relations and if it be not unreasonable to say that there is in Entity three affections and two relations in ente simplicissimo without any Composition in or Multiplication of the Entity why should it seem unreasonable or at least why should it seem incredible that there are three subsistences and severall relations in the Godhead without any composition in or multiplication of the Godhead 9. One affection nay all the affections in abstracto do but inadaequately represent Ens unlesse you take notice of the Entity it self as well as the three Affections One single Subsistence nay all three Subsistences in abstracto do but inadaequately represent God unlesse you take notice of the Godhead in which they subsist and therefore this praecisive abstraction of the Subsistences from the Divine nature is but an inadaequate conceit of God as hath been demonstrated above in this very Chapter for we must not dream of a Trinity of Modes but assert and believe the glorious and Coessential Trinunity The Father is truly God that God who is the only true God but the Father alone doth not adaequately represent God to us as he is described in the Holy Scriptures It is true that the Divine Essence is by the Subsistence of the Father adaequately the Father but as God is represented by that Divine subsistence only he is not Deus Trinunus he is not Father Son and Holy Ghost the Father alone is not all those three Witnesses who are one God And therefore the acute Socinians with their precise abstractions do but suggest an inadaequate conceit of God that only true God whom we worship doth not subsist only in the Person of the Father We worship God subsisting with all Absolute and Relative Perfection in Father Son and Holy Ghost for these three are that one God who is the only true God blessed for ever This is the adaequate representation of God in the Scriptures of truth And we are resolved to regulate all our Metaphysical notions by the holy Scriptures that we may make the highest of Sciences to acknowledge the supremacie of that Divine science which is nowhere to be learnt but in the Word of God for the purest reason must be elevated by the Word and Spirit of God for the discovery of this mysterie 10. These affections of Ens represent the manner of that Being which Ens hath as it is transcendently confidered and the three Divine Subsistences do represent that manner of Being which God hath as he is most transcendently considered namely as subsisting after the most glorious manner with all Absolute and Relative Perfection It is the manner of a transcendent Entity to be one and true and good and it is the manner of Gods being to be one God in three Subsistences These three are one single God there is no Composition or Multiplication imaginable in this single and infinite being I was bold to adventure upon this enquiry because so many reverend learned Orthodox and pious Doctours of the Church have declared that the Divine Essence differs from the Divine subsistences as the manner of the thing doth from the thing it self and the Persons differ from one another tanquam modi a modis I conceived that there was something more in the expression then was commonly known Moreover I considered that if there might be so great simplicity or singlenesse in a Created and finite Entity notwithstanding there are three affections and two relations which do affect that Entity it seemed to me somewhat easie to beleeve that there are three subsistences in one infinite Godhead without any composition in or multiplication of the single Godhead Finally I perceive that some youthfull towring wits are drawn away from the simplicity of the Gospel by some froathy speculations presented to them as most sublime curiosities and Metaphysicall notions and therefore I humbly submit what hath been said to the judgement of the learned and conclude this discourse with the same prayer wherewith Augustine shuts up his books of the Trinity Domine Deus unus Deus Trinitas quaecunque dixi in hoc libro de tuo agnoscant et tui si quid de meo et tu ignosce tui O Lord who art one God O God who art a whole Trinity of Persons in the Godhead what ever I have said in this discourse of thine let all that are thine acknowledge what ever I have said of mine own Lord let it be pardoned by thee and thine II. Concerning the Attributes of God we may observe that they are al perfect glorious infinite because they do signifie and declare the infinite Perfection Happinesse Majesty and glory of God and to speak higher yet these glorious Attributes though they be very many are nothing else but the single undivided indivisible Essence of God we may be instructed but are even confounded with the glory of this mystery There are three reasons why we do not readily apprehend this truth 1. The defect of words to expresse it especially in English but indeed the most rich and copious languages are onely happy in the confession of their penury when we come to treat of this argument because the mystery of the Godhead doth transcend all our eloquence and teaches us to admire and adore with silence what we cannot expresse without a manifest demonstration of our ignorance 2. The imperfect manner of signifying is easie to be observed in our most significant words and therefore we must confesse that the Excellency of God doth transcend the significancy of the most significant words in the most rich and copious tongues 3 The imperfection of our own understanding and of our manner of apprehending and judging of things whiles we are in the body If any man desire to know a reason why he cannot readily apprehend these divine Mysteries let him consider the perfection of the mystery and the imperfection of his own reason he hath a sufficient reason a reason from whence he may draw a most invincible argument against idolizing of his own reason so far as to make his reason judge of the mysteries of faith Let us then prudently consider that we are not able to apprehend the infinite and impartible Essence of God but as it were by parts by many incomplete and inadaequate conceits and apprehensions The most profound and serious schoolmen have fairely expressed this truth there are not say they many Attribut all Perfections nay there is but one Perfection in God for all the Essentiall Attributes of God are nothing else but that single and undivided Essence which is singularly and altogether the same Essence in all three subsistences Nay to speak properly the Divâ—ne
of God can be communicated to a Creature any more then the Divine Essence it self Isa. 42. 8. Matth. 19. 17. 1. Tim. 1. 17. For all the Attributes of God are his Name his Perfection his Glorie his Essence his Godhead and if any of the Attributes were communicated the Essence of God must be multiplied divided or distracted from it self The communicable Attributes are infinite and there cannot be more infinites then one and therefore they must all signifie one single and infinite Perfection For if any of the Attributal Perfections were finite then the Perfection of God would be made up of many finite Perfections and God would not be infinitely perfect in himself of himself and by himself but by some finite Perfections superadded to his Essence which is utterly repugnant to the single and infinite Perfection of God Yet true it is that some Attributes of God are said to be communicable by Analogical Accommodation not in respect of the properties themselves which are all infinite but in respect of the Effects of those properties there is something in the Creature by the bountie of our Creatour and Grace of our Redeemer which doth after a weak manner resemble the Perfection of God and therefore we are said to be partakers of the Divine Nature 2. Pet. 1. 4. when we bear the image of God in righteousnesse and holinesse of truth For we are still to remember that God is to be known per viam eminentiae when we make an Eminent Distinction between one Divine Attribute and another or ascribe any of the Perfections which are found in the Creatures by way of Attributal Perfection unto God For God is not great in quantity or good by a qualitie but by his own infinite Essence We must remove all imperfection from God that we may know him per viam negationis and therefore we say mercie and goodness are not accidents in God his understanding and his will are not faculties his anger and hatred are not passions his many Attributes are but one single Perfection the Perfections which are in the Creature are imperfect but the Perfection of God is infinite Finally we must consider God as the cause of all Perfection in the Creature that we may know him per Viam Causalitatis These grounds being laid let us consider what great difference there doth to ouâ— weak understanding appear to be between the Divine Attributes whether they be compared with the Divine Nature or with one another and yet that indeed and truth there is no real difference between the Attributes and the Divine Nature or between the Divine Attributes themselves and we shall more easily conceive what great difference there is between the Father Son and holy Ghost without any Essential difference between them The holy Scriptures speaking to our weak capacitie describe God and his Attributes after such a distinct manner to us that we cannot but conceive that there is some ground even in the word of God for this virtual and eminent Distinction between the Attributes as will-be most evident to any that observe the usual phrase and language of the Scriptures in these and the like places Exod. 34. 6. 7. 1. Tim. 1. 17. Psal. 103. 8. 9. 10. 1. Tim. 6. 15. 16. But it is as clear that God doth herein gratiously condescend to our weakness because we know that the Divine Nature is â—â—ngle and infinite and therefore doth conâ—ain in it all Actual Perfection eminently â—nd all possible Perfection both singly and â—ctually because all true and pure Perfection is most Formally included in the Naâ—ure and Essence of God and therefore this eminent Distinction grounded on the Phrase of Scripture and upon visible Obâ—ects and Effects gives us no ground at all â—o conceive that the Divine Nature is not one single infinite perfection because the Scripture speaks distinctly of God and of his several Attributes only to teach us to apprehend the impartible perfection of God by degrees rather then parts because we cannot apprehend it altogether Our conceits of God are inadaequate and collected by way of Analogy from the perfection of the creatures but we must consider that what the creatures do performe by many and distinct qualities and acts God doth performe by his owne Essence which is one most single and most pure act And therefore we conclude that this distinction is not really grounded upon God himself upon his Nature or Essence but upon the Effects of God The objective conceits or things conceived are not really or actually different in themselves but virtually and â—minently in the several Effects Egresses Terminations of Gods eminent vertue and single power which is every way boundlesse and infinite and therefore never works according to its full and adaequate vertue The Scotists do indeed seeme to say more because they say that this distinction of the Attributes is Formall and ex natura Rei but then they come off againe in their explication of these termes and say that their meaning is that they are distinguished Formally not Actually but Virtually and Eminently and therefore we meane the same thing For the divine Essence is not only a single Unity but the first Unity which is uncapable of any difference or number whatsoever only we cannot by a single act comprehend Gods single perfection because our understanding is finite and his perfection is infinite But it will be said that the Attributes of God have to our apprehension not only different but contrary effects the Justice of God doth punish and the mercy of God doth spare The answer is easie the Effects are to our apprehension contrary nay they are contrary in themselves but the Attributes are not contrary for the Attributes do both belong to the same God nay they are the same God and these Attributes do not overthrow but preserve one another Now we readily grant that the Effects are really different nay contrary but we deny that the Attributes of Justice and Mercy are really different or contrary in themselves Finally we grant that according to our manner of apprehension it is very improper to say that the Attribute of Gods mercy is the Attribute of his Punitive Iustice because the termes are here taken in sensu formali as we use to speak and therefore that manner of predication is improper yet if you take the termes in sensu identico the thing is true because Mercy and Justice are the same thing the same Essence We may say that the same God the same Essence which is mercy it selfe doth punish but it is very improper and absurd to say that God doth forgive by his punitive Iustice because God who speaks distinctly of his own Attributes in his word that he might help our weak understanding will not give us leave to speak so confusedly of his glorious Attributes as to puzzle the understanding of our weak brethren What I have said concerning the
Essence and his Essence is single uncompounded undivided indivisible it must needs follow that whatsoever is in God is God and God is as hath been often shewen one single infinite Perfection This is our first Principle and last Conclusion into which all our debates and by which all our doubts about this Argument may and ought to be resolved X. The Distinction between the Divine Nature and Persons may be considered 1. In respect of predication the Divine Essence is predicated of every Person because every one of the three Subsistences is God nay is the Divine Nature considered with this or that Personal Propriety and Relation respectively But one Person is not predicated of another the Father is not the Son nor is the Son the Father or the holy Ghost 2. In respect of Communication the Divine Nature is not onely communicable but communicated to all three Persons but it is of the Formal Reason of a Person to be incommunicable 3. In respect of Relation The Divine Nature doth indeed eminently containe all absolute and relative Perfection but the Formal Relations whereby the Persons are not onely distinguished from but opposed to one another cannot be Essential under that consideration because they are peculiar to the several Persons and not common to all three Persons as the Essence and Nature is Peculiar and distinctive Relations are not essential because the Persons who are relatively distinguished are not essentially distinguished The Divine Nature of the Father is not his Father-hood for if it were then every one of the three Persons would be God the Father all three Persons would be one Person which is a manifest Contradiction 4. In respect of Generation and Procession the Divine Essence doth not beget nor is it be gotten it doth not proceed and yet the Father doth beget the Son is begotten and the holy Ghost doth proceed the Person of Christ is begotten but his Divine Nature unbegotten 5 In respect of number the Persons are three the Divine Nature most simply single and singularly one 6. In respect of Order there is an Order to be observed amongst the Divine Persons the Father is the first Personal Principle the Son the second and the holy Ghost who is breathed forth by the Father and the Son is the third the Scripture saith there are three and doth commonly reckon them in that Order and we have no ground to reckon the holy Ghost before the Son because he proceeds from the Son but the Divine Nature being a single Vnitie and the first Vnitie is as uncapable of Order as it is of Number XI Notwithstanding all these and some other distinct Considerations I shall be bold to make this Peremptorie Determination The three Divine Subsistences are not really distinguished from the Divine Nature or Essence The Scripture saith Christ and his Father are one Ioh. 10. 30. and that all three are one 1. Iohn 5. 7. Essentially one and therefore really one I have said enough above to prove all three Persons to be essentially one The three Persons are one God subsisting with all possible Perfection Relative as well Absolute in one pure Act ex parte Rei The three Divine Persons do not differ from the Divine Nature as an humane Person doth from the humane Nature singularly considered for a singular humane Nature may be separated from an humane Person as is evident in the Incarnation of our Lord and Saviour But the Divine Nature cannot subsist in alieno supposito the Nature of God cannot subsist in any other or any fewer then these three Persons who are one and the same God And therefore the Divine Nature doth not differ really from the Persons tanquam res à re as we say nor tanquam res à modo separabili they do not differ really either way nor do the Persons differ really that is realiter separabiliter from one another as shall be proved when we come to speak of the Distinction of the Divine Persons in the next Chapter XII The Distinction between the Divine Nature and three Divine Subsistences is not a groundlesse Conceit or a meer fiction of reason because it is grounded on the Word of God For our apprehension of God must be agreeable to that Divine Revelation which God hath vouchsafed us of himself in Scripture Now it is most clear and evident by what hath been said in this whole Discourse that the holy Scriptures teach us to conceive distinctly of some things in God which are not really distinguished in him And therefore Mr. Fry may do well to consider and retract that rash Censure which he passes upon this Doctrine of God when he saith that the Doctrine of three distinct Persons or Subsistences in the Godhead is a chaffie grosse Carnal and absurd Opinion in the Title and 22. page of his blasphemous book For this distinction is not onely grounded on a Phrase of Scripture but is eternal XIII The Distinction between the Divine Nature and Persons is an Eminent distinction I have told you above what we mean by that expression The Persons are the Essence of God and not any thing separated or divided from it every one of the three Persons is a Person of the Godhead nay every one of the three Persons is the Godhead considered with some particular property and relation and the Godhead being absolutely single we must conclude that the Divine Nature and a Divine Person is the same Essentiall Reall thing though they are Eminently distinguished by sundry considerations as hath been shewen But it is objected that every one of the three Persons is a Substance and if there be three substances subsisting in the Godhead under sundry Formal considerations then there will be three Divine Substances three Substantial Relations and Properties and therefore the Godhead will be compounded by these three Substances substantial properties and relations or else there will be three substantiall and formall Gods To this grand objection I make these few returns by way of answer 1. Every one of the three Persons is a Substance a Divine Substance but they are the same Divine Substance because they are the same God these three are one they are unum one divine substance one God they are all three divine Persons but they are Coessentiall Persons and Inessentiall persons of the same Godhead II. The peculiar relations do distinguish but they do not compound for they do not super add any new Entity much lesse any new Godhead because all these relations are Natural eternal and therefore they are God Absolute and Relative perfection in God are but one single perfection 1. The parts or extremes wherewith any thing is compounded must be really or at least Modally and Separably distinct for all created Natures and Persons being compounded are not only Modally but separably distinct 2. The parts compounding must be united by some efficient cause and one of the parts must be
have been but there is no reall thing in God which might not have beene 2. There can be no reall relation between two extremes one of which two extremes is unchangeable and the other might not have been 3. God was not in any passive Potentiality or Power before he did create the world to receive any reall act because he is really a pure act and it is evident that a new reall relation is a kind of act wherof the pure single perfect and unchangeable essence is uncapable 4. Our weak understanding comparing God with the creatures is apt to frame many denominations which according to the manner of signifying seem to import as if God were in potentiâ ad multa yet if we do consider the thing signified as we ought in a way agreeable to the pure single and infinite Perfection of God we shall find that these are but extrinsecall denominations This point is much beaten upon by the most acute Schoolmen and Writers of Metaphysicks and therefore I need not insist upon it only observe that when I say created persons are distinguished by a heap of Accidents I do not mean that a person is made compleat in his subsistence by any Accident or an heap of Accidents for I have refuted that conceit in this present chapter pag. 73. I hasten to the eighth Difference VIII Humane Persons with whom we are best acquainted may exist in a very different time as well as in different places some lived before some since the flood some before the Incarnation others since the Death and Resurrection of our Lord and Saviour but herein all agree that time is the measure of them all their duration is very imperfect their duration is not always contemporary never Coessentiall But all three uncreated Persons are Coeternal because they are Coessential because they have the same divine eternal Essence Angels are said to have an eternall duration but they are not eternall in the same sense that the Father Son and Holy Ghost are Eternall 1. Because they were created Coloss. 1. 16. and therefore did begin to be they have not as the Schools say an interminable or interminated duration à parte ante 2. If they had been created from eternity yet they could not have beene esteemed Coeternall with their Creatour who did create them out of nothing and did not beget or breath them forth in the unity of his own divine Essence 3. There can be no lesse then an infinite difference between the finite dependent changable defective duration of an Angel and the infinite independent immutable duration of these three uncreated and all creating persons who are one independent unchangeable eternall infinite God the eternity of the three glorious persons is interminable indefectible immutable 4. If Angels had been created from eternity yet they would not have been essentially or intrinsecally eternall because their essence doth not include any repugnancy to an actuall beginning 5. If Angels had been created from eternity yet God might have annihilated them afterwards and then they had actually ceased to be 6. Although they were not actually annihilated yet the very possibility of being annihilated is enough to prove their duration terminable changeable defectible and therefore though they had been created from all eternity they would not have been coeternall with their maker nor would three Angels have been coessentially coeternall with one another 7. If Angels had been created from eternity they would have been eternall not by any intrinsecall or naturall duration as hath been proved and therefore they would have been eternall only by an extrinsecall denomination taken from the Eternity of God 8. Upon consideration of the Premises many Reverend Doctours of the Church conclude that Angels are eternall only à parte post and they are eternal à parte post not by their own nature but by the free favour and appointment of God and therefore there is an infinite difference between the duration of these three uncreated persons and the duration of the most glorious Angels in Heaven Angels are muâ—able and God is free Agent both in respect of Creation and in respect of preservation and therfore God and Angels are not Coeternall as the Peripateticks dreamt God did voluntarily engage himself to create and preserve Angels by his own Decree and therefore that subordinate aeternity which they have à parte post is vouchsafed unto them by the free and undeserved favour of God For as Damascen saith well whatsoever had a beginning would soon have an ending if he who gave a beginning to it by his infinite power should think fit to suspend his upholding and preserving influence or put forth his Almighty and irresistible power against it in a destructive way I will not take this faire occasion to speak of the acts or motions of Angels to make this difference seeme greater for that which hath been said is suâ—â—â—cient to make it evident that Angels do not coexist with God the Father with the same duration wherewith God the Son and God the Holy Ghost do coexist with him because these three coessentiall persons are Coeternall they are all three one God who is his owne Essence his owne Eternity The Scripture calls the God of Israel the Eternity of Israel 1 Sam. 15. 29. and Aristotle calls him life it selfe the best life an Eternall life that hath neither beginning nor ending nor succession and therefore it is evident that he did not beleeve God to be subject to change or variation God is saith he a self-sufficient and eternall life God is truly self-sufficient because he is alsufficient he is infinite in perfection and therefore infinite in duration his infinite perfection and duration is nothing else but but his infinite Essence and this infinite Essence is the self-same in all three Coessentiall Coeternall and Coequall persons as hath been proved And therefore we have good cause to rejoyce and triumph in this glorious difference between created and uncreated persons Give me leave to sweeten this dispute with some devotion We have an everlasting Father an everlasting Saviour and an everlasting Comforter and we have good cause to lay a charge upon our immortall souls to blesse praise all three Coeternal persons for their eternall love our eternall redemption and salvation Praise the Lord O my soule while I live will I praise the Lord whilst I have any being will I sing praises to my God and put confidence in him for with the Lord there is plenteous and eternall redemption But O put not your trust in Princes nor in those sons of men in whom there is no salvation for their breath goeth forth they returne to their first earth and in that day all their thoughts and counsels perish Happy is he that hath the God of Jacob for his help whose hope is in the Lord his God which made heaven and earth the sea and all that therein is
not serve the turn we reject it for its impertinâ—ncy and dissimilitude Christ is the only begotten Son of God he is Absolutely and Simply considered his only begotten Son and not only in some respect as Isaac was the only son of Abraham Christ as Gregory Nazianzen said is truly the Son of God he alone is the Son and the only Son of the Father and his son in an only or singular way and he is the son only he is not the Father also or the holy Ghost Jesus Christ is the proper Naturall true son of God begotten by the Father without a mother in the unity of the Godhead from all eternity equall to the Father one and the same God with the Father as the Scripture sets it forth and therefore we conclude that he is simply and absolutely the only begotten Son of God a more excellent son then all the other sons of God not only more excellent in degree for gradus non mutat speciem but a super-excellent son who doth differ from all his other sons plusquam genere aut specie because he is one God with the Father Iesus Christ is truly the Son of God because he is the true God 1 Iohn 5. 20. begotten of the Father Heb 1 5. begotten without a mother Hebr. 7. 3. begotten from the dayes of eternity Micah 5. 2. a son equal to his Father who begot him Iohn 5. 18. Phil. 2. 6. The Son of God Matth. 16. 16. the first begotten and the only begotten Son of God the naturall and proper Son of God for he is as the Father is God by nature Gal. 4. 8. and therefore naturally necessarily eternally begotten of the Father in the unity of the Godhead and therefore there is more then a graduall nay more then a specificall or genericall difference between this and all other sonnes of God we see by all these various expressions and by those divine and glorious Attributes which are ascribed to Christ in Scripture that God hath wonderfully declared his love to us in sending his only begotten to redeeme us according to that of the Apostle 1 Iohn 4. 9. In this was manifest the love of God towards us because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world that we might live through him When our Saviour called God his Father the Iewes did very well understand that he meant it in a proper and peculiar sense and therefore told him that he did make himself equall with God Iohn 5. 17. 18. and that being but a man he made himself God Iohn 10. 33. And though the Jewes accused him of blasphemy and endeavoured to stone him as they pretended for his blasphemy yet our Saviour doth not excuse his speech or say he meant it in a Metaphoricall sense but doth defend it by many arguments both in the fifth and in the tenth chapters of Saint Iohn though he did thereby endanger his life he saith he is equall to the Father nay one with the Father Iohn 5. 18. Iohn 10. 30. and when the High Priest asked him whether he was the Son of the blessed Mark 14. 61. our Saviour answers I am there 's a punctuall and positive affirmation of it v. 62 63. and you may easily know in what sense the High Priest meant it by his renting of his clothes and condemning our Saviour to death for blasphemy v. 64. And yet our Saviour did not endeavour to allay their heat and rage with any retractation he would not say that he spake Metaphorically for he spake properly he meant that he was the proper and naturall Son of God who had the same nature and power with the Father and therefore was able to do and actually did the same works with his Father And the Iewes did understand him so and therefore urged the Law against him and condemned him to death for blasphemy Iohn 19. 7. The Iews answered him We have a Law and by our Law he ought to die because he made himself the Son of God Mark the reason because he made himself the Son of God If our Saviour had not meant that he was the proper and naturall Son of God a Son equall to the Father one God with the Father the Iews would not have accused him of blasphemy Moreover the Iewes do generally hold that those words of the second Psalme This day have I begotten thee are meant of the Messiah as Rabbi Salomon doth acknowledge in his commentary upon the place Whatsoever saith he is sung in this Psalme our Masters have interpreted of King Messiah but saith he and he whispers it as a secret in regard of the sound of the words and for the refutation of Hereticks for so the Iew calls us Christians we think fit to expound it of David himself Here 's a Iew would faine conceal a confessed truth from Christians and there are some others it seems that would conceal this malitious concealment for these words are expunged out of the great Hebrew Bibles set forth at Basil but they are to be found in the Hebrew Bibles set forth with the Commentaries of the Rabbins at Venice by Bombergius or else I had not insisted upon the words I hope the detecting of this fraud may be very usefull but I must hasten to some other arguments The Socinians tâ—ll us that there are five Causes of Christs sonship assigned in Scripture which arr all temporall causes and therfore they see no reason why we should assert or they beleeve this eternall generation of the Son of God since Christ may be called the Son of God upon another and farre different account We desire to know whether every one of these five causes be totall or perpetuall causes if they be every one a totall cause then there will be as many sonships as there are causes no lesse then five sonships for that rule is certaine where there is a totall and sufficient cause in act there the effect must needs follow If they be partiall causes then the causes which succeed in order do not produce their complete effect untill the last cause be in act this we premise that the vanity of this invention may be more evident in the whole contexture of their discourse I shall now give them leave to speak their mind freely and fully 1. The first Cause of this Divine sonship is as they conceive the Conception of Christ by the Holy Ghost whereby say they Christ is said to be begotten of God in an excellent and peculiar way and they urge that testimony of the Angel which stands upon Record Luke 1. 35 to make good their conceit And the Angel answered and said unto her The holy Ghost shall come upon thee and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee therefore also that holy thing which shall be borne of thee shall be called the Son of God These words of the Angel have reference to the prophesie of Isaiah mentioned in the 31. verse of this first of Luke The words
brings in a Christian Catechising the heathens in the Doctrine of the Trinity 3. The forme of Baptism strictly observed in the Churches notwithstanding the great ignorance and contention in the East and the grand Apostacy in the West doth sufficiently prove that this Doctrine of the Trinity had taken deep root in the minds of men and that they were by the providence and speciall grace of God very diligent and faithfull in communicating of it to their posterity from time to time 4. The Doxology or as some call it the Hymn of glory doth evince the same and therefore the Arrians endeavoured to make an alteration in the Doxology and instead of saying Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy-Ghost they said Glory be to the Father By the Son and In the Spirit from whence we may observe by the way that if we suffer the Fundamentall Doctrine of our Faith to be corrupted we shall not be able to preserve the Fundamentals of our worship pure and uncorrupt 5. The Form of Apostolicall Benediction which stands upon record 2 Cor. 13. 14. doth cleerly hold forth the Doctrine of the Trinity to be a Fundamentall both of Faith and Worship And all who desire the grace of our Lord Iesus Christ the love of God the communion of the Holy-Ghost for their everlasting comfort salvation must beleeve and adore all three as onâ— God blessed for ever 6. All who beleeve in God are commanded to beleeve in Christ as God as one and the same God with the Father Ye beleeve in God beleeve also in me Joh. 14. 1. They are commanded to honour the Son as they honour the Father Joh. 5 23. And therfore the Doctrine of the divine person of Christ as Coessential with his Father is a Fundamentall both of Faith and worship 7. The Doctrine of the incarnation of the Word the naturall and proper Son of God the Doctrines of Christs satisfaction of our Redemption and justification by Christ as an all-sufficient Saviour are Fundamentall Doctrines necessary to be known beleeved and embraced for our eternall Salvation for we know the blood of a meere man cannot give satisfaction to the justice of God for those grosse affronts injuries and abuses which have been offered by man to the infinite Majesty of God The Church of God is purchased with the blood of God Act. 20. 28. And if Christ hath not redeemed the Church with the blood of God then the Church is not redeemed your Faith and our preaching are both vain because you and we are yet in our sins for then God hath not received satisfaction for our sins nor a sufficient ransome for our souls If the Son of God did not take flesh then was not God manifested in the flesh then the whole mystery of godlinesse which should be without controversie great and precious in the eyes of Christians will be cheap and vile and of no account for the whole mystery of godlinesse 1 Tim. 3. 16. depends upon the manifestation of God in the flesh Now the divine person of the Son took flesh the person of the Father was not incarnate 8. It is not enough to beleeve that the Son of Mary is risen from the dead we must beleeve that the Son of God is risen Rom. 1. 3 4. It is Iesus our Lord that rose for our justification Rom. 4. 24 25. Rom. 10. 9. 9. It is not sufficient to beleeve that there is a man sitting at the right hand of God we must beleeve that Iehovah sits there Psal. 110. 1. Mat. 22. 43 44 45. And the like must be said of our Advocate he must be such a one as can plead the worthinesse of his person the merit of his obedience and sufferings one who is able to save us to the uttermost Heb. 7. 25. 1 Ioh. 2. 1. 2 One who can plead with some Authority Majesty Father I will that they also whom thou hast given me be with me where I am Ioh. 17. 24. He speaks with Authority I will he speaks like a Coessentiall and Coequall person and it is for the glory of the Father to beleeve that the Father is in the Son and the Son in the Father that the Son is Lord equal to the Father Ioh. 14. 10 11. Phil. 2. 6 11. Many arguments more might be collected from divers places of Scripture cited above in the fourth chapter of this book and I shall enlarge upon this argument in the ninth Chapter 10. The Holy Ghost is the same God with the Father and Son the same object of divine Faith and Evangelical worship the same Author of the Scriptures and all-saving Grace Mat. 28. 19. 1 Cor. 12. 6. 11. 2 Cor. 13. 14. Through the Son and by the spirit we have accesse to the Father Eph. 2. 18. All Church administrations are to be performed in the power of the Holy Ghost and are made acceptable by the merit of the Lord Iesus Christ. If we will heare the Spirit speaking in the Scriptures to the Churches if we feel the Spirit Sanctifying of our hearts if we do not desire to undermine the foundation of the Christian Church and so overthrow the Church of Christ if we do not renounce our Christian Faith and our Baptisme the Sacrament thereof if we do not reject the fundamentall blessing the best portion of our selves and little ones the grace of Christ the love of God and communion of the Spirit why then I beseech you as the Apostle doth for the Lord Iesus Christs sake and for the love of the Spirit Rom. 15. 30. and for the glory of God the Father Phil. 2. 11. that you will beleeve adore embrace love and obey the Father Son and Holy Ghost as three Divine and Coessentiall Subsistents in the single God-head as one God blessed for ever the adaequate object and Authour of your Faith hope love and happinesse I do not desire to obtrude any thing upon the acutest disputant as Fundamentall that is curious or unnecessary Nay there are many things necessary for the maintenance of â—his truth and refutation of contrary errors when we are to deal with subtile Hereticks which I do not set before the common people as food fit to nourish them and for that reason I do desire them that they will look upon much of my sixth chapter and of some other chapters in this booke as â—t for the direction of young Scholers in this weighty point for I find young wits apt to be seduced by Logicall subtilities or rather fallacies Metaphysical notions Poetical raptures nice distinctions and vaine curiosities from the simplicity of the Gospel of Christ and therefore I have taken some pains in divers chapters but specially in the margine for the direction of hopefull youths who have been too often entangled and ensnared by Socinian fallacies and at last tempted into loud and hideous blasphemies We do therefore lay down these plain truths as necessary to be known and beleeved for the
maintaining of saving communion with God 1. That God is For he who commeth unto God must beleeve that God is Heb. 11. 6. 2. That there is but one God Deut. 6. 4. 3. That the Father Son and Holy Ghost are this one God because they are all three Coessentiall subsistents in this most single Godhead 1 Cor. 8. 5. 6. Phi. 2. 6. 1 Io 5. 7 Ioh. 10. 30. Mat. 3. 16 17. Mat. 28. 19. Act. 5. 4. 1 Cor. 12. 6. 11. 2 Cor. 13. 14. Ioh. 15. â—6 Rev. 1. 4. 5. Reverend Calvin was not so morose and austere in this point as to contend about unnecessary words or curious phrases so there were such words used as did fitly and fully expresse the whole mistery of Faith in this weighty point and sufficiently refute the damnable errours of Arrius and Sabellius If men will but acknowledge 1. That the Father Son and Spirit are one God and the selfe same God 2. That the Son is not the Father nor the Spirit the Son but that these three are distinguished by speciall Relations Incommunicable and unchangeable properties so that there is a Trinity of Coessentiall Subsistents in the selfe-same Divine Essence we are all agreed Arrius would acknowledge that Christ is God buâ— not Consubstantiall or Coessentiall with his Father for he did deny Christ to be the same God with his Father And in like manner the Socinians will say that they acknowledge and maintaine the true Divinity of the Son and Holy Ghost but they do deny that the Son and Spirit are one and the same God with the Father and affirme that the Reformed Churches who beleeve that all three persons have the selfe same God-head do ascribe a false and imaginary God-head to the Son and Spirit which the Holy Scriptures do no where acknowledge or declare And this is the true reason why the Orthodox Doctors of the Church have been so unanimous especially of late yeares in maintaining this Proposition Pater Filius Spiritus Sanctus sunt 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Father Son Holy Spirit are one and the self-same God On the other side Sabellius acknowledged that the Father Son and Holy Ghost are one God but if you say that the Father Son and Holy Ghost are three different subsistents then he cryed out as M. Fry doth that you acknowledge three Gods the best way to avoid these saith judicious Calvin is to say That there is a Trinity of Persons in one and the same essence of God For we must needs acknowledge the unity of the Divine nature because we read that the Father Son and Spirit are one and we must acknowledge the Trinity of these Coessentiall Subsistents or persons because we read that they are three Now the Trinity and unity make a Coessential Trinunity if the unity of the God-head and Trinity of the Subsistents or persons be acknowledged we shall not wrangle about curious phrases or unnecessary words The most judicious and moderate men amongst the Orthodox Doctors of the Church agree in this The learned and Reverend Doctor Davenant in his judicious exhortation to Brotherly Communion betweene the Protestant Churches teaches us how to distinguish between points that are fundamentall and Problems or Propositions that are not Fundamentall and when he comes to reckon up Fundamentals he instances in the Trinity and expresses himself after this manner That God is one in Essence three in Persons distinguished betwixt themselves That the Son is begotten of the Father That the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of the Father and the Son That these three persons are coeternall and coequall All these saith he are deservedly determined and ranked amongst the Fundamentall Articles Now if any should contend that all those things which are disputed of the School-men of the manner of proceeding and begetting are also fundamentall and necessary to be determined on one side verily he by this his rash judgement would gaine no favour with Christ. But it is objected by some who do acknowledge Christ to be God that they have no reason to close with us when we say That Iesus Christ is Coessentiall with God his eternall Father because we do impose a new word upon them and so make a new Fundamentall of our own Inventition to which I answer 1. That if we make an old truth plaine by a new word they ought to forgive us that injury 2. We explaine our new Terme 3. We save them the trouble of an artificiall and tedious deduction for as soon as they do but understand the word they must necessarily imbrace the sense and acknowledge that though the word seem new to them yet the Doctrine is old for if the persons be of a different Divine Essence then there would be more Gods then one 4. We doe hereby secure them against the subtilty of pernicious Hereticks who endeavour to seduce them into damnable Heresies For if the Father Son and Spirit have not the same Divine Essence then either there will be more Gods then one or else the Son and Spirit are no Gods at all but such petty inferiour Gods as the Socinians make them 5. No man that hath a sound braine and a single eye can conceive that there are divers Gods in the same Essence and therefore the expression is necessary and safe The Father Son and Spirit are three Coesential subsistents in the same single God-head they are all three one and the selfe-same God who is God by nature the only true God blessed for ever in this Faith we will live and in this we will dye as it becomes Orthodox Christians who were bâ—ptized in the Name of the Father Son and Holy Ghost CHAP. IX This Grand Mystery of Faith hath an Effectuall influence into the Practical Mystery of Godlinesse and Power of Religion IT is the great designe and faithfull endeavour of sincere Christians to attaine unto all riches of the full assurance of understanding to the acknowledgement of the Mystery of God and of the Father and of Christ Colos. 2. 2. They who have but a Forme of Godlines 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a kind of painted powerlesse shaddow of piety may look upon the Doctrine of the Trinity as a School-point a meer speculative Doctrine which men receive by Tradition from their fore-fathers but they who live in the spirit and walke in the spirit Gal. 5. 25. have a life that is hid with Christ in God Colos 3. 3. hid from formall men as colours are hid from blind men and these spirituall Christians do account the love of the Father the grace of Christ and the communion of the Spirit to be their Heaven upon earth They receive Iesus Christ so as to live by him walke in him and live to him Colos. 2. 6. Phil. 1. 21 1 Ioh. 5. 12 2 Cor. 5. 15. What is a Godly life but a life of faith and love of joy and thankfulnesse of self-denyall and devotion of patience and obedience hope
5. 23. The great mystery of uniting the soule to Christ by Faith Eph. 5. 32. and making of it one Spirit with the Lord Jesus 1 Cor. 6. 17. is a main Fundamentall of the mystery of Godlinesse as shall be proved cleerly before I conclude this chapter III. God the Holy Ghost is the object of a Christians divine Faith The holy-Holy-Ghost speaking in the Holy Scriptures doth teach us to beleeve not only in the Father and in the Son but in himself also It is the Spirit that beareth witnesse because the Spirit is truth 1 Joh. 5. 6. There are three that bear witnesse in Heaven but here is speciall testimony given of the Spirit that we might be moved to beleeve the spirit who is to testifie the whole truth concerning the Father the Son and himself It is the Spirit saith he whose speciall office it is to bear witnesse and therefore there is this speciall testimony given of him that the Spirit is truth and then it follows that the Spirit is one with the Father and the Son one in nature one and the same God with them both These three are one 1 Joh. 5. 7. and the witnesse of God must without controversie be received unlesse we will make God a Lyer as the Apostle reasons the point from the 9th verse to the 12th The Spirit is Truth the Spirit is God therefore the Spirit is the object of Divine faith he that tells a lye to the Holy Ghost tells a lye to God Acts 5. 3 4. He that then gives the lye to the Holy Ghost gives the lye to God The testimony of the Spirit is a Divine testimony 1 Cor. 2. 1. 4. the demonstration of the Spirit a divine demonstration the power of the Holy Ghost a divine power Paul saith his Preaching was not with enticing words of mans wisdom but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power that our faith might not stand in the wisedome of men but in the power of God The wisdome power testimony of the Spirit are all of them divine the wisdome of the Spirit is infallible the power of the Spirit is irresistible and therefore our most divine faith is built and doth stand fast grounded and established upon the wisdome of the Spirit because the wisdome of the Spirit is the wisdome of God 1 Cor. 2. 4 5. We read in the Prophets that all the children of God shall be taught of God Esay 54. 13. of all three persons for the Father teacheth Mat. 16. 17. Ioh. 5. 45. and the Son who came out of the bosome of his Father and yet remained in the bosome of his Father teacheth Heb. 1. 2. But the Father and the Son especially since the Ascension of Christ and the effusion of the Spirit do teach the children of God all his Elect by the holy Spirit And therefore the Apostle shewing how God doth teach his Elect after a more peculiar manner so that even babes in Christ those whom he calleth little children are preserved even in seducing times and led into all necessary truths notwithstanding all the diligence and subtilty of those many Antichrists who are industrious to deceive he saith they have an unction from the Holy one and know all things all things necessary to be knowne and beleeved for the obtaining the remission of sins c. ver 12. But more especially he shewes that the Spirit doth teach them to continue in the Son and in the Father ver 24. and therefore in the Doctrine concerning the Father and the Son as it is more expresly set downe in the 9th verse of the second Epistle of Iohn And then he shewes that the Spirit should abide constantly in them to give them cleer and certaine direction in all necessary points 1 Iohn 2. 27. But the annointing which yee have received of him abideth in you and ye need not that any man teach you but as the same annointing teacheth you of all things and is truth and is no lye and even as it hath taught you ye shall abide in him or it Ye shall abide in Christ and abide in the truth which hath been taught you by the Holy Spirit and the teaching of the Spirit is cleare and certaine for saith he the spirit is truth and is no lye Here is the peculiar teaching of God the Spirit teacheth us to beleeve in himselfe aswell as in the Father and the Son And the Spirit was sent by the Father in the namâ— of the Son for this very purpose Moreover it is evident that the Spirit doth not only teach Babes in Christ but he taught even the Apostles of Christ. But the Comforter which is the Holy Ghost whom the Father will send in my name he shall teach you all things Joh. 14. 26. Nay the Holy Spirit did endite all the Holy Scriptures and inspire the Prophets Apostles and all the holy men of God in the writing of them The Scriptures were not written by the will of men but by the motion of the Holy Ghost 2 Pet. 1. 21. where the motion of the Holy Ghost is opposed to the will of men to shew that the motion and will of the Holy Ghost is the motion and will of God Many other places and arguments might be superadded but for the better instruction of ordinary Readers I shall draw out my Arguments into ranke and file 1. The Spirit is God The testimony of the Spirit is the testimony of God 1 Cor. 2. 1. 4. The wisedome of the Spirit the wisedome of God and the power of the Spirit the power of God 1 Cor. 2 4 5. 13. The teaching of the Spirit is the teaching of God Ihe will of the Spirit is the will of God 2 Pet. 1. 21. 1 Cor. 12. 6. 11. 2. The Spirit is the Author of the Scriptures 2 Tim. 3. 16. 1 Pet. 1. 11 12. Revel 2. 29. 3. The Spirit is the Interpreter of the Scriptures and his interpretation is cleer certaine and infallible The Spirit discovers the hidden wisedome of God the wisedome of God in a mystery the deep things of God which could not have entred into the heart of man if the Spirit had not revealed them and therefore the deep things of God â— Cor. 2. 10. are called the things of the Spirit of God ver â—4 and things which are spiritually discerned and therefore they are such things as the Spirituall man by the help of the Spirit is able to perceive discerne receive and to say with truth and comfort Now I have the mind of Christ now I know the things that are freely given me of God because the Spirit hath revealed them to me Consider the discourse of the Apostle quite throughout the Second chapter of the first Epistle to the Corinthians and this point will be very cleer 4. The Spirit
is the Author of Faith he gives us supernaturall light and spirituall eyes 1 Cor. 2. 8 9 10. Ephes. 1. 17 18. He that beleeveth on the Son of God hath the witnes in himselfe The Spirit is called the witnesse 1 Ioh. 5. 6. 10. And the Apostle assures us that none can say with faith and full perswasion of heart that Iesus is the Lord till he hath been taught to say so by the Holy Ghost 1 Cor 12. 3. They who are sensuall and have not the Spirit Iude ver 19. do slight the testimony of the Spirit because the world cannot receive the Spirit or the things of the Spirit It is a naturall mans pride and folly to account those things below him which are above him for he doth account spirituall wisedome foolishnesse wheras indeed it is too excellent for him to understand because he is a meer naturall sensual man but these spirituall things are spiritually discerned he doth not receive them he cannot know them 1 Cor. 2. 14. This is the true reason why men do not beleeve in the Spirit and adore the Spirit because he is the Spirit of Truth whom the world cannot receive because it seeth him not neither knoweth him Ioh. 14. ver 17. But saith Christ to his Disciples ye know him for he dwelleth with you and shall be in you Ioh. 14. in the selfe-same ver and Act. 5. 32. 5. The Spirit is the Supream Judge of truth even of controverted truths in matters of Religion we need not speake of a Private judgement of Discretion such as spirituall men may passe by the help of the Spirit and word of truth nor of that Publick and ministeriall judgement which may be passed in greater or lesser Synods where Pastors and Elders are assembled by the Ordinance of Christ and therefore may pray in faith for the direction and assistance of the Holy Ghost in all their Ministeriall determinations But I speak of the supremacy and Soveraignty of Iudgement which belongs to the Holy Ghost True it is that Christ is King and head of the Church and therefore he is our master Doctor Lawgiver Mat. 23. 10. Iam. 4. 12. But the Father hath sent the Spirit in the name of Christ to teach us the meaning of the Word of Christ and to lead us into all truth and holinesse by the holy Scriptures of truth The Spirit did indite the whole Scripture and it is agreeable to the light of nature that he who made the Law should expound it This Holy Spirit is a publick Spirit he governes the whole body of Christ the whole Church and speaks in the whole body of the Scriptures every part thereof and if we do compare one place of Scripture with another we shall by comparing of Spirituall things with Spirituall come to understand the saving wisdome which the Holy Ghost teacheth which things we speak saith the Apostle not in the words which mans wisedome teacheth but which the Holy Ghost teacheth comparing spirituall things with Spirituall 1 Cor. 2. 13. The Holy Ghost speaking to us in plain places doth discover to us all that is necessary to be knowne and beleeved for our eternall salvation and doth thereby give us so much light as that we may sufficiently understand hard places if we pray as we should compare and search the Scriptures as we ought in the Spirit of Faith and modesty Iam. 1. 5. Ioh. 5. 39. Mat. 7. 7. 1 Ioh. 5. 14. Rom. 2. 2. 3. and practise what we know before Ioh. 7. 17. Phil. 3. 15 16. for we shall at least learne so much wisedom as not to expound hard places of Scripture in any sense that is contrary to the mind of the Spirit cleerly delivered in plaine places of Scripture If we expound hard places according to the Analogy of Faith cleerly delivered in other places though we should mistake in the application yet the Spirit doth so far interpose as to keep us from falling into heresie And if we meet with no plaine places to expound an hard place by there is then no danger of heresie because all things necessary to salvation are set downe cleerly in the plaine places of Scripture This conference of Scriptures is an excellent means to bring us acquainted with all Book-cases the determinations which the Spirit hath made in Scripture and left there upon Record in those sacred Rolls which are the treasury of the Church for the direction of the Saints And whether we make use of this ordinance in our private reading or in the publique ministry the spirit doth deliver his judgement authoritatively and infallibly in the holy Scriptures and we may come to be acquainted with the mind and judgment of the Spirit by both Ordinances Thine eyes shall see thy teachers And thine eares shall heare a word behind thee saying This is the way this and not that behold a cleere direction walk ye in it continue and go forward in it do not forsake it when we are wavering and even turning out of our way on one hand or the other when ye turn to the right hand and when ye turn to the left then even then doth the Spirit resolve us and put us out of doubt when we are disputing and even yielding up the truth in a controversie we have a cleer certain and infallible direction from the holy Spirit Isa 30 20 21. The Holy Ghost doth exhort the Jewes to compare the dimmer light of the Prophers with the cleerer light of the Apostles that so the Sun of righteousnesse may shine in its strength with its healing beams into their hearts and then tels them that no Prophecy of the Scripture is of private interpretation because Prophets spake as the Apostles also did not as the will of man did move or the fancy of man direct but according to the mind and will of the Holy Ghost And therefore since all the Scriptures were endited all are to be expounded by the Holy Ghost speaking in the Scriptures thus compared for the Holy Ghost did move all the Holy men Apostles as wel as Prophets to write and teach them what they should write And though we have no extraordinary revelations now by a voice from the excellent glory for our direction yet we have that which is better the writings of the Prophets and Apostles to compare together the Prophesies be darke yet they are sure more sure then those voices which may be more easily counterfeited though the Prophesies be dark yet the Spirit who did endite them will if you compare them with the writings of the Apostles give light to both and deliver his judgement as cleerly in all necessary points as if it were written with a Sun-beame this I take to be the scope of the Holy Ghost in that excellent discourse 2 Pet. 1. from the sixteenth verse to the end of the chapter
And I have consulted the most judicious and experienced writers upon that place though I cite but few in the margine because I have not time to peruse them againe True it is that we are not to beleeve every spirit and therefore are permitted to try the spirits whether they be of God or no 1 Joh. 4. 1. But in this tryall the Holy Spirit speaking in the Scriptures is the suprem Judge and the Holy Spirit doth condemn all erroneous and fantasticall spirits who forsake old truths and pretend to follow New Light The holy Spirit doth constantly teach the same truth in the holy Scriptures for he doth not change his mind or contradict himself We saith the Apostle having the same spirit of Faith according as it is written I beleeved and therefore have I spoken we also beleeve and therefore speake 2 Cor. 4. 13. The same spirit doth lead all the faithfull into all truth necessary to salvation not Absolutely and at once but by degrees For we see the Apostles themselves were for a time guilty of grosse errours Mark 10. 37 41. Act. 1. 6. But the faithfull cannot obstinately hold and continue in such odious and damnable errours as do directly overthrow the foundation of Faith And for the time in which they do erre they hearken to their own spirits so farre as they are carnall and do not as they ought search and pray and wait for the direction of the Holy Spirit It is not the Spirit of Faith which speaks in them when they dissent from such as receive the publique Testimony of the Holy Ghost speaking in the holy Scriptures And therefore the Spirit teacheth us to try the spirits and doctrines of men by the Scriptures if they speak not according to this Word it is not because they have new light from the spirit but because they have no light no morning light heavenly light conveyed unto them in that point wherein they dissent or they have not as yet received it the spirit hath not as yet sealed that portion of truth to their consciences or writ it in their hearts For the spirit doth not whisper one thing in privat to my conscience and declare the contrary in his publique Testimony delivered in the Word Behold saith the wisdome of God I will pour out my spirit unto you I will make knowen my words unto you Pro. 1. 23 For this is the Covenant of God that his Word and spirit should go together and the spirit should deliver his publique Testimony Authoritatively as it becomes his supremacy and soveraignty in the holy Scriptures This is my Covenant with them saith the Lord my spirit that is upon thee and my Word c. Isa. 59. 21. And by attendance on the ministry of the Gospel in the Church of Christ we receive the Spirit Gal. 3. 2. By hearing the doctrine of Faith preached in the Gospel they received the Spirit and therefore the ministry of the Gospel is called the ministration of the Spirit 2 Cor. 3. 8. And for these reasons we try the doctrines and Spirits of men by the word of God because the Spirit who is the Author of Scripture doth every where agree with himself and there is a friendly relation between the truth of the party witnessing the truth of the thing witnessed We do readily acknowledge that the world doth look upon this publique testimony of the Spirit in the word as a private testimony and are apt to scoffe at them who receive it as at men led by their own private spirit but the true reason is because this testimony of the Spirit is not manifest to them who have not the Spirit But it is so manifest to them that have had this publique testimony sealed up to their consciences that they will hold fast this testimony though it cost them their lives I saw under the Altar the soules of them that were slaine for the word of God and for the testimony which they held Rev. 6. 9. The testimony which they held is no other then that publick testimony which the Spirit delivers in the Word and had privately sealed up to their Spirits They were slaine for the Word of God and for the testimony which they held according to that Word They were Martyred because they gave testimony of that truth which they had learnt in the Word of God I am willing to dwell longer upon this subject because it is Fundamentum Fundamentorum and therefore we will for our better satisfaction descend from handling the point in Generall unto some very weighty points in particular and shew how the Spirit doth perswade the hearts and consciences of men to receive his testimony in particular controversies which have been raised and disputed by men of great wit and Spirit In the great controversies between us and the Papists they do as divers Hereticks have done before them urge visions miracles traditions successions prudentiall motives and sometimes Councels Fathers and for a fairer pretence the holy Scriptures But when they are beaten off from their pretending to Councels and Fathers by our learned Whitaker Iewel Abbot Vsher Rainolds not to name Chamier and other Worthyes what lamentable shifts do they make when they are pressed to stand to the publicke testimony and judgement of the Holy Ghost delivered in the holy Scriptures We do therefore in compassion to their poor soules intreat them to hearken to the Spirit of Christ and not to the Spirit of Antichrist because the right sense of the Scripture expounded by the Scripture is the sword of Gods Spirit where with all heresies whatsoever are overcome by all those good souldiers who add the shield of Faith to the Sword of the Spirit But when men neglect the Scriptures and idolize humane inventions they spend their strength in vaine and are like the blind men of Sodome who wearied themselves to find the doore The great point of the Popes Infallible Supremacy can never be proved by the Originall Universall and Perpetuall Tradition of the Church of Christ in all Ages no nor by the unanimous consent of all learned men now living in communion with the present Church of Rome The Sorbon Doctors cannot beleeve that the Popes of Rome are not subject to the sins and passions of other men and if the succession of Popes which they brag of were to be tryed by Fame Celebrity Antiquity Consent it is most evident to all that are acquainted with pure antiquity and impartiall History that the Supremacy of the Popes and Papacy would be sufficiently condemned but if the Popes infallible Supremacy come to be tryed by the Holy Ghost speaking in the holy Scriptures the Popes and Papacy will be infallibly condemned by the Supream Judge The learned Papists do not agree concerning the Infallible Propounder of Fundamentall points for 1. Some say that the Popes proposall ex Cathedrâ is sufficient but Gal. 1. 8. 2. Others
say a Councell without the Pope 3. Others the Pope and Councell both together it seems the Pope is not sent as Peter to strengthen his brethren but his brethren must be sent for to strengthen him 4. Some say both together is not sufficient either in point of manners or matter of Faith unlesse the acceptation of the Church Vniversall be superadded 5. We are not able to reckon up the number of those who deny the infallibility of the present Church and Pope of Rome 6. They cannot give us in a perfect Inventory of all written verities unwritten Traditions and Church-definitions which the whole succession of Popes have upon the credit of their infallibility determined to be necessary for all Christians to know and beleeve I need say nothing of the Papall Reservations Provisions Mandates and all postnate Dictates and Decrees which Bishops Metropolitans are by their* Oath made to the Pope at their confirmation obliged to observe Nor will I trouble my Reader with the distinction of Supremacy of knowledge in resolving Church questions because that they say belongs to the Fathers who excelled the Popes in expounding of Scriptures and Supremacy of Power to decide Church causes For this latter Supremacy is that which Popes and Cardinals and all must live by in the Court of Rome and the former Supremacy is purposely claimed for the support of this But it was a long time before the Popes presumed to challenge the power of deciding all the greater causes of the Church thorowout the world For the Bishops of Rome were at the first but Bishops within their own City then Metropolitans within their own Province afterwards Arch-Bishops or Patriarks over Metropolitans within their Princely Diocesse and last of all their pride and policy being crowned with successe did swell them up to be Popes and Lords over all the Christian or rather Antichristian world The Ecclesiasticall and Temporall Supremacy or Soveraignty of Popes is condemned by Reason and History by Fathers and Councels as others have proved at large let us not therefore be put off with that ridiculous piece of Sophistry which is so common The Pope is infallible and supream Head of the Church and Lord of the World because the Scriptures meane so and the Scriptures meane so because the Pope saith so who doth not see that the Scriptures are only put in for a meer stale and therefore the Argument had been as strong if they had proved the Popes Infallible Authority and Princely Supremacy by an ipse dixit at first The Pope saith he is Infallible ergo he is so I am not at leasure to heare what the Pope who hath endeavoured to dethrone Christ and depose the Holy Ghost saith in his owne behalfe at Rome for if he once bring this great question to be resolved in his owne Consistory he will soon bring all causes to be decided there also where he himselfe is Plaintiffe Witnesse and Iudge only in prudence and modesty he hath entertained a company of Cardinals who are to divide the spoiles with him for his Grand Inquest The Popes Supremacy is unwritten and therefore he is a fit Judge to decide all controversies amongst the Traditionaries whose faith is not written in either Testament But since the Pope doth strive with the Holy Ghost for the Chair and Christ for the Throne let us heare what Christ and the Holy Ghost do both speake in the Holy Scriptures of Truth and we shall quickly decide this grand controversie and many more Christ is the only Pastour of his Church he is to continue so and have no successor We find in holy Scripture that Christ is the only Head and Saviour of his whole Church Ephes. 1. 22. Colos. 2. 19. he doth and will continue with his Church alway even unto the end of the world to give life sense and motion to it and to rule and governe the whole and every member of it by the effectuall councell and working of his Holy Spirit The Apostles were but Ministeriall Heads or Principall Members who had a preheminence over the inferiour members for perfecting of the Saints by the worke of the Ministry 1 Cor. 12. 21. 28. First Apostles this eminent ministry or Headship did belong to all the Apostles and not to Peter only the power of remitting and retaining sins was given to the other Apostles aswel as Peter Io. 20. 21 22. 23. We deny not Peter to be the first Apostle in time as Andrew was the first Disciple and therefore Peter is first reckoned Mat 10. 2. Nay we will not deny him to be most eminent in grace and for both reasons grant him to be first in Order but we deny that he was chiefe in dignity or Supream in power Because we know the Apostles had all equall power For Christ sent them all as his Father sent him they had all of them power to open heaven to beleevers and shut it against unbeleevers The power of the Keyes was given upon the confession which Peter made in the name of al the rest Mat. 16. 16. 18. as he was wont to do Ioh. 6. 69. The confession was common to all the promise common to all the performance common to all Ioh. 20. 21 22 23. I need say no more but this 1. The Papists do entitle Peter to that Supream Soveraignty which belongs to Christ But Peter and the rest of the Apostles were joynt foundations built on Christ the only proper head and foundation Ephes. 2. 20. 2. They entitle the Pope to that power which did belong to Peter but Peter had no successour in his extraordinary and Apostolick power the Pope is no Apostle and when Peter speakes of his ordinary power he tells the Elders that he is their Fellow-Presbyter I who am also an Elder exhort the Elders 1 Tim. 5. 1. But that Peter was an ordinary Bishop of one City First of Antioch for seven yeers and then of Rome for twenty-five cannot be proved by Scripture no nor by any credible Historian I know they rely upon Eusebius his testimony But it is enough for me to reply that Eusebius his History doth dissent from his Chronicle and his Chronicle doth dissent from Scripture 3. Christ hath many Ministers to preach his Gospell but he hath no Catholick Vicar besides his Spirit who can challenge the Supream Soveraignty of deciding controversies by an infallible Sentence It is the Spirit that makes the word to be effectuall 1 Cor. 3. 7. As Christ workes by his Spirit he hath no Vicar for he himselfe is with his Disciples alwayes to the end of the world Mat. 20. Christ himselfe doth Baptize with the Holy Ghost he himselfe did open the heart of Lydia 4. The Pope challenges this power over the Gentiles but Paul was the Apostle of the Gentiles by the appointment of the Holy Ghost and Peters own consent Rom. 11. 13. Act. 13. 2. Gal. 2. 9. Paul was chief
Arminians the constant enemies of the Grace of God should consider that the Pelagians the advocates of Free-wil and corrupt nature were confounded with those plain Scriptures which were urged by the Councels of Carthage Milevis Orenge and Holy Augustine in his fragrant works The Socinians the enemies of the onely true God Father Son and Holy Ghost should consider that the Arrians were overthrown by the Scriptures in the Nicene councel and by the godly Pastours of the Church who instead of broken Scriptures which the Arians urged with as much fraud as the devil did Mat. 4. produced plain Scriptures and the whole Series of both Testaments and so did invincibly refute their blasphemous errours The Libertines who claym a liberty of publishing damnable Heresies and blasphemies under pretence of Prophesying might learn that where the Spirit of the Lord is there is liberty true liberty but no where else for he who protends to speak by the Holy Ghost and yet denies Iesus to be the Lord doth at once blaspheme Christ and the Holy Spirit and is an Anti-spiritual Lyar an Antichristian Blasphemer and hath neither Father Son nor Spirit dwelling in him For he who speaks by the Spirit doth acknowledge Jesus to be the Lord 1 Cor. 12. 3. And he who denies the Son hath not the Father Who is a lyer but he who denies that Iesus is the Christ He is Antichrist who denies the Father and the Son whosoever denies the Son the same hath not the Father 1 Jo. 2. 22 23. In like manner every Spirit which confesseth not that Iesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God but of Antichrist 1 Joh. 4. 2 3. This is that Vorstian liberty which hath undone so many Nations already and is now Idolized in England under the name of Liberty of Conscience by such as have neither Conscience nor liberty Reverend Dr. Sibbs did exceedingly cry out against this kind of Liberty in his time He would not have way given to Vorstian lawlesse licencious liberty of prophesie that every one so soone as he is big of some new conceit should bring forth his abortive Monster for then the Pillars of Christian Faith will soon be shaken and the Church of God which is an house of Order will beâ—ome a Babel an house of Confusion The dolefull issues of which pretended Liberty we see in Polonia Transylvania and in Countries neerer hand I might proceed but this is sufficient for a taste and if I should but name all the errours of this age and not confute them I should abuse my Reader and therefore I desire to stop in time and beseech all that are spiritually minded to heaâ—ken to the Spirit speaking in the word Beloved beleeve not every spirit but beleeve the Holy Spirit who is the Author of the Scriptures the Author of Faith the Iudge of Controversies the interpreter of the Scriptures the Doctor and comforter of the Elect and he will lead you into all necessary truth for your present edification and everlasting Salvation The Holy Spirit will assure you that the Scriptures of truth were all written by his own Authority and you may safely set to your seale when you have received the infallible testimony of the Holy Ghost We are witnesses of these things saith the â—postle and so is the Holy-Ghost also Act. 5. 32. We shall never receive the word as the Word of God with joy reverence submission and assurance of Faith specially in times of â—ffliction and temptation unlesse we receive the witnesse of the Spirit and ground our Faith upon the wisdome and evident demonstration of the Spirit When we look upon the word of God and consider 1 The wonderfull consent of all those Holy and selfe-denying men that penned it 2. The marvellous fulfilling of all the strange Prophecies in the fullnesse of time appointed by God 3. The Admirable Providence of God in preserving the Scriptures notwithstanding all the rage and malice of Hereticks and persecutors 4. The supernaturall Miracles wrought for to confirm it 5. The Harmonious testimony that the Church Martyrs Saints have in all ages given to it 6. The Antiquity Majesty Efficacy of it 7. The divine and heavenly matter contained in it 1. Mysteries above reason 1 Cor. 2. 9. 2. Commands contrary to our corrupt nature sent to all Nations and even to the greatest and proudest of men 3. Threats beyond the strength of man to inflict or the capacity of man to comprehend an hard heart a seared Conscience and yet a trembling Spirit a reprobate mind and sense a spirit of madnesse giddinesse horrour or slumber an everlasting worm eternall fire torments with the devil and his Angels 4. Promises and rewards beyond the power of man to bestow or wisdome of Angels to comprehend 1 Pet. 1. 12. Ephes. 3. 10. 5. The fall corruption Redemption Salvation of man wonderfully declared in the Holy Scriptures the inward frame and disposition of mans heart his secret thoughts and most intimate projects his reserved wishes desires ends and purposes undenyably discovered for his conviction even to admiration and amazement 1 Cor. 14. â—5 then the reason of man is even confounded the obstinacy of mans heart subdued all the pride of humane glory stained and the Scriptures appeare to be the word of God But now all these Arguments and many more which I could name will not be effectuall for our regeneration and conversion untill the Spirit be pleased to set all home upon the heart by his own irresistible efficacy and seale this truth to the Conscience by his own infallible testimony But when the Spirit speaks to and works upon our spirits then we do assent and consent to all the proposals of God our very thoughts are captivated and subdued unto the obedience of Christ 2 Cor. 10. 5. Our Conscience is convinced swayed and undeniably obliged to beleeve what is promised allow what is commanded our will made willing to chose both the affections to embrace both our whole man to follow after both according to the directions of God for performing what is commanded and obtaining of what is promised Rom. 7. 12. 22. Psa. 119. 106 112 113 127 128 167 173 174. I must acknowledge my absolute total and universal dependance upon the infallible wisdome infinite truth power majesty greatnesse and goodnesse of the Holy Spirit and confesse that he hath soveraigne Right and divine authority to reveale and prescribe whatsoever he pleases upon the rewards and penalties of everlasting life and death And I am obliged to beleeve and embrace al that the Spirit teacheth without any contradiction though it seeme never so improbable to my carnall reason and be really contrary to my corrupt affections ends and esianes The spirit teaches me how to apprehend and judge of spirituall things after a spirituall manner for the spirit teaches me what to approve and
the Holy Spirit as well as to the Father himself because all three are Co-essentiall Co-equall and Co-eternall When the seven Electours of the Empire met at Franckford about the election of Maximilian the second some of them being strict Protestants went out of the place of Worship when the Mass began because they would not be present at that Idolatrous service but came in again when they sang Come holy Ghost eternall God We being then convinced by clear Scriptures that Christ and the holy Spirit are one and the same God with the Father we must glorifie all three Persons as one God blessed for ever 1. We must not do any divine service to them who are not Gods by nature Gal. 4. 8. But the three divine Persons have the self-same divine nature and therefore the very same divine Worship and Service both for kind and degree is due to all three Co-essentiall Persons We must not conceive otherwise of God then he hath revealed himselfe in his Word For then we shall not worship the true God but a meere phantasticall Idoll of our own braine Ye worship ye know not what saith Christ of the Samaritans Ioh. 4. 22. the Samaritans served their own Gods who were not Gods by nature but false Gods 2 Kings 17. 29. 33. 2. Nor must we give Father Son and Holy Spirit the only true God any other kind of Worship then what is prescribed in his Word Israel is said to be without the true God when they were without the Law without a Priest to teach them how to Worship God according to his Law 2 Chron. 15. 3. Now for a long season Israel hath been without the true God and without a teaching Priest and without Law The divine kind of worship prescribed both in Law and Gospell is spirituall Worship Mark 12 33. Heb. 12. 28. Psal. 51. 6 16. Deut. 6. 5. 1 Cor. 5. 8. 1 Chron 28. 9. Phil. 3. 3. Ioh. 4. 23 24. 3. The Worship of God is either Natural or instituted Worship The instituted Worship hath been changed for it was different before the Law under the Law and under the Gospell But the naturall worship and service of God is perpetuall and eternall it is to be continued in heaven both by Saints and Angels for evermore Naturall Worship is due to Jesus Christ and the holy Spirit because they have one and the self-same divine nature with God the Father Angels are called upon to give this Naturall Worship to Jesus Christ. And let all the Angels of God worship him Heb. 1 6. 4. Instituted Worship is subservient as I may so speak to this naturall worship for when we worship God with those meane helps and actions which he himself hath appointed and ordained we must worship him in spirit and truth All Ordinances of Christ are meanes of grace to beget knowledge faith hope love self-denyal gratitude humility sincerity reverence zeale and all other graces in the soule and to encrease them in us that we may exercise all these graces upon every opportunity and give God that Natural Spiritual Divine Honour which is due unto his singular Majesty infinite excellency independent perfection and eternall Godhead in knowing esteeming admiring beleeving loving obeying God that our soules may be delighted and satisfyed with God as the chiefest good as the Crown of all our joyes an All-sufficient portion of our soules for evermore This is the full scope of the first Table of the Law and this is the summe of the Gospel If the first Table of the Law did discover to us 1. The object of worship 2. The means of worship 3. The time of worship and did not also prescribe require enjoyn 4. The manner of worship we should be at a losse the Law would not be a perfect rule Our worship would not be agreeable to the nature and will of God God would be defrauded of his naturall spirituall divine worship and therefore when our Saviour doth deliver the full scope of all the foure first Commandements by reducing them to one Commandment he saith Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart with all thy soule and with all thy mind this is the first and great Commandment Mat 22. 37 38. Deut. 6. 4 5. This Spirituall worship is taught us in every Commandement of the first Table if we look upon the inside and spirituall compasse of those Commandements discovered to us by Moses the Psalmes Prophets and the New-Testament 1. In the first Commandement we are not barely required for to take God for the object of our worship but to give him spiritual worship also because we are required in mind heart will affection and the effects of all these to take the true God Father Son and Holy Ghost God in Christ by the assistance of the Spirit to be our God to know esteem admire trust love reverence adore and serve him with hope humility self-deniall patience joy and thankefulness zeal◠and constancy This is the inside and spirituall compass of the first Commandement 2. In the second Commandement we are required to worship God purely according to his Will in every Ordinance without any carnall Imagination or affections The Papists will grant that we are by the use of Ordinances and as they dreame Images also to carry our hearts to God and Christ in obedience to the second Commandement The more learned Papists will confess that it is a sin against the first Commandement to terminate our worship in any Image because no Image is Iehovah But they worship Images Relativè though not Terminativè as visible helps to devotion to carry their hearts to God in worship and it is cleare that the Jews and Heathens of old intended no more and therefore there is as much to be said for Heathenish and Iewish as there is for Romish Idolatry This then is the great sin of the Antichristian Worshippers at Rome who endeavour to defend this Relative worship of Images that they conceive that the heart of man will be better carried to God and Christ by humane inventions such as Images Crucifixes Reliques c. then by divine Institutions and this sin is called an hatred of God in the second Commandement And in the very letter of this Commandement we are directed how to expresse our love to God namely by seeking of him and closing with him in his own Ordinances and institutions with an ingenuous contempt of humane inventions in divine worship and service and though legall Ordinances are not only changeable but actually changed and abolished yet there is something morall and unchangeable in this second Commandement which is attendance upon and observance of the Institutions and appointments of God It is an immutable Law that we should give God that worship which is due unto him expresse our saith in him and love to him by a spirituall use of such means
holy in life We can never understand the Presence Institution and mind of Christ in this Ordinance unless we beleeve the cursed condition of men in their naturall estate the divine nature and person of Christ the greatness of the price that was paid for the satisfaction of Gods justice and appeasing of Gods wrath who did not spare his own Co-essential Son but manifested his hatred against sin and love to his Elect in not sparing his Son but breaking his body and shedding of his bloud that we might be redeemed by the bloud of God this is the mystery which is made sensible in the Sacrament and is really evident to the eye of faith Gal. 3. 1. And whosoever looks upon these great mysteries of the Gospel as fancies and doth not beleeve them to be reall things truly exhibited really presented to beleevers in a Sacramental mystical spiritual way in this Ordinance hath not yet learnt the truth as it is in Jesus and is not prepared for such high Communion We Christians do not come with hungry and thirsty soules longing after farther Communion with Christ for mortifying of our lusts and encrease of all our graces by his spirit untill we beleeve this grand mystery of Faith and we are then experimentally acquainted with the mystery of Godliness when we have been made drink into one Spirit with Christ and his Members when we look upon him whom we have pierced by our sins and acknowledge him to be the natural and Co-essential Son of God there can be none of those fiduciall breathings after Christ Penitential meltings before him or obediential closings with him as is evident by our ninth Chapter untill we do in some measure beleeve this mystery of Faith and understand the substance of the Covenant of grace which is sealed in this Sacrament by God and must be actually renewed by every good Communicant our Meditations Faith Love Repentance Joy Thankfulness will not be rightly placed or exercised if this grand mystery of Faith and Godliness be rejected by us 6. I might argue from all the Offices of Christ they who do not beleeve the divine nature of Christ do utterly disable Jesus Christ from being a Mediatour a Priest a Prophet a King for the saving of his people to the uttermost They who deny the divine Essence and Person of Christ do deny his satisfaction to be all-sufficient in our behalf They depose Christ from that spirituall and heavenly kingdom which he hath by Nature and render him uncapable of that Mediatory Kingdom which is delegated to Christ God man by the Decree of the Co-essentiall Trinunity But I have said enough of that in the former part of this Book I pass on to enquire what civill respect is due to such as do deny the divine Nature of Christ and his holy Spirit That one Text to my apprehension 2 Ioh. 9. 10 11. containes a very full and satisfactory answer Whosoever transgresseth and abideth not in the doctrine of Christ hath not God he that abideth in the doctrine of Christ he hath both the Father and the Son If there come any unto you and bring not this doctrine receive him not into your house neither bid him God speed For he that biddeth him God speed is partaker of his evill deeds But that this point may be more clearly stated and all mistakes prevented be pleased to consider 1. That such Points of Religion and Worship as are necessary to be known and beleeved for the maintenance of Christian spirituall saving Communion with Father Son and holy Ghost are clearely delivered in the holy Scriptures of truth 2. That if men who were formerly unblameable in their life and conversation be seduced into any errour which doth contradict or subvert such Fundamentall Points they ought to be instructed with the spirit of meekness in a Christian and brotherly way 3. They are to be admonished with all faithfulness and meekness of Wisdom twice or thrice that they may understand the importance of the truth which is denyed the danger of the errour maintained the sad consequences of both that if their conscience be not feared they may return from their beloved and damned errours 4. If after all this meekness patience and forbearance all Christian instructions and brotherly admonitions they do as men that are judicially blinded for sinning against conscience 1. Persist in their errour 2 Reject and revile the truth of God in these high and necessary Points 3. Fall from the grace of God frustrate the grace and Covenant of God evacuate the death of Christ depose Christ and his Spirit from their Throne and Godhead 4. Seduce and poyson others Mat. 21. 38. 5. Deny and overthrow the foundation of divine Faith Hope Love and Justification by Faith and the Adequate object also of all Christian Faith Evangelicall Worship and sincere Obedience These bold Atheists for they deny the only true God Father Son and holy Ghost may without any scruple be rejected from Christian Communion For there is certainly some lust or other which hinders them from seeing the truth or professing that they do see it and therefore it may be taken for granted that these men are obstinate self-condemned men men that combine with their Wills and Lusts against their own conscience and cleare shining Scriptures And therefore these men cannot complaine that they are punished for their conscience when they are indeed punished for sinning against their conscience because they are condemned by their own conscience But it will be said that there are scarce any such men to be found as I have described To which I answer Be pleased but to consider what hath been delivered in this very Chapter already and compare it with the foregoing Chapters and with the many blasphemous Pamphlets which do pass up and down without controule in this licentious Age in which men adventure upon the very language of hell under pretence of exercising their Christian Liberty and speaking according to their New Light and this Point will be too cleare For we do already grant that no man ought to be troubled for following the dictates of his conscience rightly enformed but for following of pernicious errours which are contrary to his own conscience unless he be judicially blinded by God for his customary sinning against light of conscience in former times 2. Nothing is more common then for men to speak out of the abundance of that naturall Atheisme which lurkes in their hearts contrary to the dictates of their naturall conscience 3. Though conscience may be quiet whilst men are exercising their wits to maintaine some errour which is contrary to those mysteries of faith which transcend naturall reason and are repugnant to the corruption of reason especially if they are engaged in multitudâ— of business connived at by such as sit at sterne and do thrive and prosper in the world Yet conscience will find a time to speak when it may
Coessentiall Trin-unity of these heavenly witnesses And divers other learned and judicious men conceive that these words were blotted out in the time of Constantius and Valens the Emperours who were sworn enemies of the blessed Trinity and professed Patrons of Arrianisme 7. The Hereticks did blot out those words Ioh. 4 24. God is a spirit as Ambrose assures us and therefore this practise of expunging such words in the Scripture as did refute their errours was too common amongst the Hereticks of old as we might prove by witnesses enough if that were our businesse 8. These words 1 Ioh. 5. 7. are to be found in copies of great antiquity and best credit 9. This Text is cited by the Ancient Fathers by Athanasius in his dispute with Arrius at the counsell of Nice and Arrius never denyed it for to be Scripture which certainly he would have done if there had been any doubt made of it in the Primitive times It is cited by Cyprian also in his book de Vnitate Ecclesiae Paxillus in his booke de Monomachia proves by an induction of the learned Doctors of the Church both before and since Athanasius that the Doctrine of the Coessential Trin-Unity of these heavenly witnesses was generally received by all that were esteemed Orthodox and pious in the Church of Christ. Calovius also in his Fides Patrum ante Concilium Nicenum gives in a Catalogue for the satisfaction of all that desire resolution in this weighty point 10. These three heavenly witnesses are one in Power nature and Will all three bear witnesse to the same truth and their testimony is divine 1 Joh. 5. 9. And the truth which they bear witnesse to is a fundamentall truth a saving truth that we may beleeve on the Sonne of God and have eternall life 1 Joh. 5. 11 12 13. And if the authority of any one of these three heavenly witnesses be called into question all may be questioned upon the same grounds because their testimony is of equall authority their testimony is personall and divine and if the testimony and authority of these witnesses were not divine our faith which is built upon their testimony and authority would not be a divine Faith Quale est testimonium talis est fides All three heavenly witnesses joyne with one consent and Will in propounding this fundamentall truth and therefore if we do not beleeve and embrace it we give the lye to all the three witnesses in heaven 1 Joh. 5. 10. And if we do beleeve that Jesus is the naturall Son of God in and by whom all beleevers have eternall life then we must acknowledge that Jesus Christ is one God with his Father the true God and eternall life 1 Joh. 5. 20. Christ is God Attributivè Joh. 1. 1. Subjectivè Act 20. 28. 1 Tim. 3. 16. This one proposition That Iesus Christ is the naturall and proper Son of God is that Fundamental Confession of Faith upon which the Christian Church is built Mat. 16. 16 17 18. Thou art Christ the Son of the living God This is the Rock upon which Christ hath so firmly built his Church that the gates of Hell shal never prevail against it or this fundamentall truth We are all built upon Christ through the Spirit for an habitation of God Eph. 2. 20 21 22. Father Son Holy Ghost all three joyn in laying this foundation and all three are one and the self-same great God who is the only true God blessed for ever as hath been fully proved already in this book and therfore I may be the briefer in the discussion of this weighty point The Form of Baptism doth contain in it a short Creed or Rule of Faith Mat. 28. 19. And when the ancient Fathers speak such high things of the Creed they understand it of this short Creed which is part of Canonicall Scripture and not of that form which is commonly callled the Apostles Creed In like manner when they expound Eph. 4. 5. One Lord one Faith one Baptism they say there is one Faith and one Baptism because the sum of our Faith is contained in the forme of Baptism When Epiphanius hath reckoned up all the Heresies in his Anaceph he opposes this one Scripture Mat. 28. 19. to them all to shew that he looked upon the Doctrine of the Trinity as a Breviary or at least prime fundamentall of the Christian Faith and Eusebius Pamphilus doth the like I might produce many pertinent places out of Irenaeus Tertullian Athanasius Basil Nazianzene Augustin others to make good this useful observation That the prime Fundamentall of the Christian Faith is contained in the Form of Baptism and founded on Mat. 28. 19. It were easie to shew upon what occasion other Articles were added to the publique confessions of Faith in the most renowned Churches in severall ages And it is as easie to prove that the Doctrine of the Coessential Trin-unity was for the matter and substance if not in expresse terms in terminis terminantibus as we say constantly maintained 1. In publique Confessions of Faith composed explained confirmed by the first Generall Councels published by the decrees and edicts of pious Emperours and ratifyed by their civil sanctions from time to time I need not instance in the Nicene Creed or that Creed which was composed by Athanasius who studied this point defended suffered for it above forty yeers The Confession published by the Synod of Constantinople doth not differ in substance from the other Creeds concerning this grand mystery of the blessed Trinity I am not willing to expatiate upon this Argument because I should then be engaged to cite very many testimonies of the Ancients which would swell up my book beyond its due proportion But if any man desire to read more upon this Argument for his own satisfaction and hath not so much time as to peruse the ancient Records he may read Master Parkers book de Desc. ad inferos more especially his fourth book The learned Sermon of Reverend Doctor Vsher concerning the unity of Faith who gives a brief aud satisfactory account of the ancient Confessions of Faith with a special reference to Baptism Doctor Voetius Gomarus and the rest who have written de Symbolo Apostolico or of the mystery of the Trinity The jugling of the Arrians is so plainly set forth in the most faithfull writers of Ecclesiasticall story that I need not relate how they made use of their interest at Court and all their carnal policy in every considerable place to pack Councels forge or corrupt Creeds seduce all sorts of men who were led more by interest then Scripture and then to evade or comply with subtile distinctions mentall reservations equivocations and such unworthy shifts for to save themselves from censure in a time of Reformation 2. The Catechismes of the Ancients hold forth this doctrine the Catechumeni were trained up in the knowledge of it Lucian who lived in Trajans time