Selected quad for the lemma: soul_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
soul_n	nature_n	person_n	union_n	4,088	5	9.9328	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A48160	A letter to a friend concerning a postscript to the Defense of Dr. Sherlock's notion of the Trinity in unity, relating to the Calm and sober enquiry upon the same subject	Howe, John, 1630-1705.	1694 (1694)	Wing L1639; ESTC R3143	19,814	66

neither of them can be absolutely perfect and infinite I would rather have said none or no one than neither since the discourse is of more than two I thought the meaning of uter and neuter had been agreed long ago tho' we could suppose their union to make such a perfect Being because they are not the same and neither no one of them is the whole c. This is the only thing that ever came under my notice among the School-men that hath any appearing strengh in it against the Hypothesis which I have proposed as possible for ought I knew They generally dispute against many sorts of Compositions in the Being of God which I am not concern'd in That of Matter and Form which is alien from this affair of quantitative parts which is as alien Of subject and accident which touches us not Of act and power which doth it as little Each subsistent being eternally in utmost actuality And by sundry sorts and methods of argument whereof only this can seem to signify any thing against the present supposition And it wholly resolves into the Notion of Infinity about which I generally spoke my sense in that first Letter to Dr. Wallis And as I there intimated how much easier it is to puzzle another upon that subject than to satisfy one self so I here say that I doubt not to give any man as much trouble about it in respect of quantitative extension as he can me in this I think it demonstrable that one Infinite can never be from another by voluntary production that it cannot by necessary Emanation I think not so In the mean time when we are told so plainly by the Divine Oracles of a sacred three that are each of them God and of some one whereof some things are spoken that are not nor can be of the others I think it easier to count three than to determine of Infiniteness And accordingly to form ones Belief But of this more when we come to compare him with himself And for what he discourses of the aspect this supposition hath upon the Trinity and the Homo-ousion It all proceeds still upon his own fiction of parts and upon the invidious straining of that similitude of the union of soul and body as he himself doth tantum non confess except that he lessens it by saying most untruly that he the Enquirer doth expresly own the Consequence Therefore if he do not own the Consequence then the Defender confesses himself to have invidiously devised it and what is it That if all three by this composition are but one God neither of them by himself is true and perfect God The Divinity is like the English But both his own The Enquirer denies both antecedent which he knows and consequent too Leave out by this composition his own figment and his argument as much disproves any Trinity at all as it doth the present Hypothesis But wherein doth the Enquirer own it because such a Similitude is used as 't is often in that discourse of the union between soul and body declared elsewhere to be unexpressibly defective that therefore the Father Son and Holy Ghost are each of them by himself no more truly Lord or God according to the Athanasian Creed or otherwise than in as improper a sense as the Body of a Man excluding the Soul is a Man or an Humane Person Or as if Deity were no more in one of the Persons than humanity in a Carkass who that looks upon all this with equal Eyes but will rather choose as doubtful a notion than so apparently ill a Spirit Are similitudes ever wont to be alike throughout to what they are brought to illustrate It might as well be said because he mentions with Approbation such as illustrate the Doctrine of the Trinity by a Tree and its Branches that therefore there we are to expect Leaves and Blossoms Is it strange the Created Universe should not afford us an exact Representation of uncreated Being How could he but think of that To whom do ye liken me At least one would have thought he should not have forgot what he had so lately said himself We must grant we have no perfect Example of any such union in nature What Appetite in him is it that now seeks what Nature doth not afford A very unnatural One we may conclude 'T were trifling to repeat what was said and was so plain before that the union between Soul and Body was never brought to illustrate personal union but essential The former is here imagin'd without pretence there being no mention or occasion for the the mentioning of Persons in the place he alledges But to make out his violent Consequence he foists in a supposition that never came into any man's Imagination but a Socinians and his own Which I say contradistinguishing him to them that the matter may as it ought appear the more strange If God be a person he can be but one Is God the appropriate Name of a Person then indeed there will be but one person but who here says so but himself The name God is the name of the Essence not the distinguishing name of a Person But if three intelligent Natures be united in one Deity each will be Persons and each will be God and all will be one God not by parts other than conceptible undivided and inseperable as the Soul and Body of a Man are not Which sufficiently conserves the Christian Trinity from such furious and impotent Attaques as these And the Homoousiotes is most entirely conserved too For what are three spiritual natures no more the same than as he grosly speaks the Soul and Body are no more than an intelligent mind and a piece of Clay by what consequence is this said from any thing in the Enquirers Hypothesis Whereas also he expresly insists that the Father as Fons Trinitatis is first the Son of the Father the Holy Ghost from both Is not the water in the streams the same that was in the Fountain and are not the several Attributes expresly spoken of as common to these three Essential Power Wisdom Goodness which are deny'd to be the precise notions of Father Son and Spirit said by more than a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as that may be understood to signify meer presence how intimate soever but by real vital union as much each one 's as any one 's and all other conceivable perfections besides Why were these words read with Eyes refusing their office to let them into the Reader 's mind whence also how fabulous is the Talk of Powers begetting Wisdom c. against what is so plainly said of the order of Priority and Posteriority c. There had been some prudence seen in all this conduct if the Defender could have taken effectual care that every thing should have been blotted out of all the Copies of that Discourse but what he would have thought fit to be permitted to the view of

believes no man can tell what it is For how can such actual sensation be imagin'd to be union As well might the use of sense its self speaking of any thing singly to which it belongs be said to be its constituent form or consequently the doing any thing that proceeds from Reason be the form of a Man So the writing a Book should be the Author And whereas he says it is certain the Dean took it to be so and therefore he did not leave out a natural external union it follows indeed that he did not leave it out in his Mind and Design but he nevertheless left it out of his Book and therefore said not enough there to salve the unity of the Godhead but ought to have insisted upon somewhat prior to mutual consciousness as constituent of that unity and which might make the three one and not meerly argue them to be so 2. But now p. 105. he comes to find as great fault with the Enquirers way of maintaining this unity and because he is resolv'd to dislike it if he can't find it faulty sets himself to make it so The Temper of Mind wherewith he writes to this purpose what follows p. 105. and onwards to the end so soon and so constantly shews it self that no man whose mind is not in the same disorder will upon Tryal apprehend any thing in it but such heat as dwells in darkness And he himself hath given the Document which may be a measure to any apprehensive Reader True divine Wisdom rests not on an ill natur'd and perverse Spirit I understand it while the ill fit lasts But 't is strange he could write those words without any self-reflection The Thing to be reveng'd is that the Enquirer did freely speak his Thoughts wherein he judg'd the Dean's Hypothesis defective his not taking notice of what he reckon'd naturally antecedent and fundamental to mutual consciousness A most intimate natural necessary eternal union of the sacred Three If the Enquirer spake sincerely as he understood the matter and him and it evidently apppear the Defender did not so I only say the wrong'd person hath much the advantage and wishes him no other harm than such gentle Regrets as are necessary to set him right with himself and his higher Judge He says he the Enquirer represents this Unity by the union of soul and body and by the union of the divine and humane nature c. 'T is true he partly doth so but more fully by the supposed union of three created Spirits to which he that will may see he only makes that a lower step and he says with respect especially to the former of these That an union supposeable to be originally eternally and by natural necessity in the most perfect being is to be thought unexpressibly more perfect than any other But he adds these are personal unions and therefore cannot be the unity of the Godhead And he very well knew for he had but little before cited the passage that the Enquirer never intended them so but only to represent that the union of the three in the Godhead could not be reasonably thought less possible What he farther adds is much stranger and yet herein I am resolv'd to put Charity towards him to the utmost stretch as he professes to have done his understanding for he says as far as he can possibly understand and that he should be glad to be better informed tho' there is some reason to apprehend that former displeasure darkned his understanding and even dimn'd his Eye-sight which yet I hope hath it's more lucid Intervals and that his distemper is not a fixed habit with him And what is it now that he cannot possibly understand otherwise that no other union will satisfie him viz. the Enquirer but such an union of three spiritual Beings and individual natures as by their composition constitute the Godhead as the composition of soul and body do the Man i. e. He cannot understand but he means what he expresly denies Who can help so cross an understanding If he had not had his very finger upon the place where the Enquirer says in express words I peremptorily deny all composition in the Being of God this had been more excusable besides much said to the same purpose elsewhere It had been ingenuous in any man not to impute that to another as his meaning which in the plainest terms he disavows as none of his meaning And it had been prudent in the Dean or his Defender of all Mankind not to have done so in the present case as will further be seen in due time But he takes it for an Affront when he fancies a man to come too near him He adds for this reason he disputes earnestly against the universal absolute omnimodous simplicity of the divine Nature and will not allow that Wisdom Power and Goodness are the same thing in God and distinguished into different Conceptions by us only through the weakness of our understandings which cannot comprehend an infinite Being in one thought and therefore must as well as we can contemplate him by parts I know not what he means by earnestly the matter was weighty and it is true he was in writing about it in no disposition to jeast But it 's said he disputed against the universal absolute omnimodous simplicity of the Divine Nature I hope the Defender in this means honestly but he speaks very improperly for it supposes him to think that the universal absolute omnimodous simplicity so earnestly disputed against did really belong to the Divine Nature but I can scarce believe him to think so and therefore he should have said his disputation tended to prove it not to belong If he viz. the Defender or the Dean did really think it did they or he must be very singular in that sentiment I would have them name me the man that ever laid down and asserted such a position Some I know have said of that Sacred Being that it is summè simplex or more simple than any thing else but that imports not universal absolute omnimodous simplicity which is impossible to be a perfection or therefore to belong to the Divine Nature No man that ever acknowledged a Trinity of persons even modally distinguished could ever pretend it for such simplicity excludes all modes Nay the Antitrinitarians themselves can never be for it as the Calm Discourse hath shewn And if the Dean be he is gone into the remotest extream from what he held and plainly enough seems still to hold that ever man of sense did But for what is added that he will not allow that Wisdom Power and Goodness are the same thing in God This is not fairly said Civility allows me not to say untruly There is no word in the place he cites nor any where in that book that signifies not allowing 't is intimated we are not instructed by the Scripture to conceive of the Divine Nature as in every respect most absolutely