Selected quad for the lemma: sense_n
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A40441
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A dialogue by way of question and answer concerning the deity all the responses being taken verbatim out of the Scriptures.
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Freke, William, 1662-1744.; Freke, William, 1662-1744. A brief but clear confutation of the doctrine of the trinity.
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1693
(1693)
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Wing F2163; ESTC R30389
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26,997
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16
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of the Holy Ghost and the Homoousiotes Great and noble Thoughts indeed if true But I here challenge any man upon the face of the Earth to shew so much as one Text with sence to favour them and might not we be asham'd then of such Castles in the Air. IX Nor is the Tradition of this Doctrine when examined less considerable than its Scripture proof What Are not all our Prayers even at this day to the Father except a few and trifling innovations And can there be a greater Tradition in Nature for it than that is against it They Christen this Doctrine Athanasian indeed and surely a happy Doctrine to as happy a Patron What was his first entrance into the Ministry but a wicked Mock-Baptism And while that for which another would have punished him as confident and impious Alexander forsooth admires and advances him Nay read but his treatment of the excellent Emperour Constantius not so much an Arrian as one who sought the Apostolique Liberty and you will quickly see what a blessed Saint he was I may say Mr. Johnson in his Book call'd Julian's Arts p. 55. has set out Athanasius and his Followers beyond all the bloody Anabaptists Jesuits and Villains that ever professed Christianity had they not been more cowardly in acting than thinking His Passage is too fine of it self about it to need the least stroke of an Unitarian Addition Nor may I add is the common Doxology of a less precious stamp than its Patron Sparks himself on the Liturgy tells you that before the Trinitarians alter'd it it run Glory be to the Father through the Son and by the Holy Ghost and then surely hopefully improved since To be short who can read Histories and not see that Popes that Councils yea that the whole World was Unitarian at one time and till a corrupter Church that has since forged and mangled as well all Histories as Traditions as the Apostle prophesied was given up to believe a Lie X. And what these things consider'd then can any Mortal be so unreasonable as to vindicate an Imposition of the Trinity or an innovation of new Articles of Faith upon us for it And thus also what tho this Doctrine were a most Divine Truth yet in the terms explain'd is it not apparently humane What Is there either Trinity in Unity Homoousios Eternal Generation Procession of the Holy Ghost or Athanasian Creed to be found in Holy Writ And are not men very confident then that dare change the words and yet not fear the spoiling of incomprehensible Mysteries under them and in Scripture-terms pray who will disagree with them Nay or what can the Trinitarians mean when they explain this Doctrine the most nicely of any and yet at the same time cry out 't is incomprehensible What Are not these shrewd men that would force all Mankind to conceive things even by themselves confessed inconceivable Nay and what says Christ in this case Wo be to him that gives Offence it were better that a milâ—â—one were hung about his neck c. But are our Trinitarians of that mind No they are glad of an incomprehensible stumbling-block and hug and enforce it more eagerly tho' confessed unintelligible than the plainest Doctrins whatever To be short History tells us that the Jews have often met if possible to reconcile themselves to Christianity and what think you has hindred Nothing but this and a few other enforced unscriptural Mysteries that were it not for prejudice none but an Idiot could go down with And think you then that these men shall not one day pay for these their Offences In plain terms I 'd loose a Million were I worth it but to hear one inconvenience named in the ancient and Apostolick Liberty and Freedom But no forsooth that 's not the case with our Trinitarians a bastard Constancy and Obstinacy shall make them maintain a Creed with Damnation at middle and both ends be it only to set us on Sins and Confusions inextricable and to fright every body from the Church of Christ that would approach it Says Constantine Christians fall short of Heathen Philosophers for they tho' disagreeing in multitudes of Opinions yet still and nevertheless esteem one another for their Learning And in truth our different Opinions of God should rather convince us of our Ignorance and teach us how to adore his unsearchable Goodness then set us to quarrelling with one another So St. Hillary Bp. of Poictiers in France writing of the times about the Council of Nice says Annuas menstruas de deo fides decernimus decretis paenitemus paenitentes defendimus defendentes anthematizamur aut in nostris aliena aut in alienis nostra damnamus mordentes invicem jam absumpti sumus But what says a Modern Author upon it Nevertheless the more advised Christians were more moderate still reputing honest men honest men tho' weak and not able to discern the subtilties of the times But what is this like the Temper of our present Mystery Men Nay and this on the supposition that this Doctrine of the Trinity may be a probable Doctrine and not absolutely false But good God! how little grounds of any probability is there to be found in this Mystery And then pray what can be alledged for its unreasonableness XI And thus first is it likely that God should so far innovate with the Jews on their first Commandment as the Trinity implies and yet not give it an express Repeal and Construction Or is it probable that the Scriptures should be so silent of the Worship and Dignity of the Son and Holy Ghost if Persons really coequal with the Father as not once to mention it Or is it probable that so great a truth should be left for Alexander and Athanasius only to declare it and that near 300 years after Christ and his Apostles Or is it probable that the Apostolique Church that wanted this new-fangled Faith was therefore less perfect than our present Churches Or if it were is it probable that they would have omitted it Or is it probable that as the Athanasian Creed implies we should be saved only by Parroting over a few and unintelligible Articles of Faith Or is it more probable that the Church should be less pure or Orthodox in a Primitive Simplicity without them Nay is it probable that ever that can be a plainly revealed Divine Mystery which the Trinitarians for this 1300 years have neither known what 't is they mean nor agreed either in Expressions or Sence about it and so that their Foundation is after all so tottering that not a little Heretick as they call them appears but what is able to put them to suppression and to use Force instead of Argument XII But good God! this charging of the Trinitarians with Unreasonableness and Improbabilities is trifling tho most just when compared with their real Guilt To be short as I have said Trinitarianism is Politheism and Idolatry if there be any such a thing in
Body at 20 we see manifestly is not the same as it is at 30 and yet we say that 't is properly enough the same to most purposes And why then also might not the whole Doctrine be true by the same reason according to John the 6th c But what Is there any such Apology as this in nature for the Contradictions of the Trinity But good God then that in the mean while we should thus embrace even the worst of Popish Errours and out-do even the Deliriums of the Heathens But what while we do thus can we think that God will either prosper us or our Popish Reformation What Can we be so presumptuous as to continue in the very sink of Errours and that to the highest Dishonour of God and yet expect his Favour and Protection VI. Nor is this Doctrine one jot less absurd when examined more particularly than when thus in the gross And thus First with relation to the Son Bless me What a number of Absurdities quite drown his absolute and coequal Divinity with the Father What God himself must die to satisfie his own Justice to himself and that only because we have offended him Bless me What a notion we have of God's Justice and so that the Infinite and Immortal God could become incarnate grow in Wisdom and suffer nay and cry out unto himself upon the Cross My God my God why hast thou forsaken me Yes yes Infinity could become a Babe Wisdom it Child and God impotent Nay surely Elijah was a vile and wretched Blasphemer to mock the Baalites as he did when he said their God was either walking talking or gone a Journey What Can we suppose that that great Prophet who was afterwards translated did not know that God himself was afterwards to become incarnate But what Did only the Man die Was only the Man tempted Christ then was but inhabited by the Godhead and when the Man was in his Streights God left him to comfort himself but where is the room for the Merits and Sufferings of the Godhead then So you say Christ liv'd and suffer'd as our Example Alas What Affinity for God to be a Pattern for Man What Is there any Parity in their Natures But no 't was not the Godhead that was tempted or suffered some say But why then is the Merits of it charged unjustly upon the Godhead when it belongs to the Man only So also sometimes by a kind of Ventriloquy they make Christ as God to be able to tell us all things but by and by again as as Man they attribute Ignorance to him So sometimes again they make him omnipotent and yet by and by again Hocus Focus we must have an Angel to comfort him against his Sufferings Good God! shall we never be delivered from these Labyrinths So also they tell us that Christ for his Sufferings is made our Mediator But what Is that an Honour for a coequal God 1 Cor. 15.28 And so that all Power in Heaven and Earth was given him on his Death But what Could he then be a coequal God before Or what Was such Power given to his Manhood only Nay and do not the Scriptures also assure us that the Son as God yet even as such has the Father as his God Heb. 1. and that even the Revelations he gave St. John he had from the Father Rev. 11. But alas our Trinitarians forsooth will not own that we honour Christ at all unless we hairbrainly equal him with them to the Father VII But now as for the pretended Deity of the Holy Ghost there there can be no such Shuffle and Apology as the Incarnation occasions for the Son and yet think you that our Trinitarians for all that cannot wire-draw the manifest Inferiority of that Holy Being also quite up to a Coequality with the Father Thus he that is not once called God in Scripture nor once order'd to be worship'd is it likely that he should be our one and only adorable Supream God And is not this true of the Holy Ghost And yet for all this do they not equal him to the Father So also he that has an Understanding distinct from God can he be God himself 1 Cor. 2.10 Or a Will distinct can he be God Rom. 8.26 27. And what then Would not these Reasonings make a man protest with the Holy Ghost that surely these men have Eyes and see not and Ears and hear not But to proceed the Holy Ghost prays to another how can he then be God Rev. 22.17 Matth. 10.20 Rom. 8.15.26 So he that men have not known much less believed and yet have been Disciples can he be God And are we not told this of the Holy Ghost in the Acts of the Apostles So also he that is sent by God and is his Gift John 16.7 Acts 12.17 1 Pet. 1.12 can he be that God giving and sending also Surely I may say that these bundles of Incongruities have so quite confounded our Trinitarians that they know not how to reason at all in the matter or their Enemy has a most peculiar Charm over them to with hold them from Truth against all the powers of Reasoning So he that receives from another or changes place cannot be God And does not this appear of the Holy Ghost by John 16 14 And his descending on Christ like a Dove and so also he that speaks not of himself can he be God And does not the Holy Ghost appear to receive what he shall speak by the whole course of Scriptures John 16.13 But good God then that Men can seign such Epicles in Theology on any pretence as that the all-wise and immutable God should be taught and truckle thus VIII Nor are these few only a small number of Consequences drawn from Reasoning Alas this Doctrine is as unscriptural as absurd The expressest Text of the Father is the first Commandment of the Son Heb. cap. 1. and of the Holy Ghost John 16.12 c. But surely those are all as contrary and remote from a coequal and independent Trinity in Unity as Light from Darkness Or if Men were otherwise minded to controvert this Doctrine by the whole Scriptures I say let them but do it fairly and have at them By wresting little single Scraps indeed the Trinitarians seem as if they had something to plead for themselves but when I have gather'd but all the Texts of a Subject together methinks nothing possibly can look more unscriptural Nay and 't is pleasant to observe how the Trinitarians even confound one another about this matter Forsooth for all this Creed is such an infallible Thunderer yet Dr. W. dares be so bold as to clip the Wings of its Damnatory Sentences and Dr. S. with the Greek Church to deny the Filioque I thought that this rare Contexture was all of a piece But I find for their turns even our very Adversaries can shew I am mistaken To be short the three grand Foundations of this Doctrine are the Eternal Generation the Procession