is there in being sincere and seeking most carefully to understand the real Meaning of the Scripture No Men do account innocent Mistakes punishable in most difficult Matters in which honest and diligent Persons may err And shall we think God harder than Men Far be that thought from any Christian The Gospel is a benign and a gracious Oeconomy and we are in the hands of the Father of Mercies We may then be sure that God will not impute unavoidable and therefore pitiable Errors Wherefore the most rigid Trinitarians that will impartially and attentively consider the Vnitarian Arguments must needs discern that if Vnitarianism be an Error yet it is not a damnable one and consequently not an intolerable one nor therefore a Heresy Gal. 5.19 20. The Apostle declares that Heresy taken in an evil Sense for in general it signifies a Sect which includes some particular Sentiment whether good or bad is a Work of the Flesh that is is the Attendant and Product of Wilfulness and Wickedness And therefore from what has been said it manifestly appears that Vnitarianism cannot be a Heresy in that Sense tho' it were an Error seeing that if it be supposed that it may be an Error yet it cannot but be own'd it has so many Arguments of Credibility and looks so much like a Truth that inquisitive Men may very honestly mistake about it if indeed they err when they take it for the very Import and real Sense of Scripture Tit. 3.11 The same Apostle expresly says that those that are Hereticks in being so sin willfully and are condemned of their own Conscience being perverted by some evil consideration knowing that they do not sincerely what lies in them towards the acknowledgement of the Truth and it being in their power to consider and discern that their Tenets are not right but favour Vice and are suggested by the Flesh So that a Heresy is a criminal and wilful departing from some Evident Truth for the gratifying of Sensual Inclinations Such was the Heresy of the Nicolaïtans who as it is thought would have Women to be Common Such was the Heresy of the Gnosticks who made Religion to consist in Speculation and the Knowledge of Mysteries and who held that it was lawful to dissemble the truth to avoid Persecution And such is the Heresy of those who possessed with a domineering Spirit and a hasty and imperious Temper drive away from their Communion by Human Decisions those that differ from their Sentiment in Matters that are most Difficult This is a Schismatical Heresy But there is no such thing in the Sentiment of the Vnitarians if it be an Error It is far from gratifying the Flesh It doth not indulge a careless and lazy humour averse to consideration and making Men willing to follow others blindly any whether so they may but enjoy their ease and pleasure But it exposes Men to trouble And it is grounded on Arguments that manifestly appear rational and apt to persuade those who are sincere and inquisitive and who fear and love God Moreover Vnitarianism doth not require of any Christians nor doth impose upon them any thing against their Conscience or necessitate them to dissemble their Sentiments For it is not Magisterial and Imposing Vnitarians in Mr. Chillingworth's words proposing the Bible that is the Generality of the Expressions of Scripture for Terms of Church Communion And that Vnitarianism doth not cause Men to be absolutely wanting in any essential Part of Religion is implied in this consideration that it is attended with so much Evidence and Credibility that Men as has been shewn may be Vnitarians and be guiltless and without crime it being not to be thought that God has made any thing absolutely essential to Religion wherein sincere and inquisitive Persons may mistake For when Men out of a Principle of Piety do in all Particulars and even in the most intricate what they can to be rightly Inform'd and to discharge their Duty what can a Good God exact more According to the Natural Ideas of God the Tenor of the Gospel and the Principles of Protestants Whatsoever is indispensibly Necessary must needs be Ciear and Discernible to all that are sincerely Inquisitive And after all it cannot be denied but that the Vnitarians acknowledge those weighty Points which are absolutely requisite to move us to love and obey God and Christ. For in general they believe that Christ according to God's express Will is to be lov'd and worshipped on God's account and to God's Glory and as most intimately united with God that the Spirit belonging to Christ which Christ disposes of which He communicates to his Disciples and whereby Christians are sanctified is the Spirit and Power of God that God dwells and acts most eminently in Christ and that Christ is in the highest Station of the Universe all Things being Subjected to him the Father only excepted to whose Praise and Service all Dispensations are designed ultimately to tend as all own and who efficaciously directs and assists Christ in his Soveraign and Universal Government whereby Christ rules and acts as God and according to his Desire and the Laws he has enacted and established by the Covenant of Grace thus appearing not as being a Subject but as being the Soveraign together with the Father in this illustrious Oeconomy the Effect and Fruit of which will last for ever and the Honour and Glory whereof will eternally crown the Lord Jesus so that he shall to all Eternity be most intimately United to the Father and when he shall particularly commit and deliver up the Universal Administration of Government into God's hands when all his Subjects shall have attain'd to a Sinless Perfection and shall become Subjects to the Laws of a most Perfect State even then he shall retain the title of Soveraign he shall always be the next to God and tho' himself Subject to God so as that he shall live under God's peculiar Government and that all Creatures under him shall be under such an Oeconomy with respect to the Father as Adam was and as therefore may in that respect be termed the Law and not the Gospel he shall remain World without end the Prince and Head of all Men and Angels The Vnitarians therefore believe Christ to be most highly exalted and dignified and to be most intimately partaker of the Divine Nature infinitely more eminently than Joseph was made partaker of the Egyptian Majesty and Government together with Pharaoh when Pharaoh told him See I have set thee over all the Land of Egypt thou shalt be over my House and according unto thy Word shall all my People be ruled only in the Throne will I be greater than thou and when accordingly Pharaoh took off his Ring from his Hand and put it upon Joseph's Hand and arrayed him in Princely Apparel and made him to ride in the Second Chariot which he had and they cried before him Bow the Knee and so Pharaoh made Joseph Ruler over all the Land of
the contrary This may be a Sign that they searched after the Truth like other Men as well as they could which is very commendable and is every ones indispensible Duty But it is not the Character of those who are infallible and who must implicitely and absolately be followed as our Rule CHAP. IX A Second General Objection against the Unitarian System Answered THE next Objection on which the Trinitarians commonly lay great stress is That the Work of Redemption and what the Scripture ascribes to our Saviour is above the Capacity of a Man it being impossible for a Creature to become the Object of Worship and hear the Prayers of Men to make Satisfaction for Sins or reconcile God to these that have forfeited his Favour to know the Hearts to forgive Sins to govern the Vniverse to raise the Dead to judge the World and do whatsoever the Father doth In answering this this Reflection cannot but be premised that it is lamentable Men are usually so careless as not to inform themselves rightly of the Sentiment of those whom they condemn or are so unsincere as not fairly to represent it But most certainly this is the Case here As for my part I absolutely take party neither with the Socinians nor with the Arians but think it presumptuous to determine expresly a Mystery which the Scripture has left in a great Generality Howbeit I see plainly and am fully persuaded that the present Objection is wholly groundless and doth not in the least invalidate either of those Systems for it is founded on an either wilfully or otherwise erroneous and mistaken Supposition as if the Arians or Socinians held our Saviour to be a mere Creature or a mere Man Surely it is a Point of Justice and a Duty of Christian Charity not to misrepresent the Cause of any Party but to endeavour to take it in the best Sense and put upon it the favourablest Construction possible But the quite contrary is done in this Objection The Vnitarians therefore answer it thus According to our Sentiment Christ in the business of Salvation or Redemption is not left to work with the bare Strength and Capacity of a Man but is commissionated of God and by him constituted in Authority constantly enlightened and influenced by the Holy Spirit and directed and assisted by the Divine Wisdom and Power dwelling in him For we hold agreably to the Scripture that the Father assisting acting and dwelling in his Son by his Inspiration and the Influences of his Power and Wisdom the Fulness of the God-head inhabiting in him by its constant concurrence enables him to perform all that he is appointed to do Christ therefore in the Execution of his Office is not to be considered as a mere Creature but as a Creature in and by which God works and which acts for God and most eminently represents God and is most intimately possible one with God There is no Vnitarian but holds all this believing that by the said Means there is as strict an Union betwixt the God-head and Christ as there can be betwixt God and a Creature This is particularly what the Arians mean in giving the title of God to our Lord Jesus Christ And this especially is what the Socinians intimate by their seemingly strange Saying that Christ was made God Homo Deus factus What Advantage then over the Vnitarians have the Trinitarians by their Notion of the Incarnation of a supposed Second Divine Person Can any thing be done by a Man supposed Hypostatically or Personally United with a Second Divine Person that cannot be performed by a Man in whom the Fulness of the God-head dwells in the manner aforesaid Since it is the God-head dwelling in Christ that doth the Marvellous Works can he not do whatsoever God pleases and whatsoever God can do And indeed what can the Trinitarians mean by their Term of the Hypostatical Vnion of a Divine Person with Christ's Human Nature but this In-dwelling of the God-head in the Man Christ Jesus Dr. Sherlock at the 210th and 211th Pages of his Answer to the Bishop of Gloucester's Book gives the true Description of the Trinitarian Notion of the Incarnation in these Words The perfect Wisdom and Goodness of our Saviour was not mere Human Nature tho' as innocent and perfect as Human Nature can be in this World but the Divinity dwelling and acting in Human Nature influencing and guiding all its Motions as the Soul governs the Body for this is a true Notion of a God Incarnate that God lives and acts in Human Nature and is the Principle of all its Actions and Motions And is there any thing here that the Vnitarians do not hold Do they assert that Christ did any thing without the Divine Motions or without God's Guidance and Acting in him They firmly believe that the Man Christ Jesus readily and willingly assented to the whole Will of God and that God constantly assisted him and thus wrought in and by him all the Super-natural Works that Christ did What colour of reason then have the Trinitarians to pretend that the Work of Redemption surpasses the Capacity which the Vnitarians ascribe to Christ It is plain that since the Vnitarians assert that God constantly influences and guides assists and acts in and by Christ which it seems is the Summ of what the Trinitarians themselves hold which expresly is all that the Scripture teaches of the Union between God and Christ and which most certainly suffices to impower Christ to do whatsoever God can do the Dispute and Quarrel here of the Trinitarians with the Vnitarians is altogether groundless and unwarrantable We have all the reason imaginable to love God with all our Soul and to be eternally thankful to his Divine Majesty for thus addressing himself to us miserable Sinners wonderfully speaking and acting in and by his Son Christ Jesus to reconcile the World unto himself and enabling him to Save to the uttermost all those that come to God thro' him As was said this is all that the Scripture expresly teaches us concerning this Matter The Scripture represents God doing all things for Christ upon his request The Trinitarians therefore cannot justly find fault with the Doctrin of the Vnitarians concerning our Saviour's Person But the Vnitarians are bound to reject what the Trinitarians add thereto not only without express Authority of Scripture but contrary to the clearest Light of Scripture and Reason Altho' God by the Influence of his Divine Wisdom and Power dwells in Christ and is represented as constantly assisting him and acting in and by him yet the Scripture no where says that God or the Father and Christ make but one Person It cannot be imagined and the Trinitarians themselves do not assert that by God's dwelling in Christ is meant any more than God's constant guiding and assisting him Now it no way follows that because a Son willeth all that his Father willeth and the Father constantly guides and assists his Son therefore the Father and
them and concurrs with them at their Working and which properly doth the Wonders or the Chiefest Part of them in the effecting of Super-natural Works They are as it were but the Bearers of the Divine Virtue or the Disposers of it which God entrusts to them because in that Employment they reap the glory delight of Serving God and of being Instrumental in the good of Others They dispose therefore of that Portion of Divine Power as they dispose of their own Faculties That which was alloted to a Prophet was called his Spirit 2 Kings 2 15. and 5.26 1 Cor. 5.3 4. But the Word especially since his Exaltation has the Disposition of the Divine Power as was said of all the Holy Angels whom he sends whensoever he will on Errands to do what He pleases and so he is said to have received the Spirit without Measure whereas no Prophet before him had and that but at sometimes the Share but of an Angel or at most the Assistance it may be of two or three Angels and the Power accompanying them or annexed to them That by the Holy Spirit something like this Viz some Angel or Angels together with a certain Concurrence of God's Acting or a certain Influence of the Divine Power is to be understood and not altogether and expresly God himself or a literally and properly Divine Person is evinced by the Vnitarian Arguments in the Brief History in the Apology for the Irenicum Magnum and in Crell's Book Of one God the Father It is certain that in Job 32.8 the Spirit and the Divine Inspiration are manifestly put as Synonyma or as Terms that imply and explain one the other the Original Words Rouak in the Hebrew and Pneuma in the Greek being undoubtedly susceptible of that Sense not only signifying Spirit but properly signifying Breath or Breathing which is likewise the import of Afflatus the Expression Metaphorically also us'd in Latin to imply Inspiration which is represented as a Spiritual Breathing or a certain Acting of the Divine Power figured by Breathing And on the other hand in John 1.32 compared with John 1.51 Acts. 8.26.29.39 Revel 8.3 compared with Rom. 8.26 and several other Places the Spirit and an Angel or the Angels John 1.51 Hebr. 1.7 compared with Acts 2.3 4. are also put as the same or synonymous terms From whence it seems it follows that by the Spirit we must understand the Divine Inspiration carried and communicated by the Means of a Holy Spirit or Holy Angel that is to say an Acting and Influence of the Divine Power communicated to or performed on some Men at the Presence and Acting of an Angel or which is the same a Holy Angel acting according to the Direction of the Divine Inspiration and together with the Assistance and a certain Instuence of the Divine Power Thus the Spirit is both a Creature and not a Creature an Angel and also the Spiritual Breath of God or a certain Virtue of God or an Influence of the Power of God which is Something belonging to the Father or a certain Acting of the Father but appears not and need not be concluded and in reason cannot be thought to be a particular real Divine Person distinct from the Father As by the Word is understood both the First-Born the Word-Bearer and the Chief of all Creatures and a Divine Word or an Influence of the Father's Wisdom and Divine Nature dwelling in and as intimately as possible united with the First-Born The Father according to these Notions may then truly be said to be the whole Godhead or the only true God and to know alone all things but then by the Influences of his Divine Word Spirit he may manifest to others what He pleases that when he thinks fit properly 't is not the Father that is Incarnate but his Word which is agreable to Scripture as well as Reason And the Spirit may be said by a Figure to search the things of God See Crell's Touching One God c. Book 1. Sect. 3. Chap. 14. And indeed who besides God should know or search the things of God but the Divine Inspiration or they to whom it is reveal'd by the Divine Inspiration In the Form of Baptism and in the Creed the Word and the Spirit may well be mentioned after mention made in general of the Father tho' they be not Divine Persons distinct from the Father but be certain Influences of the Divine Perfections or certain Actings of the Father by some Powers or Virtues belonging to his Nature The Form of Baptism thus implies that thereby we are Consecrated the Disciples of God our Father and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ and the Disciples of the Word communicated to Christ who has Redeemed us by his Doctrine and by his Blood and in fine of the Holy Inspiration also which Confirms the Gospel and Sanctifies the Soul of true Believers And in the Creed we profess this Belief Evidently herein is no Tautology nor any thing Superfluous For the Father and his Influences or God and the most eminent Actings of his Powers are things distinct And those Actings and Influences are not therefore known tho' the Father be and tho' they belong to the Father And tho' they were Necessarily in the Father it would not be Impertinent to particularize them after having made mention of the Father As after having said that there is a Sun it would not be irrational to add that we believe and know the Sun produceth Light and Heat Otherwise indeed what could the Trinitarians themselves plead for mentioning the Son and Spirit after the Father when they hold that the whole Son and Spirit are wholly in the Father and that the Father cannot be without them Now according to our System the Spirit implying an Influence and an Acting of the Divine Nature those may well be said to be the Temple of God in whom the Divine Inspiration resides tho' the Divine Inspiration be not a Person or not a Person distinct from the Father Indeed tho' the Divine Inspiration were only the Acting of an Angel commissionated and directed by God Christians in whom the Impiration works might then also be truly said to be the Temple of God and not of the Angel because the Angel works not for himself or on his own account but as sent and ordered by God and Christ and then according to the Jewish Phrase Apostolus cujusque est quisque as when an Embassador Wedds a Princess in his Master's Name She is not thereby Married to the Subject but to the Prince that sent him And the Angels may be called by way of eminence the Breath of God inasmuch as they proceed from him as our Breath doth from us or most probably inasmuch as they carry the Influence of the Divine Spirit or Power as God's-Word Bearer is called God's Word inasmuch as he carries the Commands of God and both acts by Gods ' Power and Wisdom and represents and exhibits God's
15. 16. The Arian Notion of the Creation of the Material World by the Word and the Spirit or according to some the Holy Spirits under God p. 16. 17. That Christ in his Agony was strength'ned by an Angel is no Argument against the Arian System p. 18. In CHAP. V. That the Authority of some Heathens who spake somewhat like the Anti-Unitarians doth not credit the Trinitarian Cause and can be made no Argument against Unitarianism p. 19. 20. That the Jews never held the Doctrin of three Persons in God p. 20. c. The objected Passages in Pliny's Letter and in a Dialogue ascribed to lucian consider'd p. 23. 24. In CHAP. VI. That few of the Ante-nicene wrote and it was not impossible for them to deviate from the truth and therefore it is certainly 〈◊〉 preposterous Way to seek to be tried by the Writings of the Fathers p. 25. 26. That several Books of the Primitive Writers most credibly were suppressed which favoured the Unitarian Sentiment p. 27. That of the few remaining Ante-nicene Writers 't is credible that some are corrupted and that some are suppositious p. 28. c. In CHAP. VII That nevertheless it still appears that the generality of the Primitive Christians were really Unitarians Nazerenes Arians or Semi-Arians p. 31. c. Some Chronological Remarks or the Times in which some of the Chief of the Ante-nicene Fathers lived p. 36. In CHAP. VIII That the prevailing Sentiment of the Nicene and Post-nicene Doctors is of no weight against the Unitarians p. 46 c. In CHAP. IX An Answer to this Objection That the Work of Redemption and what the Scripture ascribes to our Saviour seems inconsistent with the Unitarian System it being impossible even for the most innocent and the most excellent Creature to reconcile God with those that have forfeited his Favour to know the Hearts to forgive Sins to govern the Universe to raise the Dead to judge the World and to do whatsoever the Father doth p. 50. c. An Appendix to the IXth Chapter being a Consideration of the Controversy concerning the Invocation of Christ p. 56. In CHAP. X. The stating of the third and last general Objection which consists of four Branches to this effect That the Unitarians their too much leaning to Human Reason is the Cause of their Error wherefore they should consider that Reason tho' an excellent Light and Guide so far as its Province and Capacity extends is in some most sublime Points short-sighted and blind and consequently an incompetent Judge then they might discern that the Unitarian Interpretations besides that they imply most unlikely Assertions are forced and unnatural and so remote from the obvious Import of the Words that 't is not to be conceived the generality of Christians when they read the Scripture can find out such Interpretations and imagin that it is to be understood in that Sense and therefore it is incredible that that is the true Meaning thereof moreover in opposition to all Reasonings it is to be observed that there are many Texts of Scripture which make up a strong Evidence of the truth of the Trinitarian Sentiment whereas in fine the Texts that the Unitarians alledge seem not express and positive for their System p. 60 In CHAP. XI That the Unitarians do not lay the whole or chief stress of their Cause upon Arguments drawn from Reason yet very justly on the other hand they think like all Protestants that Reason ought not wholly to be slighted p. 66. c. In CHAP. XII That none of the Unitarian Assertions are incredible and that their Interpretations are rational and agreable to the stile and current of Scripture and therefore natural and obvious enough p. 69. c. Some further Considerations concerning the Creation attributed to Christ in Scripture p. 71. c. What is to be understood by the Holy Spirit more largely shewn something also very particular specified concerning what may be the Nature of what the Scripture calls the Word and the Creation p. 73. c. In CHAP. XIII That it is possible and easy and warrantable to understand in an Unitarian sense all the Texts which the Trinitarians alledge for their Sentiment p. 79. Some further Considerations concerning the Worship and Invocation of Christ p. 80. c. In CHAP. XIV That several Texts of Scripture are most express and evident for the Unitarian System p. 88. c. In CHAP. XV. That from the whole Dissertation and the Gospel-Terms of Communion these four things are the least that can be inferrâ—d in favour of the Unitarians p. 96. 1. That the State of this Controversy is such that Men may be Unitarians and be very sincere pious and inquisitive and that if Unitarianism be an Error it is not a damnable and intolerable one or a Heresy p. 97. 2. That in our Terms of Church-Communion with relation to this most abstruse and intricate Subject We ought to keep to the Generality of the Expressions of Scripture and not to make any Publick Determinations and Impositions which would drive away the Unitarians out of our Communion p. 100. 3. That therefore First in the Publick Service We ought to address the Current of our Prayers to God in general in the Name and thro' the Mediation of Christ in the conclusion of them beseeching God to hear us and grant us our Requests for the sake of his Dear Son our Blessed Lord Saviour and Redeemer and so when We address some Ejaculations to Christ We ought in general to address to him as to our Mediator most highly exalted and assisted by the Divine Nature dwelling in him as aforesaid Secondly in our Publick Service likewise the Terms of Church-Union We ought to be content with the Apostles Creed which is worded in a Generality agreable to that of Scripture Thirdly no Subscription or Assent ought to be required of Clergy-Men in this Matter and its dependents but to the Expressions of the Scripture it self or to Terms that agree to the Scripture-Generality the Clergy-Mens Declaration being admitted of and accepted that they solemnly subscribe and assent to any of those things proposed to them but so far as they are agreeable to the Generality of Scripture p. 101. 4. That this Generality in Terms of Church-Union is a Safe Method in so intricate a Matter and is incontestably Sufficient all being certainly worshipped when in general God is pray'd to that is to be ador'd with Supreme Worship and the Mediatory Honour due to our Saviour being paid him when our Petitions are put up in the Name of Christ as our Intercessor and Redeemer most beloved of God exalted at God's Right Hand and in whom the Fulness of the God-head dwells p. 102. In the Post-Script I. That the strongest Arguments for the Divinity of Christ and of the Holy Ghost are not inconsistent with Unitarianism p. 104. II. An Inquiry Whether the Unitarians may joyn in Communion with a Trinitarian Church Of the Reasons of both
probably Ireneus was an Arian or at most a Semi-Arian What Grotius says of the Occasion of St. John's writting this Gospel may be seen in his Annotations The Vnitarians consistently to their System may hold all that he there says of the Word Verse 15. John the Baptist bare witness of him saying This is he of whom I spake He that cometh after me is preferred before me for he is before me As if the Baptist had said Tho' then this Man as it is at the 30th Verse that cometh after me enters upon his Office but when I have almost done mine yet he is called to an Higher Office and Dignity than mine for he is my Superior my Lord and my Prince he is the Messiah the Saviour of the World a most Holy Man the Son of God the designed Sovereign of the Universe and I am but his Servant and Harbinger Whereas the Vulgate has translated This WAS he of whom I spake Beza shews there is no reason but that it may be rendred This IS he In like manner we need not read he WAS before me but he IS Thus it runs more naturally This is he of whom I spake or said He that cometh after me is preferred before me for he is before me Is preferred before me That is then is preferred to an Higher Office and Dignity than mine Which saying the Baptist explains tho' somewhat obscurely as are expressed all the like Mysteries on the infallible understanding of which most credibly Salvation depends not and which seem intended to try our Humility and Moderation as well as our Attention and Industry by adding For he is before me Before me Or as it is in the Original Protos mou Princeps meus My Primate the designed Head and Saviour of the Church and Lord of Men and Angels And this explains and particularizes or intimates how Christ's Office is greater than that of the Baptist's See Erasmus and Grotius upon the Place Verse 18. Which is in the Bosom of the Father Or which WAS or has been namely when immediately before his entering on his Office Christ was taken up into the Highest Heavens See John 3.13 Sometimes that Phrase to be in the bosom signifies to be most Dear See Numb 11.12 Deut. 13.6 By these remarks and hypotheses the Socinians conceive the beginning of St. John's Gospel is made plain and intelligible And they believe that by the same means by using the like care and attention all the other Texts which the Trinitarians object may also be made to appear consistent with the Unity of God with the whole Scripture and with Reason CHAP. IV. The ARIAN System THE Arians do not much dislike the foregoing Exposition excepting that they are persuaded it is short as to these Particulars in that the Socinians do not hold our Saviour's Soul to have prae-existed before its Conception and consequently do not admit it to have been an Instrument in the first Creation of the World But the Arians maintain both these Points It is true say they the Word the Son of God by excellency is a Creature tho' most intimately assisted of God which the Socinians do not deny Christ is a true Man made up of a Body and Soul only and not of an absolutely eternal Hypostasis also or infinite Person of the same numerical Essence with the Father But then say they this Man's Soul was not only before Abraham but even was the first Created Spirit John 17.5 For so the Scripture calls him expresly the First-born of every Creature or the Beginning of the Creation of God and terms him by eminency the Image of the invisible God Col. 1.15 Revel 3.14 c. Moreover it is asserted that by him God made the Worlds Heb. 1.2 And St. John says positively that without him was not any thing made that was made John 1.3 Which expressions seem too extensive to be restrained to the New-Creation only All things then were made by him And therefore the First-born of every Creature must be so transcendently Excellent as incomparably farther to surpass originally all Men and Angels in Excellency of Nature Wisdom and Power than they surpass the meanest of the Brute Beasts In a word the Arians believe that that Holy Spirit whom the Scripture calls the First-Born and who in process of time was made the Soul of the Messiah is originally as Perfect a Being and as like unto God as Divine and Almighty Power could produce and as can possibly be imagined salving the Unity of God seeing it is said he had a Part in the Creation of the World in which God most efficaciously assisted him and it is represented as the highest Liberality to Mankind that God gave his Son to Redeem Men. The Arians then say that the First-Bern is Omâ—â—â—ousian or as like the Divine Essence beside that he is as much assisted by the Divine Nature as it is possible for a Creature to be And they believe he was produced in the Duration of Eternity and before Time that is to say before the Creation of the World And in that sense like the Semi-Arians they will not scruple to say that the First-born is Eternal so it be remembred that he was made and that he is not an uncreated Being it being impossible there should be two uncreated Beings or two Gods in the proper sense of the word But the First-born is a God next to God and as Eternal as it is possible for the Excellentest Creature to be If it be asked how the First-born could be Instrumental in the making of Angels 〈◊〉 may be answered that a Part might be assigned to him therein that we know not 〈…〉 has been held by many that the Souls of Men are produced by the Parents Iâ— so it cannot be thought impossible but that God might have endued the most excellent created Spirit with Power to Produce other Spirits But perhaps Angels have fine Vehicles which are Part of their Being as a Human Body is Part of a Man And then the First-born might be assisting in the preparing of these Vehicles when God had Created the Substance thereof When the First-born was created then was also another eminent Spirit or other eminent Spirits according to some Modern Arians produced but inferior to him and called in Scripture the Holy Spirit Thus far the Arians hold It may be that by this or these last not only an Archangel or the Archangels 1. Tim. 5.21 but the whole Body of Angels is to be understood for they often seem to be meant when the Scripture speaks of the Holy Spirit And if so they also were instrumental in the Creation of the World as well as the First-born tho' not so eminently as he but under him Which doth not import that the Angels or the First-born produced Creatures into being out of Nothing But the Chaos being created or prepared by Almighty God then for reasons not perfectly known to us God thought good to set the First born and the Holy
Angels in their several stations to work upon it and He directed and enabled them to concur with Him in the disposing and setting of it into a regular frame and beautiful and convenient order It is now the constant course of Nature that Creatures produce other Creatures A like Power then in an incomparably higher degree might undoubtedly be given by God to incomparably more excellent Beings It may be said that by the Sun all things in the World live and grow and that without him no living thing subsists or can subsist And could God create no intelligent spiritual and invisible Beings Superior to the Sun in Power and Vertue Why should we think the Material Sun to be God's Ne plus ultra or his powerfulest and excellentest Creature possible Thus then the Holy Spirits of God and among the rest and in the Chiefest Place that Most Excellent Spirit which afterwards took Flesh of the Virgin Maâ—y and was the Soul of the ever Blessed Jesus and next after him that Holy Spirit who is the Chief of the Angels or the select Angels sate and moved upon the Face of the Waters and helped to give the Chaos a Motion and to hatch it into a World It is certain that God alone might as easily have done all this as with the concurrent Assistance of his Son or Chief Minister and of his Angels But it may be He had a mind thereby to exercise their Talents and to try their Obedience Assiduity Diligence and Faithfulness in his Service Probably it adds to the Happiness of vertuous and holy Spirits to be doing somthing in the service of God It is also possible God would cause them to have a hand in that Work to endear the whole Creation to them and them to all rational Creatures according to the natural Duties of Gratitude What has cost us some labor we commonly have a great affection for witness the love of Mothers to their Children It cannot then but be a great satisfaction to the Holy Spirits to look upon Men as in some measure their Production as well as their Pupils That will naturally give them an extraordinary tenderness for Mankind Now there is a Pleasure in Love and in doing good And that the Holy Angels might not want that rational solid and durable Pleasure God according to this System thought good to employ them in his Works It is then no Argument that God could not employ them therein because He is himself All-sufficient thereto being Almighty Tho' God can easily do all things alone and is properly the only Creator yet we daily see that He makes use of Instruments or Means and Second Causes We have then no reason to stagger at that assertion of the Scripture that by and with that Holy Spirit that was born of the Virgin Mary God had made the World or drawn Order out of the Chaos and dispos'd all the Parts of the Universe in their due Places and Frame Tho' that Holy Spirit was the First born of every Creature and a most excellent Image of God yet immediatly after that he was produced before the being of Time or the Production of Angels and of the Material Creation it may be that God created many more Spirits of almost a like Kind and Dignity or incomparably above the Angelical Nature and that the Soul of the Messiah had then no Superiority besides that of Order over them but these were in a manner or in other respects equals subject only to God and equally Superior to the Holy Angels an equal number of the Angels and inferior Spirits being put when created as they were afterwards under those principal Lords or Gods according to the Scripture-stile But when the Lord Jesus was become Man and especially after He had shed his Blood upon the Cross and was risen from the Dead and ascended again into Heaven then He was made the Prince and Sovereign under Almighty God of all Archangels as well as of all Angels and of all other Creatures It seems necessary to suppose that then began his Superiority over all the sublimest Angels and all Creatures because the Scripture represents that as the Reward of his Obedience and of the constant and faithful Performance of his Undertaking So that if there were no created Spirits of almost the like Excellency with him yet from the very beginning that there were Angels there might be many Archangels which were not wholly subjected to him tho' of a nature very much inferior to his but had like him an immediate access to God and were then accountable to God alone altho' at the first at their Creation God had left it to the First-born to appoint to each of them their Office and Station Perhaps the Socinian Exposition is here to take place as to the Creation of Dominions and Powers by our Lord Jesus Christ and the First-born inherited not the Dominion till after the Performance of his Undertaking for Mankind And perhaps the Eternal Continuation of Glory was the Reward proposed to Christ These things may exactly be some of these ways for ought any body knows And there is no reason to look upon the Arian System as incredible upon the account that during the Agony which our Blessed Saviour underwent a little before his Passion an Angel was sent to strengthen him Creatures may sometime need to be put in mind of those things which they already know We daily see that good Men are much comforted and edified by the Exhortations of other Men like themselves and somtimes inferior to themselves Our Saviour was become a Man and was then under such streights as are most dreadful to Human Nature He wanted therefore external Assistances the Powers of his Spirit being depressed to the Measure of a Human Soul at its Incarnation But it was afterwards raised above its former Grandeur being exalted to Sir at the right hand of God The first Verses of St. John's Gospel and the other Texts relating to our Lord Jesus Christ are very easy and intelligible being taken in a Sense agreable to this System But as to the Holy Spirit it may be the Scripture means chiefly thereby the Holy Inspiration and an Influence of the Power of God CHAP. V. The Answers of the Unitarians to the Chief Objections commonly made against their Expositions in General and First the Answer to the Objected Antiquity and Vniversality of the Trinitarian Sentiment THE Trinitarians urge that all the Vnitarian Expositions may in general and all at once be confuted by this one consideration That theirs is the old prevailing Sentiment To evince which besides the Writings of the Fathers since the Council of Nice and some Passages out of the Ante-nicene they quote Pliny's Letter to Trajan wherein he acquaints him that Christians Sang Hymns to Christ as to a God and Lucian's Philopatris where mention is made of the God of Christians his being one in three and three in one Now say the Trinitarians it hereby appears that ours is the
purpose The Church says he dispersed thro' the whole World has both from the Apostles and their Disciples received that Faith which is in one God the Father Almighty and in one Jesus Christ the Son of God incarnated for our Salvation and in one Holy Spirit who by the Prophets published the Dispensations of God Jesus Christ is our Lord and God and Saviour and King according to the good Pleasure of the Invisible Father advers haeres L. 1. C. 2. He who has no other God above him is the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ Ib. C. 19. And in speaking of that Saying of Christ that he knew not the Day and Hour of Judgment he says The Father is above all things for the Father says Christ is greater than I Wherefore in knowledge also the Father is declared to have the Preeminence Ib. L. 2. C. 49. The Apostles would not call any one of his own Persor Lord but him that exerciseth Lordship over all even God the Father and his Son who has received from the Father the Lordship of all the Creation Ib. L. 3. C. 6. The Apostles confessed the Father and Son to be God and Lord but neither named any other God nor confessed any other to be Lord. Ib. C. 9. I invocate thee O Lord the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who art the only true God above whom there is no other God who rulest over all and dost in domination besides our Lord Jesus Christ rule also over the Holy Spirit Ib. C. 6. By these Passages it appears that Irenaeus held the Father alone to be God in the most eminent sense of that word and the Son to be Lord and God under the Father but the Holy Spirit to be neither Lord nor God Yet he might hold the Holy Spirit to be above the Angels and 't is probable he understood thereby what the Vnitarians do These Matters being left in a great Generality in Scripture the Fathers explained them as they thought best That liberty of inquiry and examination must be allowed of so those explications and interpretations be but offer'd as Opinions and Conjectures but be not Magisterially imposed by any Man on other Men. For to follow the Design and Intention of Scripture Christians must Unite in the Generality of the Terms of Scripture as we see it in the Apostles Creed If these Measures had always been observed Platonism had done but little harm It seems that Platonism made the Platonizing Fathers differ from the strict Vnitarians and Arians I mean the Ancient and Primitive Christians that held the Sentiment that Arius revived or improved For it seems he believed after them that the Word like other Creatures was made out of Nothing But it seems Plato as after him his Christian Disciples of the Number of whom Irenaeus seems to be taught that the Word was created out of the Substance of God Dalaeus observes in the last quoted Place of his aforesaid Book that Tertullian tho' the most thorow-stitcht Platonist of his time had much the same Thoughts and held that God the Father produced the Word out of himself and made him his Son but that the Father is the whole Substance and the Son a Portion and Derivation of that whole In another Place the same Tertullian says expresly that there was a time when the Son was not Adv. Hermogen C. 3. and it seems that by the Holy Spirit-he means only the Vertue and Power of God De Praescript C. 13. Novatian says that the Holy Spirit is less than Christ De Trin. C. 24. moreover that once the Son was not and that before him was nothing besides the Father C. 11. Whereby he positively asserts that the Father alone is from all Eternity and consequently that the Father alone is God in the eminent Sense of that word Which is very different from the Sentiment of the rigid Platonists and the present Trinitarians who hold the Son and Holy Spirit to be from all Eternity as well as the Father and to be equal among themselves and co-equal with him as it is in the Creed of Athanasius Now those that do not assert the Son and Spirit to be eternal and consequently not to have a necessary Existence nor unlimited Perfections nor unborrowed Powers or Powers that they have not received freely from another may very well pass for Vnitarians seeing they make not the Son and Spirit to be God like the Father but the Father's Creatures Dalaeus in the Place we last quoted remarks that those expressions which afterwards were so much found sault with in Arius were used by these Antenicene be mentions Dionysius Arexandrinus who expresly calls the Son the Father's Workmanship which is the same as to say the Father's Creature They expresly say that the Father Made the Son and they even use the very term that the Father Created him Nay Dalaeus in the same Place forgets not to take notice that the 80 Platonick Bishops who at the latter end of the 3d. Century so violently condemned the famous Patriarch of Antioch yet at the same time did expresly declare that the Son is not of the same Essence with the Father Now therefore by the Acknowledgement of the Trinitarians themselves the Post-Nicene Trinitarians cannot with any Modesty pretend that the Ancients were of the same Opinion with them and consequently there can be nothing more vain than for them to plead Antiquity Origen like the foregoing Authors not only called the Son a Second God Contr. Cel. L. 5. p. 258. but a Creature and the oldest of the Creatures Ib. p. 257. And in his First and Second Books concerning Prayer he has so many Arguments against Praying to any but the Father and so blames those that would also direct their Prayers to the Son plainly calling them Fools for so doing that it clearly appears that according to him the Supreme or true Divinity belong'd to the Father only This is so notorious that many have believed that Origen was of the same Opinion that Arius afterwards was of and Epiphanius did well observe that in many Places Origen makes the Son and Holy Spirit to be of another kind of God-head or of another Nature and Essence than that of the Father Epiphan adv Haer. L. 2. T. 1. p. 531. Now since so antient so renowned and learned a Doctor as Origen was of this Sentiment that alone is a sufficient Argument that the Notion of the present Trinitarians was not then known to be the Apostolick Doctrin that at least the Tradition about that Point is uncertain and consequently that the Determination thereof ought not to be sought for by this Means Indeed in reason so Abstruse and Intricate a Matter ought to be Magisterially determined by no Means if they are not attended with greater evidence but every one must be allowed to judge the best he can for himself and Men must Unite in the use of the terms and expressions themselves of Scripture if they appear to be susceptible of a
have been permitted to come to our hands so express themselves that they may be taken for Arians Howbeit it suffices us if they generally appear to be but Semi-Arians For then it is evident the present Trinitarians cannot justly plead Antiquity The celebrated Writings of Lactantius are a further Testimony to what I have said concerning the State of the Platonick Trinitarianism in the Church before the Council of Nice He asserts that God before he set upon this ourious Work of the World begat an incorruptible and irreproveable Spirit that he might call him his Son Altho' God produced also for his Service infinite others whom we call Angels yet he has vouchsafed to give the Name of Son but to his First-born Instit L. 4. C. 6. And because the Son was faithful to God and taught Mankind that there is one God and that he alone is to be worshipped neither did ever call himself a God because he had not discharged his Trust therefore he received the Dignity of a Perpetual Priest and the Honor of a Soveraign King and the Power of a Judg and the Name of God Ib. C. 13. Now when any one has a Son whom he entirely loves who notwithstanding dwells in the House and under the Governing Power of his Father altho' the Father grants him the Name and Authority of a Master yet in the terms of Civilians here is but one House and one Master So this World is but one House belonging to God and the Son and the Father who inhabit the World and who are of one Mind or of like Affections and perfectly agree are as One Government or One only God the One being as the Two and the Two as the One. And no marvel since the Son is in the Father because the Father loveth the Son and the Father is in the Son by reason of his faithful Resignation to his Fathers Will and that he does nothing but what the Father Commands him This evidently declares in what sense the Father and Son are to be understood to be One God or One Mind and One Spirit Namely inasmuch as they are of one Mind they are therefore as if they were but one Spirit or but one Person and one God Yet according to this they really are Two distinct Beings and Two very unequal Spirits For the Son has freely received all from the Father and is ever Inferior and Subject to the Father and was produced then when God was going to set himself upon the Creating of the World and consequently is not from all Eternity The Father then is the First and Principal God and the Son is a God of a lower kind If this be not pure Arianism as it may be taken and seems to be all that it can amount to is at most Semi-Arianism which indeed very little differs from Arianism for both Systems hold the Son to be God but in an Inferior sense and assert the Father alone to be the one only true God tho' the Semi-Arians esteem that the Son was Created out of the Fathers Nature or Substance whereas Arius and those that are exactly of his Opinion as was said conceive that the Son tho' immediately produced by the Father was Created out of Nothing and only differs from other Creatures in that he is more Excellent than they all put together was Created by the Father alone and is set by the Father over all created Beings As concerning the Person and Nature of the Holy Spirit Dalaeus in the Fourth Chap. of his Second Book De usu Patrum remarks after St. Jerom that Lactantius expresly asserts the Holy Ghost to be but a Creature and not to partake of the Deity Sandius brings many Instances to prove that both Lactantius and all the other foremention'd Authors were even of Arius his Sentiment and not they only but also generally the remaining Ante-nicene Writers All these Authors which we have quoted were undoubtedly most learned and deservedly esteem'd in their Generations and are now generally esteem'd still by all Christians and indeed they may be accounted the Chief of the Ante-nicene whose Writings have been preserved We may also rank among them Eusebius Bishop of Caesarea as well as Lactantius since he Flourished somtime before as well as since the Council of Nice and appears to follow wholly the Sentiments of Justin Martyr when not aw'd by the Nicene Tyranny so that the then current Ante-nicene Doctrin may be known in these Writings Concerning these Matters therefore we may remark Eusebius expresses himself to this purpose He that is beyond all things the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ the Governor of all things how many and of what quality soever they be even of the Holy Spirit himself yea further of the Only Begotten Son also is deservedly stiled by the Apostle the God that is over all and he only may be called the one God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ But the Son is the Only Begotten God who is in the Bosom of the Father And the Advocate the Holy Spirit is neither God nor Son for he has not received his Production from the Father like the Son but is one of those things which were made by the Son De Ecclesiast Theol. L. 3. C. 6. If John had conceived the Father and the Son to be one and the same thing he would have said that the Word was the God with the Addition of the Article which not doing he evidently teaches us that he is the Prime God who is the Father of the Word and that the Word was not that very God but yet that he also was a God Ib. L. 2. C. 17. This is the Current Doctrin of the Old Ante-nicene Platonists concerning the Son and Holy Ghost Eusebius like the other before him expresly asserts that the Holy Ghost is not God and it is visible he says no more of the Son than at most what is agreable to Semi-Arianism That was it seems what the generality of the Primitive or Ancient Aâ—teâ—nicene Platonists meant by the Divinity of the Word and for the not coming up to which they opposed the Ebionite and the Nazarene Vnitarians Eusebius in the 25th and last Chap. of the 5th Book of his History quotes a remarkable Passage of an Author a Platonizing Christian who had written upon that account against the most rigid Vnitarians The Passage is to this effect The Vnitarians pretend that the Apostles and all the Ancients held the very Doctrine concerning the Person of our Saviour that is now maintained by the Vnitarians and that it is but only since the Times of the Popes Victor and Zepherin that the Truth has been adulterated and discountenanced This would be credible if first the Vnitarian Doctrin were not contrary to Holy Scripture and if divers before Victor and Zepherin had not contended for the Divinity of the Lord Christ Namely Justin Martyr Miltiades Tatianus Clemens of Alexandria Irenaeus Melito To whom we may add the ancient Hymns or
the Son are but one Person But it is evident that the Father being an intelligent Being and the Son a distinst intelligent Being from the Father the Father and the Son must necessarily be two Persons For a Spirit as long as he exists cannot but have always in himself distinctly from all other Spirits what constitutes a Person and can say some things of himself distinctly from others Thus how strictly soever God and Christ be United Christ can say of himself that he is a Creature so many Ages Old God can say that he is Self existent and never had a Beginning Now here are two he 's or two l's and consequently 2 Persons for these are Personal Pronouns each of them denotes a distinct Person And the Scripture is so far from asserting God and Christ to be one Person that it constantly distinguishes Christ from God Indeed in the Scripture-stile a special Messenger and Representative may beare the Name of him whom he most especially acts for and represents And Christ may moreover be termed a God in an Inferior Sense as Kings and Princes are called Gods in Scripture He may also be called God inasmuch as a Divine Influence most intimately dwells in him But the Scripture not only no where says that Christ is literally the same God with the eternal God or is the Whole of the Father but it teaches the contrary For it all along represents Christ as a Man in whom God dwells and whom God exalts to the highest Dignity over all other Creatures And Christ himself expresly says that the Father is greater than be Which manifestly imports that tho' God dwels and acts in him yet God is distinct from him and still keeps the Supreme Authority to himself reserving to himself the Power to act in him when or so far as he pleases for he was not pleased for instance to enable him to dispose wholly of the Gifts of the Spirit till after his Ascension and he had not revealed to him when should be the Day of Judgment but kept to himself the Times and Seasons c. Thereby then it appears that Christ is but a Man acting for God and to that end assisted of God as was said tho' the Trinitarians generally will not allow him to be truly a Man but only a Human Nature which is but an imaginary Shadow of a Man When they call him God-Man they mean only a Divine Person united with their General Conception of a Human Nature that has no real Subsistence which is not truly a Man For as the Bishop of Gloucester excellently well observes p. 63d of his Reflections upon the late Examination of the Discourse of the Descent of the Man Christ Jesus from Heaven to say that the Man Jesus has no Subsistence of his own is to say that he has no other Subsistence than an Accident has in union with the Substance to which it belongs and this makes him inferior to any Man God ever made Nay this actually unmans him Therefore the Bishop rightly calls this monstrous Doctrine Scholastick Gibberish Whereas the Scripture not only never calls Christ a God Man but in a great many places calls him a Man John 8.40 John 1.30 Acts 13.38 1 Tim. 2.5 c. and expresly says that as to his Person and Human Circumstances he was in all things like unto us Sin excepted Hebr. 2.17 Hebr. 4.15 1 Cor. 15.21 Now if he be a Man he has a Subsistence of his own for so has a Man and if he has a Subsistence of his own he cannot be supposed to be united to the Godhead and to be a God but as the Vnitarians hold he is Namely inasmuch as God constantly guides him and acts in and by him in the High Station in which He has placed him which after all the Trinitarians as we have seen own is all they mean by the Incarnation or Personal Union and so it is most incontestably evident that notwithstanding the Difference that the Trinitarians make between Them and the Vnitarians they can give no reason for their pretence that according to the Vnitarian System the Lord Jesus is Vncapacitated for the Work of Redemption And if he were So according to the Vnitarian from what has been said it manifestly appears he should as much be So according to the Trinitarian Scheme For both found his Capacity upon the In-dwelling or Assisting Godhead in him To this the Trinitarians reply that except the Godhead and the Man Jesus Christ were supposed to make but one Person Christ could not be said as be is to do those things which none but the Divine Power doth Therefore it must be infer'd that this one Person Christ is God-Man and implies a Divine and a Human Nature Personally-united together For the Scripture attributes the Miracles of our Saviour to his own inherent Power and his Revelations and Prophesies to his own Personal Knowledg For it is said that he knew what was in Man that he rebuked the Wind and the Sea that he will raise the Dead at the last Day c. To this Plea the Vnitarians answer that by the same reasoning when our Saviour promised his Disciples John 14.12 that They should Do greater Works than those he had done the Trinitarians cannot avoid concluding that they should do those Miracles by their own Power and that they should then be considered as indeed Personally-united with the Godhead But cannot the Trinitarians consider that Men may be said to do those things which are effected by the Means and Helps which they make use and can dispose of Is not a General said to take a City which his Army storms at his Orders Is not a Physician said to do a Cure that is effected with God's Blessing by the Remedy he has prescrib'd In like manner may not Men be said to do those things which are wrought by the Power which God has invested them with or granted them the disposal of To come then to the objected Particulars Christ works Miracles raises the Dead forgives Sins and doth whatsoever the Father does by desiring God to do these things at his request which the Father alloweth him to ask and to expect of him Therefore all things whatsoever that he sees or knows the Father doth or can do and that are requisite to the fulfilling the Work of Salvation Christ begs the Father to do them and the Father doing them at this his most beloved Son's Intercession Christ is censed or reckoned to do them The way that all Intelligent Beings Do those Things that God has put in their Power is by Willing them and Vsing the Means which God or Reason has shewn they may be effected by For instance For a Man to move his Hands or Feet his Soul needs but to will it to nourish his Body he must take the things and apply them as God has appointed to that end Now it seems all the Means which God has appointed for Christ to do whatsoever the Father doth
not to believe him Our own Reason in such a Case shews us that seeing we are credibly assured he knows these things not only better than We but perfectly well it is reasonable to submit all our Difficulties to his Testimony It is then most evident that in some Cases the most express Contradictions ought not in Reason to hinder our belief For We believe that Matter either is Divisible infinitely or is not Divisible infinitely tho' it is well known there are manifest Demonstrations against either of those Systems We firmly believe there is such a thing as Eternity tho' which way imaginable soever We conceive it to be We find therein unavoidable Contradictions We believe that either there is a Vacuum or no Vacuum tho' either seem absolutely Impossible And if We knew an infallible Judge in these Matters We would believe him and should think We ought in Reason to believe him whether he told Us there is a Vacuum or told Us there is no Vacuum c. It appears therefore that not only We are ready to believe but even that we actually believe in some Cases what evidently seems to Us to be contradictory and impossible Not that what is truely contradictory can be supposed to be possible But We must own some things may seem to Us to be truely contradictory which really are not so And therefore if a Judge credibly known to be infallible should tell us that that is not contradictory which seems to be so to Us We ought in reason to believe him Now wherein is it likely We may sooner be puzled with seeming Contradictions than in the most sublime and incomprehensible Subject the eternal the infinite the necessary and divine Being And who in reason can be thought a more credible and competent Judge of these things than Almighty God Himself We are sensible that in some Cases We must believe some things to be true which yet after all our best reasonings and inquiries exprefly seem contradictory and impossible And shall We not believe the Trinitarian System because of some seeming Contradictions tho' God Almighty should assure Us it is true What reason can there be for such a Dealing or how can We reconcile it with our own avow'd and incontestable Measures in many instances The Rule of Reason then undoubtedly implies that We are to follow what after the best search We are capable of appears the most evident notwithstanding all the Difficulties which otherwise the greatest Credibility may seem to be attended with and that there can be nothing more credible and no greater or surer Evidence than the assured Testimony of the Infallible God Thus We may reconcile together those excellent Directions of Holy Scripture in Vnderstanding to be Men to prove all things and to judge 1 Cor. 10.15 1 Thess 5.21 1 Cor. 14.20 and yet not to lean to our own Vnderstanding Prov. 3.5 That is not to stick to our own imperfect Imaginations but to consider most exactly what Right Reason after the most sincere and careful atention leads Us to and inviolably to follow that The Vnitarians therefore are unreasonable to seek any excuse not to believe the Trinitarian System if it be taught in the Word of God And those Trinitarians take more trouble than needs or than can be effectual who content not themselves to prove the Doctrin of the Trinity out of the Scripture but attempt to reconcile it to Reason There can be nothing more reasonable than to believe when God speaks whatever Difficulties our own weak and shallow Imaginations may find in the Subject-Matter of the otherwise credibly attested Divine Revelation But some Trinitarians as well as the Vnitarians seem to labour under this Prepossession that Men are to believe nothing of what God tells Us unless it can be shewn to be free from all Difficulties or unless all the Objections be answered that Human Reason can make against it Let it but be proved that God has said a thing and then tho' it be attended with never so great and many seeming Contradictions and Impossibilities it suffices Us to hold that it is a Mystery which We are to believe so far as We can find that God has revealed it Here it is most evidently our reasonable Service to sacrifice our Human Understanding to Divine Faith But this is a Point which the Vnitarians seem not to have duely considered Yet they might easily observe that God has sown Difficulties in most things in this State of Imperfection and Probation to make Men both humble and diligent or religiously industrious and to try or manifest who will be sincere and careful in the Momentous Inquiry and Search after the Truth which incontestably is of the greatest Concernment to Us to weigh as it deserves The not attending to the right use of Reason herein is what makes Men not only Vnitarians but Deists and even Atheists Some will believe no Spirit because it seems a Contradiction that what is not Material should act upon Matter They believe no God but hold the World to be of itself because they do not conceive that Something can be made out of Nothing nor are able to imagine how it is possible that what is absolutely Immaterial should produce Matter and because they do not see or understand with what Tools as well as with what Materials God made the World And some reject Revelation on pretence that there are Prophecies in Scripture and God is in it represented as Concerning himself with Men whereas if he did so they think he would not permit Evil if he could hinder it and it seems to them to be a Contradiction to fore-see certainly Future Contingencies This shews Us that We ought to be truely humble and not wise in our own conceits and that if We will not expose our selves to Error concerning Sublime Matters We are not rashly to determine those things to be impossible which to our Reason seem most strange and wonderful This is the First Branch of the Trinitarian Argument The Second is 2. That the Vnitarian Interpretations imply some most unlikely Assertions and are besides that forced and unnatural and so remote from the obvious Import of the Words that 't is not to be conceiv'd the generality of Christians can understand the Scripture in that Sense The Vnitarians to avoid the Difficulties of the Trinitarian System run to other seemingly as great Difficulties What can for instance seem more impossible than those Assertions that a Creature can perform the Office of a Creator which at least one would think is to set up two Gods one Superior and one Inferior besides the Holy Ghost or that the most excellent Creature as like God as possible and in whom the Fulness of the God-head dwells can ever need the Assistance and Ministry of Angels by the Holy Spirit or the Spirit of God meaning both the Chief and under him the whole Body of Angels or that by the Spirit understanding the Divine Power and the essential Virtue and as
Sun causing the Seeds of things to grow unto Perfection and into a beautiful Order Indeed the Sun is not properly a Creatour nor are Men properly Creatours but they are Instruments in the Hands of the Creatour God is pleas'd to make use of them in the effecting of those Works but all the while He concurrs with them as well as prepares the Subject for them He not only provides the Matter and Means and endues the Instruments with a fit Capacity but He also upholds and assists them and works with as well as by them In like manner the Vnitarians observe it is not said that the Word is the Creatour or Maker but that by him God made the Universe When the Word was created or that most excellent Person which is the most express Image of the Divine Wisdom and is therefore in that sense call'd the Wisdom of God the first Being which God then produced and which with the Instrumental Concurrence of the Word He fashioned and perfected was according to the most illustrious Vnitarians another very eminent Creature which not only for distinction-sake but also for his excellent Perfection and the designation of his Office was called the Holy Spirit and the Power of God But tho' the Word had a part in the fashioning or modelling of him or in the medial and instrumental pouring vital or spiritual influences upon him yet he had so little share in the Work in comparison of that which God had in it that not the Word himself but God only is to be reckoned as the Producer or Maker of that Holy Spirit And for the same reason God only is called the Author of all the other Creatures tho' both the Word and the Holy Spirit had a hand together with God in the drawing of them out of the Chaos God prepared the Chaos and having created the Word and by the Word the Spirit by the breathing and moving of the Spirit he gave Motion to other Creatures that were set into a sit Order to that end Yet all Creatures and even the Holy Spirit are said to belong to the Word because in the creating of them God designed to Subject them all to the Word and accordingly they were all Subjected to him from the beginning tho' then so only as Servants are Subject to a Son in his Minority in his Father's House whereas after Christ's Passion and Exaltation they were Subjected to him as to the Master of the House himself or as to a Son com to Age to whom the Father commits the Government of the House If by the Word in the beginning of St. John's Gospel be to be understood not only the First created Spirit but also a Divine Virtue and Influence united to and assisting that most excellent Creature it is easy to conceive that the Word might be Instrumental in Creating the Chaos or the World out of the Chaos Howbeit nothing in Scripture or Reason contradicts the System implying that the Chaos is an eternal Emanation of God that it is a confus'd Mixture of unactive Material and Spiritual Natures that Creating is the putting some of them in a certain Motion and Order that all Spiritual Creatures have a Material Vehicle that the Material Vehicle being prepared God with what somtimes is called his Word what is called his Breath forces into it some Portion of the Spiritual Nature scattered in the Chaos that what the Scripture somtimes also calls the Word that is the Soul of the Messiah and the Holy Spirit thereby then meaning a Creature are the largest Portions of the Spiritual Part of the Chaos that God ever put together and that the Word and Holy Spirit being created God made use of them to Create or Breath upon and Put into a fit Motion and Order the rest of the Creatures By the H. Spirit then so far as that title may be applied to other beside God may be understood the Chief of the Elect Angels or of the Seven Archangels 1 Tim. 5.21 which are represented immediately surrounding standing before the Throne of Glory Rev. 1.4 Most probably such a glorious Creature as incomparably surpasses all the other Archangels in Excellency of Nature is then primarily to be understood by the H. Spirit Yet it may be also that the whole Body of Angels under him consequently every Angel may sometime be thereby meant For the term Holy Spirit may be a Collective Word implying then several Holy Spirits or all the Holy Angels every Holy Angel being a Holy and Pure Spirit And what all the Subordinate Angels do at the Command of their Cheif is reck'ned as done by him who when he has receiv'd the Orders of the Word divides to them their Tasks and originally is the Holy Spirit or Holy Angel by excellency and so in that respect these Works are represented as performed by One Holy Spirit and the whole Body of Holy Angels is then reputed as if it were but One Holy Angel as in speaking of what is done by Devils the Scripture mentions but One of those Impure Beings as if there were but one such the Evil One or the Vnholy Spirit what all the Devils do being ascribed to their Chief who Commands and Directs them in all things Howbeit there is no reason why we may not think that One Immense Spirit next to God and the Word may not be suppos'd to do all that is attributed to the Holy Spirit For the Excellency of the Holy Spirit may be so great as to have incomparably greater Powers and Perfections than all the Angels and all other Inferior Creatures put together and even almost to equal the Word except in Dignity One Sun and One Moon pour their Influences effectually upon all the Seeds and Creatures in the World And do we think that God could not frame an excellent Spirit or two excellent Spirits so powerful as to be able to do the like to all Human Spirits on Earth and to shine upon them all and enlighten and guide them and suggest good Motions to them and watch alone over them if not with the Concurrence also of other Angels which yet cannot be doubted of as Spiritual Stars in comparison of those other most excellent Spirits Yet all these Holy Spirits are but the disposing Instruments and Ministers of the Divine Power which at their working together works by and with them The Word has the disposition of the Divine Power of that which is his particular and ordinary Attendant and even of that which God himself immediately exercises and of that also the disposition of which is given to the Holy Spirit and to the Angels For the Word having receiv'd that Priviledge has made the Holy Spirit partaker of a vast Share of the Divine Power above all Angels according to this System And to every Angel according to his Station is alloted likewise by the Word 's Appointment Authorized thereunto by God a certain Portion of the Administration of the Divine Power which always accompanies
fine pretended that it seems marvellous that a Creature should be named before and should be said to have the preheminence over the Power of God by the Holy Ghost understanding the Influence of the Divine Power and Divine Inspiration it must be remembred both that by the Divine Inspiration or Influence of the Divine Power the Vnitarians do not understand a Person but a Property or an Act and that agreeably to the express Doctrine of Scripture they hold that Christ is made partaker of the Fulness of the Godhead in the manner we have spoken of before and just now have further specified so that for Desiring the Father he may at any time Dispose of the Divine Power and Inspiration and doth actually dispose thereof as is said according to what he pleases to ask it of God and therefore the Holy Spirit is represented as proceeding from the Father by the Son and the Holy Spirit is said to be Christ's Now it is not strange that the Disposer should be mentioned before the thing disposed of as it is in the Form of Baptism There is then no need to insist any longer upon this And so we have don with the second Particular importing that the Assertions of the Vnitarians are not uncredible and that their Interpretations are rational and agreeable to the stile and current of Scripture and therefore natural and obvious enough And this together with the following Particular being considered the Trinitarian Sentiment will appear to be wholly groundless and incontestably therefore altogether incredible For indeed is it likely that Christianity for many Ages having been altered in many weighty Points the present Trinitarian at least seemingly impossible and contradictory System has all this while remained the same that it was from the beginning and by the hands of the Platonists and Scholasticks has passed pure and undefiled In Summ. When some Texts seem susceptible of two Senses the one more literal but expresly irrational or contradictory impossible manifestly inconsistent with other Passages and the Current of Scripture and the other more strained or figurative but agreeable to the Scripture-Stile and reconcileable with Reason which of the two Senses do the generality of Christians and in particular Protestants commonly prefer in their Interpretations They unanimously hold as a standing Rule by which the Scripture is to be interpreted that it may be rightly understood as was shewn in the last Chapter That We are to reject that Sense which is manifestly absurd and inconsistent with express Texts and are then to hold by that which is reconcileable to Reason and Scripture tho' somwhat more remote from the Sound of the Words And indeed it would evidently be most unreasonable to follow other Measures We ought then most incontestably constantly to prefer that Interpretation which is consistent with Scripture and Reason before that which is inconsistent with both And this Consideration leads Us to the next Particular CHAP. XIII An Answer to the third Branch of the Objection 3. IT is possible and easy and warrantable to understand in an Vnitarian Sense all the Texts which the Trinitarians alledge for their Sentiment To evince the truth of which Proposition we shall consider those Texts which are mentioned in the Objection and instanced in as the strongest for the Anti-Vnitarian Cause and as for the others we shall refer the Reader to the Brief History of the Vnitarians or even to Grotius his Annotations but especially to the Works of the Fratres Poloni The Texts instanced in for the purpose aforesaid are those which either call Christ the Son of God by way of eminency or shew that Christ may and is to be Pray'd to and declare that God will have Men honour the Son even as they honour the Father As to the Texts which call Christ the Son of God by way of eminency an Observation of Dr. Sherlocks will go a great way to give a light into that Matter These are his words at Pages 71st and 72d of his Book against the Bishop of Gloucester That which entitles Creatures to the natural relation of Sonship to God is to receive their being from God in the likeness and resemblance of his own Nature Thus Angels are called the Sons of God and so is Adam who was immediately formed by God in his own Image and Likeness And thus som think that Christ who was as immediately formed by a Divine Power in the Womb of the Virgin as Adam was of the Dust of the Earth is for this reason called the Son of God See Luk. 1.35 where that reason is expresly given of Christ's being call'd the Son of God The Vnitarians to this Observation will in particular add that no Creature was ever made in so great a Likeness and Resemblance of the Divine Nature nor designed to so high a Dignity as Christ was and that this particularly is the reason why Christ is called the Son of God by way of eminency besides that He is actually God's Only-Begotten Son as we did observe from Luk. 1.35 This is a plain and a rational and after all an unexceptionable account of the Matter and therefore what Dr. Sherlock adds thereupon serves only to shew that the Scholastick or Platonick Trinitarian Sentiment of Christ's Sonship is impossible For this is certain and undeniable and yet if the Platonick or Scholastick Sentiment were true this could not be allowed of according to that System for he says that System implies that there being but one Son in Christ it is Heresy to hold that Christ is the Son of God in any other sense than by an Eternal Generation Christ as we have seen is called the Only-Begotten Son of God because he is the only Person whom God caused to be born of a Woman without the help of Man And in that sense he is God's Only Son as well as in this respect that he is the only Lord whom God has placed at the head of the Vniverse and to whom he has subjected all Creatures For Soveraigns and Kings are called the Sons of God Luk. 1.32 John 1.49 c. as is shewn in the Introduction of Dr. Patrick's Witnesses of Christianity and this is the Only Soveraign and King who is constituted the Lord of all other created Lords and Kings in which respect he is like to God which we have not well translated equal to God as also in respect of the exercise of the Divine Power in working the greatest Miracles whenever be pleased and whenever he will Som People are apt to imagin that even God being called the Father is a valid Proof of more Persons than One in the Divine Nature But seriously do they think that the Samaritan Women and common Soldiers were acquainted with the Scholastick or Platonick Trinity Yet these speak of a Son of God Mat. 27.54 and to the other our Saviour speaks of the Father as of Somwhat intelligible to them John 4.21 Conclude we then that by the Father we must understand God the
the Ephesians is that as we would stand in aw before the King of Kings so in proportion of the Subordination Servants ought to demean themselves before their Masters The Sense of the Text of the 5th of St. Mathew is that as God is truly perfect so we ought effectually to strive to be perfect with that Perfection which our Natures are capable of And in like manner the Sense of the 23d Vers of the 5th of St. John is that as we honour God we must also honour his Deputy Vicegerent tho' nevertheless the one as properly God's Chief Minister as was said the other as expresly the Almighty himself The Kings of England may use the same Phrase to declare it their Will Pleasure That the Subjects in Ireland should honour the Viceroy even as they honour the King But that doth not imply that the one must absolutely be taken for the other consequently that is not to give the Supreme Royal Glory itself to the Viceroy no more than to honour Christ is to give expresly God's Supreme Glory to Another as the Arians do well observe besides that the Saying that God will not give his Glory to Another may signify that He will not give it to be dispos'd of that He will not give the disposition of it to Another or that He will not give to Another that Glory which is peculiar to Him of disposing of religious Honour and appointing Rites of Religion or that He will not give or impart a Sublime Heavenly Honour to Strangers or Aliens from Him neither will give his Praise to Idols that is He will not patiently suffer or allow that Men should make to themselves Objects of Religious Service at their Pleasure like the Heathens that the Religious Worship which is properly ultimately due to Him should be paid to Unfit Beings to Stocks Stones or to Daemons which are not truly in any holy scriptural sense Gods being neither the Supreme God nor Soveraign Officers of God commissionated with Power Authority thus to act for God so as most eminently to represent god and so to receive a Suitable Honour appointed to terminate ultimately to God So that God then doth not give properly the Religious Honour to Another tho' He commands us to bow the Knee to the Man Jesus Christ as we do to God If He pleased He might set Angels over Us or any Good Spirits and command Us to bow to them and ask and receive Graces of them tho' his Holy Nature cannot permit him to give any such Glory to his Enemies or ever to allow that Impure Spirits be sought to and reverenced That could not redound to God's Glory or the Good of his Creatures whereas the other might See a Passage of St. Gregory's quoted in the 1st Part of Bishop Taylor 's Sermon on Ps 86.5 where St. Gregery observes that Angels were Worshipped under the Old Testament But if so yet to be sure not only that was not a Divine Worship but even that Worship so far as it extended was for the sake of and terminated to God whose Immediate and Highest Officers and Messengers the Angels then appeared to be and so that hindred not but it might truly be said that God alone was properly Worshipped The Text Gal. 4.8 which we translate doing Service to them which By Nature are no Gods may be translated doing Service to them which TRUELY are no Gods yet it is the same if we read Of their Nature whether Supreme according to the proper and eminent sense of the word or Inferiour of God's creating and constituting according to the Scripture-Stile See Grotius on the Place Certainly we are expresly Commanded in Scripture to Serve the Man Jesus Christ Phil. 2.9 Yet incontestably the Man Jesus Christ properly is a God but in an inferiour sense We are then without doubt to serve the Man Jesus Christ as such a God appointed and dignified by the Supreme and Eternal God Act. 2.36 and we are to serve the Supreme God as absolutely being the Supreme God or as Him who is of himself God and who consequently is God in the most proper and eminent sense of that word Howbeit this doth not imply that Christ is not as intimately united with the Divine Nature as possible For all Power is given him in Heaven and Earth and acting for God in the highest Post he represents God at the Helm of the Universe But a Creature cannot thus represent God and govern the World and have all Power given it except God be with it and assist and direct it so as that that Creature have the enjoyment and disposition of the Divine Nature as of it's own Being whereby it's Power and Understanding being enlarged it may in a high measure Know and Act as God And accordingly as Sandius observes the Vnitarians held from the Beginning of Christianity that an Influence of the Divine Nature was incarnated in and most strictly united with the Man Christ Jesus So that Christ is not Worshipped neither is God's Representative or the Father's Universal Vicegerent merely as he is a Creature A mere Creature cannot comprehend in it's Thoughts and under it's Care the whole Universe and can never be such a Representative of the Father 's at the Helm of the Universal Government Nor can a mere Creature be Worshipped by all the Creatures in the Universe as Christ by God's Appointment is to be It seems God neither can nor will be thus represented by any Creature as a Creature Christ then is God's Representative and is Worshipped in his Mediatory Kingdom over the whole Universe Inasmuch as an Influence of the Divine Nature most intimately Dwells in him Assists and Directs him and Worketh in and by him and Inasmuch as the Divine Majesty is Conspicuous in him and As by his Intercession and by the Merit of his Death and the Vertue of the Covenant of Grace and of his Union with God and his Exaltation he Disposes of the Divine Power in the Gospel-Oeconomy A mere Creature may have a vast Honor and Power but not like that which appears in Christ in his Government of the Universe Whereas God has given us two Eyes whereby we may perceive three or four Objects at a time at a certain distance and two Ears which may imperfectly discern some few several Sounds also at the same time as the Sounds of certain several Voices and of some Instruments and two Hands by which we may take hold of several Particies of Matter and strike ten Strings at a time and move a certain Mass and steer a Ship and but a narrow Understanding according to the present Needs and the Capacity of our bodily Organs God might give a freer Carrier to our Spirits and endue us with more noble and vaster Capaeities and give us two hundred or two hundred thousand Hands and Ears and Eyes and enable our Souls to use them all fitly in reference to so many several Objects in the same instant
to our Decisions and profess the eternal Generation three Persons in one God-head and the Equality of the Son and Spirit with the Father which is to judge for others in a most abstruse and obscure Subject and to require of them as Terms of Union to act against their Conscience as the generality of them believe and be hypocrites and utter lies and grosly equivocate in the greatest Solemnities of Religion whereby many Souls may be caused to perish for whom Christ died See The Consequences of the Modalists System The Athanasian and Nicene Creeds are too express or particular and magisterial for so subling Speculations left in so great a Generality as we see these are in Scripture We have no right therefore to set up such magisterial imperious Terms of Communion according to the Protestant Principles as it appears from what has been said but We are necessarily oblig'd to keep to the Terms of Church-Vnion that we have here described seeing it appears that We are to receive the Vnitarians and not to drive them away out of our Communion it being incontestable upon impartial consideration that the Vnitarian Controversy is of that nature that Men may be Vnitarians and be very sincere and inquisitive and consequently not to be rejected and it being to be remarked that the Generality of the Scripture-Terms is sufficient and safe from the whole it being necessarily to be inferred in the last place IV. That this Generality in Terms of Church-Vnion is a safe Method in so intricate a Matter and is incontestably sufficient all being certainly worshipped when God in general is directly and ultimately Prayed to that is to be adored with Supreme Worship and the Mediatory Honour due to our Saviour being paid him when our Petitions are put up in the Name of Christ as our Intercessor and Redeemer most beloved of God and exalted at God's Right Hand and so is addressed to as the Mediator of the New Covenant as was said In most intricate Matters that certainly cannot but be most safe which is subject to the least Inconveniencies and which is in some measure sufficient And incontestably it is sufficient to worship God with Supreme Worship for all that is God is Worshipped when God in general is Worshipped Wherefore the generality of the Reformed Churches content themselves to address their Prayers in general to God And some of the most Learned Trinitarians maintain that it is not lawful to do otherwise but that formal Addresses to different Most Supreme Persons in Divine Worship set up different Objects of Supreme Worship For the same reasons in the Publick Terms of Vnion a general Profession of the Doctrine of the Trinity in the general Expressions of Scripture is both the safest and is certainly sufficient And all this doth even necessarily follow from the 1st and 2d Inferences For there it appears that God absolutely requires no more for Terms of Vnion What God therefore is content with to that end is to that end incontestably safest as well as sufficient so that if Men instead of taking upon them to be Magisterial Judges would have stuck to the Latitude and Generality of Scripture for Terms of Agreement and Union all had been well We must needs then own that the Scripture-Expressions to be adhered to in Terms of Church-Vnion at least will suffice to all the indispensibly necessary ends of Salvation and that consequently it is sufficient in general to know and believe that the Holy Ghost is the Spirit and Inspiration and Power of God and that Christ is the Only-Begotten Son of God in whom the Fulness of the God-head that may be communicated and that is an Influence of all the Divine Perfections most intimately dwells and that he is in some sense God It is evident that this System furnishes the same Motives to love God and Christ and to practise the Precepts of the Gospel that the other System doth For if one Divine Person with the Influences and Assistances of his Wisdom and Power be suppos'd to do together with Christ all that belongs to our Salvation have we the less reason to be thankful to God and Christ and to hearken to the Gospel-Injunctions than if we suppos'd three Divine Persons or called God three Persons It is as effectual therefore to the ends of Christianity to hold that the Spirit is the Power of God and that Christ most eminently acts for God and is most intimately united with God by the means of the Divine Influence dwelling in him so that when Christ is obey'd and lov'd thereby God is actually lov'd and obey'd Christ being thus lookt upon both as most excellently and most extraordinarily representing God and as being in some sense God Many Trinitarians do expresly assert that the Second Person is but a continual Acting of the Father Why may not the same be said of the Holy Spirit and Inspiration Or why may not the Word and the Spirit be stiled Influences as well as Acts of the Father Howbeit We may certainly very fitly conclude this Subject with the Words of the late Dr. Sherlock at the 7th Page of that Book of his intituled The Present State of the Socinian Controversy where concerning the human and unscriptural Expressions three Persons Of the same Substance Essence and the like he has this judicious remark The Catholick Faith does not depend upon the use of these terms for it was before them Now this is all that I plead for that these and the like unscriptural terms be not lookt upon as necessary for Christian-Communion but that Christians may be so reasonable and just as to Vnite in the Generality of the Expressions of Scripture which it is evident God has judg'd sufficient since He thought fit to use them as He has done that is in the Generality of which they appear susceptible Incontestably then 't is neither Necessary nor indeed consequently Safe nor Just in such most Intricate Matters to go beyond the very express Words of Scripture in Terms and Acts of Church-Communion Besides Are not the Tares as well as Wheat to be suffered in the Church by Christ's Order Math. 13.30 The Scripture-Latitude must needs therefore be THE TERMS OF UNION We need not and ought not to be more express or determining and imposing than the Scripture Tho' the Person of Christ were not fully known yet notwithstanding that there is no other Name by which Penitent Men are Saved He may be the Saviour of all them in every Nation who do righteousness and for his Sake God may accept of their sincere Repentance and Obedience As Amyraldus judiciously observed if a Prince has been graciously pleased to ransom a Captive or pay the Debts of a Poor Prisoner that Redeemed one is not the less ransomed and made free tho' he do not perfectly or exactly know all that belongs to the Person by whom he is redeemed all that is reasonably and indispensably requisite being that he should do what he can to