THE DOCTRINE OF THE Fathers and Schools CONSIDER'D Concerning the ARTICLES of A TRINITY of Divine Persons AND The UNITY of GOD. In ANSWER to the Animadversions on the Dean of St. Paul's Vindication of the Doctrine of the Holy and Ever Blessed TRINITY IN Defence of those Sacred ARTICLES Against the Objections of the SOCINIANS and the Misrepresentations of the ANIMADVERTER PART the First By J. B. A. M. Presbyter of the Church of England LONDON Printed for W. Rogers at the Sun against St. Dunstan's Church in Fleetstreet M.DC.XCV A Preface to the READER Concerning TRITHEISM Charg'd c. HAsty Births commonly are imperfect If so I have reason to fear the Imperfections of the following Papers which come out without the Second and most Essential Part concerning the Vnity of God My distance from the Press denies me the Priviledge of Correcting one single Sheet with my own Eyes or indeed of comparing them since their Printing with my own Copy Since the Printing of more than half the following Papers a Second Part of the Animadversions came to my hands under this Title viz. Tritheism charged upon Dr. Sherlock 's New Notion of the Trinity c. By the Contents I presently saw that the Animadverter had resumed the Debate I first consulted those Places which I judged most nearly to concern me and since read over the whole I was sorrowful that the Press was so far gone and in so much haste to finish by the end of this Term that I could not add an Appendix to those few things which the Animadverter has added However I was on the other hand pleased that as yet I found no reason to recant one sentence of what I had advanced in my Answer to the Animadversions The Debate betwixt the Reverend Dean and the Animadverter as the Animadverter often states it is concerning the Truth of these Three Articles 1st Whether Self-Consciousness be the formal reason of Personality in Finite and Infinite Persons 2dly Whether Mutual-Consciousness be the formal reason of Vnity of Nature in the Divine Persons 3dly Whether the Three Divine Persons may in an Orthodox Sense be stiled Three Infinite Minds The Animadverter resolves these Three Enquiries in the Negative and charges the Affirmative upon the Reverend Dean I agree with the Animadverter that the two former ought to be resolved Negatively I further declare my opinion That the Reverend Dean never intended the Affirmative Solution of those Questions in a strict and rigorous sense of the Terms so that I am not directly concerned in that part of the Dispute Though in my Passage I could not forbear noting 1st That this Assertion of the Animadverter's See chap. 3. n. 2. viz. That Self-Consciousness is a Personal Act does in its just consequence infer That the Divine Persons are Three Absolute Persons Three Absolute Beings nay according to his Principles that they have Three Absolute Omnisciencies or Divine Natures and consequently are Three Infinite Spirits in an higher sense than ever the Reverend Dean intended and this Consequence I still challenge him to clear that Assertion from if he can See chap. 3. n. 3 4. Secondly That the same Argument which himself calls a Demonstration against what he supposed the Reverend Dean's Assertion viz. That Self-Consciousness could not be the formal reason of Personality because it was a Personal Act was equally strong against his own Hypothesis viz. That Generation was the formal reason of Personality in the Person of the Father and this still stands unanswered and upon the Animadverter's Principles is I am satisfied unanswerable See chap. 2. n. 4 c. Thirdly I discuss at large that Philosophical Question Whether the Soul is a Person which I affirm and leave him at his leisure to overthrow if he can As for that weak Objection Tritheism c. p. 150. That then the Soul may be said to be Incarnate let me tell him that this is an Heretical Arian Sense of this Term Incarnate as if the WORD assumed only a Body and not a Human Soul this Term Incarnate signifies both Fourthly Ibid. chap. 2. n. 4 c. I vindicate the Sacred Article of the Incarnation from the Socinian Objections of the Animadverter which in terminis he brings against the Personality of the Soul only but in reality overthrow the Personality of the WORD had they been of any force Fifthly I explain that Subtilty of the Schools See chap. 3. n. 3 4. concerning the Relativeness of the Divine Persons and shew the Animadverter's Mistakes in this Article the Novelty of this Opinion not asserted as I verily believe by any one single Ecclesiastical Writer for more than a Thousand Years after Christ and give as I am fully satisfied unanswerable Arguments against the Truth of it Sixthly I enquire into that Question See chap. 3. n. 5. Why the Divine Persons are Three and no more and give a just Solution of it from Revelation Seventhly See chap. 3. n. 6. c. I discuss that Important and Fundamental Enquiry in this Mystery viz. What it is which determines the Singularity or Plurality of the Predication of any Attribute concerning the Divine Persons Where I first give the Predications themselves which are to be solved A very necessary matter to be known by all who pretend to give us an Hypothesis to solve the Sacred Mystery of the Trinity To do otherwise is to make a Key for a Lock by the Key-hole only Such a Key is a mere shew 't is Ten thousand to one that it never fits the Wards Secondly I consider the Answers of the Schools and shew their Insufficiency Lastly I endeavour to give the true Solution my self It is very weak to make an Outcry about a single Phrase how unusual soever to charge it in the Title of a Book with the odious name of Tritheism and in a Preface to the Two Vniversities with Paganism with being a New Christianity Determine the General Question first and this latter concerning the Phrase of Three Infinite Minds will be solved of course Chap. 3. n. 2. See chap. 6. n. 20. If Self-Consciousness be a Personal Act if the Term Deus be a terminus communis Both which the Animadverter has affirmed in express Terms then I do here aver and engage to make good against the Animadverter that according to his own Principles he cannot avoid the Charge of Tritheism but he must at the same time clear that expression of the Reverend Dean of Three Infinite Minds from the same severe and unjust Charge For so I am not afraid to call it The Three Divine Persons may be orthodoxly stiled Three Infinite Minds or Spirits I plead not for the Use but the Orthodoxness of the Phrase and this I prove Chap. 4. n. 4. First From the Adjective Form allowed by the Schools viz. Tres Infinitam Spiritualem naturam habentes Ibid. Secondly From the Authority of the Learned Genebrard to whom this Proposition Tres sunt
except Innascibility or the property of being unbegotten which notifies not a difference of Essence or a different essential Dignity but a personal Property even as Adam being unbegotten for he was immediately formed by God and Seth begotten for he was the Son of Adam and Eve proceeding out of the side of Adam for she was not begotten differ not in Nature for they are all Men or human Persons but in a distinct personal Property These words need no Comment Seth's Birth and Eve's Procession of the Rib of Adam are not their Personalities not their Modes of Subsistence but their personal Properties not that which constituted them Persons but that which distinguished them in our Conception one from another that which constituted them distinct Persons one from another Besides the Phrase 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is not of it self capable of any other Interpretation to be unbegotten a negation See Ch. 2. n. 10. can never be the Father's Mode of Subsistence his Personality 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 says the Animadverter is a term not importing in it any positive Relation but only a meer Negation of all Producibility by any superior Principle Anim. c. p. 248. This term therefore cannot signifie causally and consequently not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is here stiled contrary to the Animadverter's Observation I acknowledge to the Animadverter that every Person Ibid p. 250 251. and consequently the Divine Persons are formally constituted such by a Mode of Subsistence or what we are obliged to conceive of as a Mode of Subsistence that is each distinct Person has a distinct Mode of Subsistence and the three Divine Persons have in our Conception three distinct Modes of Subsistence Nay I will add further that I believe that no Man who understands the meaning of the term Hypostasis and uses it without Aequivocation will or can deny any part of this The Reverend Dean expresly acknowledges this truth A Beast is a Suppositum Vind. of the Trinity p. 262. that is a distinct living subsisting Being by it self But I do here deny to the Animadverter that the Ancient Fathers did ever assert that the Divine Relations were in this proper formal Sense Modes of Subsistence or that That Phrase 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 when applied to the Divine Relations and much more when applied to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was by them understood in the proper formal Sense of which we are now enquiring Secondly If the Animadverter could get over the first Difficulty Anim. c. p. 120. he would find a second behind how one simple Being which is the Animadverter's Hypothesis of the Trinity can have three Modes of Subsistence The whole School of the Thomists and Scotists assert an absolute essential Subsistence and consequently one Subsistence of the whole Trinity they esteem the three Divine Persons to be unum subsistens unum suppositum aut personam incompletam says Cajetan one of the most famous Commentators upon Aquinas to which Suarez only replies Suarez de incar q 3. Act. 1. disp 11. S. 5. p. 285. Cavendus est hic loquendi modus utpote alienus à modo loquendi conciliorum Patrum Theologorum that is have a care lest Hereticks hear us and take advantage at such a novel Expression otherwise Suarez finds no fault with the Doctrine and indeed to say That Existence or Subsistence by it self is Relative is a contradiction to the very Phrase Subsistence by it self denies all relation to any other So that according to the Thomists and Scotists the three Personalities are not three Modes of Subsistence not three Subsistences but one essential absolute Subsistence with three Relations or three relative Modes or three Modes of Incommunicability But of this I have already spoke Chap. 1. n. 11 12 13. Thirdly To allot three Subsistences to the God-head is to contradict the Ancients 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 these Properties are not Names of the Essence of the God-head but of the Persons The God head does not properly subsist but the Divine Persons subsist Cajetan may inform the Animadverter what is the consequence of ascribing Subsistence to the God-head even the same with calling it a suppositum or incompleat Person where the term incompleat is only added to avoid the grossness of the Phrase otherwise they ascribe all the Divine Acts to this unum subsistens unum suppositum and call them essential Acts whereas the Notion of Philosophers is that actiones non 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 attribuuntur that Actions ought not to be attributed to the Nature but to the Person endowed with such Nature The Person is the principium quod Nature only the principium quo the power by which the Person acteth The School-men retain in words the personal Acts of the Divine Persons that Generation is the personal Act of the Father Incarnation the personal Act of the Son Sanctification the personal Act of the Holy Spirit Active Spiration the personal Act of the Father and Son But these are meer words Generation according to the School-men is the reflex Act of the Divine Understanding whereby it knows it self and this singular individual Act they ascribe in common to Father Son and Holy Ghost So every thing that is an Act in Incarnation is according to them the Act of the whole Trinity they pretend indeed that the same singular reflex Act of the Divine Understanding only generates as it proceeds from the Person of the Father and that the Incarnation is only terminated upon the Person of the Son But what Pretence to invent for Sanctification I do not find that they are yet agreed The sacred Scriptures give Sanctification for the distinguishing Character of the third Person he is so called in the very Form of Baptism to deny this distinguishing Character was Sabellianism to the Ancients Yet this the School-men have undeniably done in the Act of Sanctification The Maxim of the Ancients was that Opera Trinitatis ad extra sunt indivisa They have not only misconstrued indivisa for confusa but in reality left out the Exception ad extra and confounded the Actions ad intra as well as those ad extra So Spiration to the School-men is that Act of the Divine Will whereby it loves it self and this singular individual Act they also ascribe to the Holy Spirit equally with the Father and the Son Only say they The Divine Will 's loving it self is not Spiration in the Person of the Holy Ghost but only in the Person of the Father and Son How much better is it with the Ancient Fathers to confess these to be inscrutable Mysteries than to expose the sacred Article by such bold and abstruse Definitions and yet these are the Gentlemen whom the Animadverter commends for venturing little for preceding upon the surest grounds of Reason and Scripture Again Sanctification which the divinely inspired Writings give us as the peculiar
is one he is not the other this latter is a Modal not simple Negation But the Animadvertor himself tells us That wheresoever there are Two distinct Persons we do and must by all the Rules of Grammar and Logick say Animadv c. p. 74. l. 1. that one of them is simply not the other Which single passage overthrows our Animadvertor's Hypothesis that the Divine Persons differ by a Modal difference We have no way from Logicks of knowing when Two Beings differ wholly but from such simple negation a Negative Sign in Logicks distributes all which follows it in the same Proposition but of this more hereafter And therefore to argue from a Person to a Spirit here is manifestly sophistical P. 121. N. 9. and that which is called Fallacia accidentis or since several fallacies may concur in the same proposition it may be also a dicto secundum quid ad dictum simpliciter For so it is to conclude that three Persons are three distinct Gods since the difference of Persons is only from a diverse respect between them but three Gods import three absolute distinct Natures or Substances Where are we now this is a perfectly new Topick To argue from a Person to a Spirit is manifestly sophistical it is fallacia Accidentis and fallacia a dicto secundum quid ad dictum simpliciter Grant all this for once how is this a consequence from the former why is this ushered in with a therefore The former Answer obscurely denies that there are Three Persons this denies that a Divine Person or a person in this Mystery is a Spirit or God and asserts that a Divine Person is only ex accidenti or secundum quid a Spirit or God This will make strange Divinity if we apply it to the Father Son or Holy Ghost The Father is a Divine Person or a Person in this Mystery Will the Animadvertor himself have the Confidence to deduce the Conclusion that the Person of the Father is only ex accidenti or secundum quid a Spirit or God If the Animadvertor does not already know it let me inform him that the Catholick Faith is That every single Divine Person is essentially quidditative as the Schools speak a Spirit or God as fully as every single Angelical person is essentially a Spirit or an Angel And therefore when the Animadvertor tells us in the same page That a Person here imports only a Relation or Mode of Subsistence in conjunction with the nature it belongs to he is guilty of two absurdities First it is unintelligible cant a singular nature or substance in conjunction with the Mode or a singular nature sustaining a Mode is usual but to put the cart before the Horses to put the Mode before the Nature the Adjunct before the Subject is new Philosophy peculiar to the Animadvertor Secondly A person in this Mystery is not in recto a relation or Mode but the subject of the Relation or Mode a Divine Person has a Relation or Mode the Father has a relation or Mode but the Father is not a relation or Mode Animad c. p. 321. The Animadvertor himself tells us that a Person as such is a Substance and a compleat substance therefore not a Mode Ib. p. 121. Every Spirit has a Mode a proper Mode of subsistence belonging to it and yet in the same place the Animadvertor tells us that a Spirit is not a Mode of Being Ib. p. 121. N. 10. The ternary number all the while not belonging to their infinity but only to their personalities Will the Animadvertor stand by this Conclusion that the ternary Number belongs only to the Personalities if he does I am satisfied he gives up the Catholick Faith for that asserts that the ternary Number belongs to the Persons as well as Personalities If the Animadvertor will confess to the Socinians that there is but one Person in the Trinity I believe they will scarce think it worth their while to dispute whether there are Three Modes or not or whether these Modes are to be called Personalities or not One and the same Nature may sustain several distinct Relations or Modes of Subsistence P. 121. N. 11. A Mode of Subsistence in the sense of the Animadvertor for a Subsistential form or Personality is improperly said to be sustained Personality is the constituent form of the Person and not an adjunct of the Person Again Nature when distinguished from the Suppositum or Person is not the Subject of the Relations or Modes The Suppositum or Person is the proper Subject of the Relations or Modes sustained by that Person Further The common Assertion of the Schools is not barely that the Divine Nature sustains three distinct Relations or three distinct Modes but that it sustains three Relations of the same kind three distinct Personalities which is the great difficulty One and the same Person may be twice a Father if he has Two Children that is Natural But can we conceive that a Man can be twice a Father of one and the same Son This is the question how according to the Schools one and the same singular Nature when it is become one Person in the Father by one subsistential form can receive a distinct subsistential form without losing the first and also a third without losing the first or second I freely acknowledge that this is to me an insuperable difficulty and therefore I bless God that to me the Faith of Three Divine Persons needs not so nice a speculation Argument II. Three distinct Minds or Spirits P. 122. N. 12. are Three distinct Substances c. Tres Substantiae signifies no more than Tres Substantialem naturam habentes which is allowed by the strictest of the School-men Secondly The Phrase of Three Substances has been more or less allowed in all Ages of the Church to be predicated of the Three Divine Persons Calvin 's Instit lib. 1. cap. 13. n. 5. St. Hillary calls them so says the Learned Calvin plus Centies more than an hundred times The Greek Fathers understood the same by the term 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Plural Number St. Augustin confesses this of the Greek Fathers and that he knew no other signification of the term Hypostasis In Monologia cap. Anselmus very plainly Hoec nomina sc Persona substantia aptius eliguntur ad designandam pluralitatem in summa essentia quia Persona non dicitur nisi de individuâ rationali natura Substantia principaliter dicitur de individuis quoe maximè inpluralitate subsistunt Suarez lib. 1. de Trin. cap. 2. n. 11. Suarez Metaph. Disp 34. s. 1. n. 6. The School-men acknowledge Tres substantias incommunicabiles Ita D. Thom. 1 Part quoest 30. artic 1. ad 1. dicit juxta consuetudinem Eclesioe non esse absolutè dicendas tres substantias propter nominis oequivocationem addendo vero aliquid quod determinet significationem dici posse ut si
Ancient Fathers denied them to have one simple subject Vt visum est Sabellio sed diversitatem illam multiplicitatem in subjecto esse reverà To assent to the ternary number to be only in the Modes or Properties is the Sabellian Heresy the Catholick Faith is that there are three Persons as well as three Personalities three Subjects of the Divine Relations It is no contradiction that the same 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the same Subject should be Father and Son the contradiction is that the same Subject should be Father and Son to it self These Properties cannot have relation to the same Subject Otherwise they are consistent in the same Subject in the same Person in the same finite Person the same Man is both Father and Son The Divine Person of the Son according to the Western Church is produced himself and doth produce the Holy Spirit which are opposite Relations as well as Paternity and Filiation But the contradiction vanishes since those opposite relations respect distinct Subjects He is produced by the Father he doth produce the Holy Spirit This therefore is the principal enquiry in this sacred Article what is the Subject of Paternity not what is Paternity that is but a secondary Article of less moment what is the Subject of Filiation not what Filiation is What is the Subject of Procession not what Procession is in other words what is the Father what is the Son what is the Holy Ghost The Subject of Paternity is not the Subject of Filiation for then the Father would be the Son Nor is the Subject of Procession the Subject either of Paternity or Filiation for then the Holy Ghost would either be Father or Son or both To say that the Divine Nature is the Subject of Paternity Filiation and Procession is not only contrary to the Ancients who assert these Properties not to be the Names of the Essence but renders the Sabellian Heresy impossible to be confuted since an infinite Person is as capable of sustaining these three distinct relations as an infinite nature and makes one and the same Subject Father and Son to it self lastly contradicts our formal conception of these sacred Articles The Divine Nature is according to our conception the essential Form of the Divine Persons is predicated of the Divine Persons in obliquo Father Son and Holy Ghost have each of them the full whole and entire Divine Nature in them We are enquiring what it is which may be predicated in recto of them and which may be multiplied with them what is the Subject to which the essential form in our imperfect conception of these things is joyned and which we conceive as the proper subject of the Divine Relations And after the strictest enquiry I can make no better Answer than the Church has done before me Father Son and Holy Ghost are three Hypostases three Substances when that term is not understood as equipollent with Essence three infinite Substances so say the Schoolmen only they add Relative three infinite spiritual Beings which is all the Reverend Dean understood by three infinite Spirits That is that they are not three Faculties or Affections of one Being but three proper Beings Both Accidents and Modes are affections of Being And moreover P. 242. l. 5. n. 7. as every Mode essentially includes in it the Thing or Being of which it is the Mode so every Person of the Blessed Trinity by vertue of its proper Mode of Subsistence includes in it the God-head it self and is properly and formally p. 293. the God-head it self as subsisting with and under such a certain Mode or Relation This is a very fruitfull Period of Paradoxes A Mode according to the Animadverter is an Abstract not concrete Term to be understood as a simple Form as the Affection of a Being as Himself defines it p. 31. and not a Being affected The Concrete of a Mode includes the Being as well as the Mode Album includes the Thing that is white as well as whiteness but Album is not formally the Mode not Whiteness but that which has Whiteness the subject of Whiteness Whiteness the Affection the Mode is an Abstract and by the Term abstracts from the Subject Secondly The Father is Essentially God by his Nature this all confess but who ever said that the Father is Essentially God by his Personality by his Paternity Thirdly There can be no such Heresy as that of Sabellius if every Mode of the Deity essentially includes the Deity the Rankest Sabellianist never denied that Father Son and Holy Ghost signified three Modes of the Deity Fourthly I cannot but ask this great Master of Language why he uses those Terms its and it speaking of a Divine Person He was pleased to condemn this Language as improper and absurd when used of Human Persons Anim. c. p. 341. is there more respect due to Human Persons than to Divine Persons Had it been any fault to have expressed it thus So every Person of the Blessed Trinity by vertue of his not its proper Mode of Subsistence includes in Him not it the God-head it self Far be it from me to pretend to be a Critick in Words or Phrases I rather crave the Reader 's even the Animadverter's pardon for much greater slips than this However 't is some comfort that I find Homer Himself may nod sometimes P. 242. l. 17. n. 8. And accordingly as these Relations are three and and but three so the Persons of the God-head to whom they belong are so too viz. Father Son and Holy Ghost Some Persons take a priviledge to speak and write what they please The Animadverter might almost as well have said that the Persons of the God-head are but two as that the Relations are but three Nothing is more notorious than that there are four Relations in the Trinity if the Relation of the Father to the Son and of the Son to the Father inferr two Relations there can be no shadow of pretence why the Relation of the Father and Son to the Holy Spirit and of the Holy Spirit to the Father and Son should not make two more P. 243. There are says the Animadverter four internal Acts Generation Filiation Spiration Procession though by the By two of these are not Acts but Passions viz. Filiation and Procession upon which the Divine Relations are founded and from which they flow And in the same Page puts the Objection That four Relations inferr four Persons which he endeavours to solve in the following Words That is one Difficulty and unanswerable upon the Animadverter's Principles that one singular Divine Nature is the Subject of these four Relations The Second is What this Relation of it self is whether a Mode or not an infinite relative Substance or not The Schoolmen are obliged to confess this a Property of a Person already constituted and not a Mode of Subsistence Whereas if with the Ancients we assert the Divine Persons to be three substantial Beings three Hypostases