Gods Both these were honour'd with this Title by reason of their Commission which when at an end they cease to be call'd Gods God himself says concerning the Angel that was to conduct the People of Israel Obey him for I have put my Name in him He saith as much of Men whom he invested with Magistracy Ye are Gods and Sons of the most High He saith to them Ye are Gods viz. I have given you my Glory with my Name and set you in my Place 3. Lastly God appears after a sensible manner in the sanctified Flesh of his Son who is the Brightness of his Glory his Image and Character which is the great Mystery of Godliness God manifested in the Flesh and speaking to us in these last Times by his own Son For Jesus Christ doth now succeed the Angels and speaks to us in the Person of God The Angels are now become his Ministring Spirits and our Fellow-Servants Gregory the Great teacheth us this Homil. 8. in Evangel The Angels saith he reconcile him with us and they who despis'd us in our low Estate look upon us now as their Companions Hence it comes that Lot and Joshua have worshipt Angels Gen. 19. Deut. 31. without being reprov'd for it But St. John going about to worship an Angel Rev. 22. the Angel repuls'd him saying Take heed thou doest it not I am thy Fellow-Servant Hence it is that before the Redeemer's coming the Angels suffer'd themselves to be worship'd by Men without opposing it but since they now refuse their Adorations is it not that seeing our Nature rais'd above theirs they can no longer suffer that it should be submitted to them and disdain not to look upon Man as their Companion ever since they are oblig'd to worship a Man-God All these Apparitions are call'd the Word of God or to speak with the Hebrews his Shechinah that is his Habitation and his Presence But the last is the Word of God by way of Excellence 1. Because God reveals thereby his final and principal Design his last and perfect Will 2. Because God appears here not only in some measure but with the Fulness of his Graces 3. Because he manifests himself here not in a transitory manner but inseparably intimately and perpetually Hence it is that the Scripture saith only of J. C. that his Name is the Word of God St. John describes to us the first of these Manifestations when he saith that the Word was in the beginning that this Word was with God and this Word by which all things were made was God himself In effect God himself was the Word when he spake to create the World out of nothing because he spoke immediately without the intervention of any Angel or the Ministry of any Man The Doctrine of St. John is no other herein than that of the other Sacred Writers God said saith the Psalmist Psal 33.9 and all was made And to explain what this Speech was he adds God commanded and all was created Where we see that his Word is nothing else but his immediate Command Is there any other Mystery in what St. Peter teacheth us That the Heavens as well as the Earth were made by the Word of God 2 Pet. 3.5 Was it not by his Power and Command What doth St. Paul mean when he assures us That the World was made by the Word of God Heb. 11.3 You cannot find here the Mystery for the mysterious Word is not in the Original it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He means therefore that the World was made by the single Command of God and not by the Logos of Plato The same Evangelist St. John a little after describes to us the last of these Manifestations when he adds that this Word was made Flesh that is to say that the Flesh of J. C. was a glorious Cloud where God made himself visible in these last Times and made his Will known so that the Word or the Presence of God is now no longer a Body of Light or the Person of an Angel but truly a Man a Body and palpable Flesh Ireneus calls this Dispensation the Oeconomy of God in the human Nature lib. 1. c. 4. Bartholomew of Edessa conceived no otherwise of this Incarnation when he expresseth himself thus in his Refutation of Mahomet The Word saith he did dwell in the Flesh 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and this Flesh was made the Temple of God The Word or the Power of God was not made Flesh according to him but only because it dwells in the Flesh as it were in a Temple God dwelt in the Ark heretofore and there shewed his Glory and Power and receiv'd there the Homage from his People but now he dwells in the Flesh of J. C. but with a greater Power and in a more glorious and more visible manner That St. John had no other thought may be proved by some of our best Interpreters But in order to understand them better before we produce their Testimonies we must say something about the second Manifestation of God viz. that by the Ministry of the Angels The Old Testament calls these Heavenly Messengers often the Face of God his Glory and his Presence which is the same thing with his Word But besides this we will set down here those remarkable Words of Clemens of Alexandria lib. 1. c. 7. The Word saith he is the Face of God by the which he manifests and makes himself known The Antients had the Old Testament and the Law instructed them by Fear and the Word was an Angel 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But the new People hath receiv'd the New Testament and the Word was made 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the Fear is turn'd into Love and Jesus the Mystical Angel is born 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Dr. Bull relating these Words of Clement in his Defence of the Council of Nice Verbum Angelus erat interprets them thus Hoc est per Angelos apparuit that is to say he manifested himself by the Angels or as Clement speaks by an Angel or by the Angel viz. by the Angel that bore the Name of God but he is mistaken if he understands by the Word an Hypostasis distinct from the Father and if he means thereby that the design of Clement was to insinuate to us that the Son of God did manifest himself by the means of Angels For who seeth not that these words of Clement the Word is the Face of God do denote that the Word is the Manifestation of God And these the Word was an Angel mean that the Divine Manifestation was an Angel or was perform'd by an Angel Otherwise what can be the meaning of the opposite difference this Father makes between the Word which instructed the Antients by Fear and the Word which instructs the New People with Gentleness that is to say between the Word Angel and the Word Man between God speaking to the Antients by Angels and speaking to us in these last times
incarnate And what can this Reason be which it merited and which was united to it When the Veil of Allegory is taken off it can be no other than that high Contemplation whereof the Soul of Jesus Christ had by its pre-existent Obedience render'd it self capable or than that degree of Prophecy and that Spirit without measure wherewith God had honoured it and which made it Partaker of the Divine Nature or lastly the very Office of Word or of Interpreter of God whereof God had judged it worthy as the most perfect and noblest of the Spirits which he had decreed to declare his Mind Celsus says he ibid. lib. 7. will not own that he who suffer'd Death can be worthy of the second Honours next to the Supreme God as well because of the Powers he had acquir'd in Heaven as because of those he had acquir'd on Earth Supposing as you see that Jesus Christ had merited in Heaven before he came to merit on our Earth he was very far from believing him to be the most High God Wherefore Origen having said of the Word that it was in God that it came from God that it was made Flesh and affirming the same of the Soul of J. C. this Conformity yields just reason to suspect that the Doctrine of the Word is nothing but the Soul of Jesus Christ theologiz'd whereon they discours'd Allegorically That 's in a manner prov'd by the Hypothesis of the Arians who believ'd that the Word was to Jesus Christ instead of a Soul and consequently by the Word understood only the Soul of Jesus Christ created before all Ages An Hypothesis renew'd in our time by John Turner who has given it a new turn for he maintains That the Word is nothing else but the Soul of Jesus Christ created indeed but eternally united to the Substance of God and by that Union participating all his Perfections A Discourse concerning the Messiah Ep. Dedic p. 154. The same is infer'd from the Use which has been made of some Texts of Scripture as for example these I came from the Father O Father glorify me with the Glory which I had with thee c. Who being in the Form of God c. Our Divines interpret them of the Pre-existence of the Word but Origen and Dr. Rust in his Book intitul'd Origen and his chief Opinions interpret them of the Pre-existence of the Soul of Jesus Christ Whence comes this Confusion of Ideas The reason of it is easily given The former of these Interpretations is mysterious and allegorical and the latter literal So we may conclude that the Fathers allegoriz'd on the pre-existent Soul of Jesus Christ loving our Nature and becoming incarnate for our Salvation which they in their allegorical Stile call'd the Word or the Son of God And consequently those who take this last Allegory in the literal Sense and understand it of a Divine Person united to our Flesh are not less ridioulous than they who stumbling at the Letter of the first Allegory really believ'd that Angels had mix'd themselves with mortal Women The Text for the first Hypothesis that the Sons of God were married to the Daughters of Men serves as well as that for the second I have begotten thee before the Morning This Pre-existence of Souls and particularly of that of Jesus Christ has been very antient in the Church We find it plainly enough express'd in the second letter attributed to Clemens Romanus C. 10. These are his Words As you have been call'd dwelling in the Flesh so you will come in the Flesh Jesus Christ the Lord who sav'd us being the first Spirit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was made Flesh and so called us 〈◊〉 likewise we shall receive the Recompence in the Flesh This Passage supposes the Pre-existence of our Souls as well as that of the Soul of Jesus Christ For he compares our Spirits existing in the Flesh to that first Spirit which was made Flesh to call us He calls Jesus Christ the first of all Spirits whether Souls or Angels because God begat him first a little before he undertook the Creation of the World and afterwards imploy'd him to create the other Spirits according to the Doctrine of Lactantius Instit lib. 4. c. 6. who further teaches us ibid. c. 1.2 That this Holy Spirit descending from Heaven chose the Womb of a Virgin to enter into And the better to carry on the Comparison which he makes of that Spirit to all incarnate Spirits he shews that he was rais'd to the Recompence only by his faithful Obedience and Vertue ibid. cap. 14. His Words are remarkable God says he having sent his Son to Men He hath shewn his Faithfulness in teaching that there is but one God and that he only is to be worship'd and he never call'd himself God because he would have violated his Truth if being sent to take away from the World the Plurality of Gods and to establish the Unity of God he had introduc'd more than one God That had not been preaching One God nor working for the Interest of him who sent him but for his own and it would have been dividing himself from the Father whom he came to glorify Then by his having been thus faithful and in the Design of discharging his Commission not attributing any thing to himself he has receiv'd the Dignity of everlasting High Priest the Honour of Supreme King the Power of Judg and the Name of God By the way these Words of this Father are a curious Paraphrase on those of St. Paul Phil. 2.6 c. Who being in the Form of God did not attribute to himself c. Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him and hath given him a Name which is above every Name c. Let us here remember a distinction of the Fathers which has been mention'd already and wherein the Footsteps of antient Allegory visibly appear The Fathers distinguish'd two kinds of Generation of the Word the one eternal and internal and the other external which began with the World and the only one which they properly call Generation Dr. Bull acknowledgeth this distinction only he pretends but without reason that 〈◊〉 the latter which is metaphorical Granting him his desire 't is the same thing with respect to the Question now treated of For it remains nevertheless true that they allegoriz'd on one of the Generations of the Word be it which it will and that 's all I need Let them as long as they please say that the Fathers spake of a Generation of the Word which was proper and literal I shall answer Yes and that 's what I call gross Platonism which has made them philosophize so absurdly But by their own confession the same Fathers have spoken of another Generation of the Word which is metaphorical and allegorical and that 's what I call their refin'd Platonism the fair Remains of sound Philosophy which betrays them and manifestly discovers the absurdity of the other part of their System whereon they
to the Learned and the Philosophers with whom they convers'd 'T is this mischievous Policy that has brought so much confusion into the Christian Religion that there can be no appealing to pretended Antiquity the testimony whereof is become altogether useless and liable to great illusion One may think of having recourse to the Antients as to very good Witnesses but instead of that we meet with Oracles ambiguous and unintelligible A Person of good Abilitys in the last Age complains of this as well as I. Michael le Vassor Traite de l' Examen ch 1. p. 10. Since Philosophy says he was brought into Christianity the latter has so visibly degenerated from its primitive Simplicity that the Pagans themselves have taken notice of it The Men of thought believ'd it would be a great Service done to Religion to render it agreeable to the taste of the Philosophers they had a mind to reconcile our Mysteries with Plato's Principles which were extremely in fashion when the Gospel first went abroad into the World Origen and St. Austin afterwards have so embarass'd Theology the former in the East and the latter in the Western Churches where both had their Admirers and Disciples by endeavouring to adjust Christianity to that Philosophy that 't will cost one a world of pains to distinguish that which they and their Followers have said with any exactness of thought upon divers important points of Religion They give us none but allegorical Senses to divers Passages in the Holy Scriptures Their Expositions appear so wide from the Sense of the Sacred Authors that one knows not how to understand it so as to discern the true Doctrine of the Apostles from the particular Speculations of the major part of those Fathers to whom we are refer'd as to faithful Witnesses of the Faith of the Times they liv'd in But the Fathers were not content to accommodate their Doctrines to the Platonick Word or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but enquir'd further after another Pre-existence of Jesus Christ for the satisfaction of the Jews and they found it in the Angel that spoke to Moses and the other Patriarchs Tertullian in his Dispute against Marcion lib. 3. speaking of the State of Christ before the Revelation of the Gospel says that he was in that allegorical State of spiritual Grace c. These few Words seem to discover the whole Mystery of the Oeconomy of the Antients For they signify that Christ was not only represented in the Figures of the Law but as Origen speaks that he was substantially present in Moses and the Prophets Tract 26. in Mat. meaning thereby that Moses and the Prophets were if one may so speak substantial and personal Types of Christ to come or rather that Christ was then present in the Person of Moses and the Prophets who were his Types On the like ground may we not say that he was allegorically present in all the Angels who spoke from God to Men and that he was also allegorically present in that Word of God which created the World that powerful Word which said Let there be Light being a Type of this powerful Word which said by Jesus Christ Let the Light shine in the Hearts of Men. This allegorical Pre-existence of Christ is very agreeable with the Scriptures which say that of him which cannot belong to any thing but these Types as the Reproach of Christ the Spirit of Christ prophesying tempted of Christ and other Expressions of that kind which represent to us Jesus Christ in his allegorical State Those particular Commissions of Angels and Prophets being in some sort the Preludia of this universal and extraordinary Commission of Jesus Christ with regard to the whole World I ought not to pass over the Remark of Father Simon upon this Occonomy of the Antients Hist Crit. du N. T. Tom. 1. chap. 2. The mingling says he of the Platonick Philosophy with the Christian Religion was not intended to ruin the Orthodox Faith but the more easily to persuade the Greeks to embrace the Christian Religion The Fathers were in this for imitating the Apostles especially St. Paul who sometimes did stoop to the Infirmitys of the Weak becoming all things to all men Father Simon observes further that Clemens of Alexandria does sometimes carry this Occonomy too far that he applies himself intirely to Allegory it being fashionable in his time amongst the Christians especially with the Gnosticks who thought thereby to raise the Credit of the Scriptures that he is no ways behind 'em in point of Invention and Subtilty That this was the more excusable in him because he liv'd in a great City where 't is likely they affected those kind of Subtilties and that he believ'd 'em of use to establish the Christian Religion it being a prudent part in an able Master to adapt things to the capacity of them he is to instruct That his Paedagogus wherein he was to lay down nothing but plain Instructions was drawn up with this design and that in it he explains the Scriptures in the sublime and allegorical Sense He observes also Chap. 4. That those who had not these sublime Notions pass'd for plain weak Christians who knew not the design of Religion that the Gnosticks imagin'd themselves outdid all others in this kind of Knowledg and that it had been better if the Orthodox had not imitated them therein but had contented themselves with the literal Expositions of the Scriptures He goes forward to say that the Jews had mingled in their Religion divers Platonick Notions whereof one finds at this day not a few in their Cabalistick Writings This made some impression on the Minds of some of the first Christians who read with pleasure Books that treated of Angels and their Converse with Men. The same Author makes it appear That not only those who rejected the allegorical way were accounted illiterate but even pass'd for Hereticks too ibid. chap. 31. and that Theodorus of Mopsues who followed the literal Sense of the Bible according to the Method of his Master Diodorus and avoided the spiritual and allegorical Sense was reckoned for a Person who favour'd Judaism by his too literal Expositions For my part I make no doubt but 't was of that Set of Divines who imitated Theodorus that Pamphilus is speaking when he complains Apol. pro Orig. That they who charg'd Origen with so many Absurdities would not admit Allegory to be us'd in expounding the Holy Scriptures It may be conjectur'd from these words that the great reason why the Ebionites and Nazarenes were accounted plain simple People and poor in the Faith was this that they rejected the allegorical Theology of the Platonizing and Gnostick Christians The Word Ebionite which signifies poor and the other Word Gnostick which signifies knowing being directly oppos'd 'T is certain Origen calls the Ebionites poor in Spirit Philoc. c. 1. because they adher'd too much to the Poverty of the Letter or literal Sense and despis'd the rich and the sublime
Sense of Contemplation 'T is moreover upon the same account that so many great Men are said to Judaize because they were for keeping the Scriptures in their natural and literal Sense such were Aquila Symmachus Theodotion and others 'T is evident that the Fathers who were for appearing Learned and would not be outdone by the Gnosticks have allegoriz'd after the very manner of those Hereticks but upon such things that had some sort of Foundation in the Scriptures and in the Philosophy of those Times embrac'd by the Jews or the Platonick Party As for instance about the Ideas and Decrees of God concerning the Messiah about the Soul of the Messiah about the Spirit that form'd and after sanctified him about the Angels that were the Preludia of his Mission or lastly about that Word of God which created the World to whom they ascrib'd Personality after the Platonick way The Word or Logos might signify all these things the Wisdom of God that dwelt in Jesus Christ his pre-existent Soul the Spirit that form'd him and the facility with which he wrought so many Miracles only as it were at the expence of a Word After this manner the Jews have allegoriz'd upon the seven things that they say were created before the World among which they count the Name or the Glory of the Messiah To say the truth the Oeconomy of the Fathers very often varys For at one time they are for concealing the sublimer part of their Mysteries that they mayn't give offence to some sturdy Minds that will not so readily give way to mystical Notions At other times they pass over the plainer part of Religion to gain upon their speculative Gentlemen who admire chiefly what we call the Wonderful But however they are always constant in pursuing this Design of their Oeconomy and Rule of Prudence in adapting themselves to the Genius and Relish of every body in making Mystery of every thing to beget in their Scholars a Veneration for their Opinions when they come to be acquainted with ' em And further they take care to distinguish between those Opinions which were transmitted to 'em by the Writings of the Apostles and others which came from the same Apostles by Tradition only and in Mystery as St. Basil speaks Lib. de Spir. S. ad Amphil. Cap. 27. that is by the way of secret Discipline and Instruction Clemens of Alexandria makes mention of these last Opinions Stromat 5. p. 576. and calls 'em The Lesson of the Perfect which consists in certain spiritual and sublime Senses which were deliver'd vivâ voce and by Tradition but the Apostles could not set 'em down in their Epistles This Expedient of setret Tradition open'd a wide Field for philosophizing according to their humour and is adapted to the purpose of introducing new Opinions into Religion We must be upon our guard when we are reading their Writings and take very little of them in the literal Sense where every thing almost is allegorical and they are throout pursuing what we call the Wonderful 'T is well known to the Protestants that the Declamations and Apostrophe's of the Fathers have given birth to some Errors and the Idolatry practis'd at this day They know well enough how to account for the hyperbolical Expositions of the Antients upon the Eucharist as that Jesus Christ was offer'd upon an Altar that he was slain strangl'd extended died carry'd bury'd c. And these ridiculous Apostrophe's O great and sacred Passover the Purgation of our Sins c. Greg. Naz. O Divine and sacred Mystery vouchsase to remove the Veil wherewith we are encompassed and manifest your self clearly to us by enlightning with your brightness the Eyes of our Mind See Counterseit Denis These Apostrophe's seem to deify the Sacrament and to make it a Person Why should we not acknowledg at the same time that the over-curious Platonism of the same Fathers has led 'em into those extravagant Descriptions whereby they have made a second God a Person of the Word or Logos a Son begotten before Ages and incarnate in time Mysteries no less strange than that of Transubstantiation Who does not see that they had a mind to speak magnificently of every thing They ascrib'd a Divine and extraordinary Virtue to the Oil and the Cream They say that the Holy Ghost has chang'd and transform'd 'em by a Divine Emcacy They have said no less of Baptism for they believ'd the Divinity and the Holy Ghost descending and insinuating it self into the Water us'd in that Sacrament imparts to it the Power and Virtue of regenerating They allow that the Eucharist shews a Divine and quickening Virtue emanating from the Body of the incarnate Word The Word according to them is an Emanation from the Substance of God The Body of Christ is hypostatically united to the Word The Bread is hypostatically united to that Divine Body and consequently hath the quickening Virtue of the Word They own a twofold Emanation the Word is the Emanation of God and the quickening Virtue of his Flesh is an Emanation of the Word And they hold a twofold Incarnation one of the Word in the Body of Jesus Christ and another of the quickening Virtue of the Body of Christ in the Bread of the Sacrament This was a System of Policy well contriv'd whereby these cunning Doctors brought nothing less than Divinity into every thing and spoke with advantage upon the meanest Subjects to make 'em look mysterious and venerable It may be said of them as has been observ'd of those who make Canons in Councils that they spake more than they meant so that many Ages after Mysteries are discover'd in their Expressions which they never dreamt of I have met with nothing so like that as these two Apostrophe's which the Church of Rome chants in her Liturgy One is address'd to the Trinity O Holy Blessed and Glorious Trinity Three Persons and One God have Mercy upon us miserable Sinners The other is address'd to the Cross of Christ O Cross my only Hope I salute thee at this time of the Passion increase the Righteousness of Good Men and pardon the Crimes of the Wicked Here you have two Saints which one and the same Superstition hath canoniz'd two Prayers cast in the same Mould for both one and t'other are the fruit of Idolatry and of false Eloquence Upon which I will make this Observation that it has fal'n out with the Oeconomy of these Primitive Fathers as it has with the Admirers of Episcopacy here in England who having retain'd a Liturgy and divers Ceremonies that they might bring over the more Papists to their Communion yet they still continue to look upon those things at this time in a sort necessary to Religion altho there 's now no more occasion for that Reason of Prudence and even as great a Reason of Charity and a second Reason of Prudence should oblige 'em to relax or lay 'em by to gain the Non-Conformists 'T is the same case with the Allegorical
and of Spirit begotten and unbegotten made a God in the Flesh the true Life in Death born of Mary and of God This Father arguing against the Josephites does not oppose to their Error the eternal Generation of the Son of God but his Birth of a Virgin by the Holy Spirit I would say he does not speak of a God incarnate but of a Man who was made God in the Flesh that is to say who was born a God or made a God by his Birth because he was born of God and of the Virgin Mary In this Sense Ignatius assures us that our Physician is partly Flesh and partly Spirit since by his wonderful Conception he partook equally of the fleshly or Human and of the Spiritual and Divine Nature He adds this Physician is begotten and unbegotten since he was begotten of a Woman like other Men and at the same time unbegotten having no Man for his Father Lastly he says that this Physician was born of the Virgin Mary and of God which explains all the rest for 't is as much as to say that he was born of the Virgin Mary by the Power of the Spirit of God and not by her Intercourse with Joseph This word God as you may see being there manifestly oppos'd to Man or to Joseph Jesus Christ our God as Ignatius further says in the same Epistle was conceived of the Virgin Mary according to the Divine Dispensation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 being in truth of the Seed of David but by the intervention of the Holy Spirit Where one sees the same Antithesis continued which we observ'd in the foregoing Passage that is between God and Mary and between the Seed of David and the Power of the Spirit The true Oeconomy according to Ignatius is not the Incarnation of the Supreme God but the miraculous Conception of the Messiah who is both God and Man by his Birth of a Woman by the Power of God This is a Physician who was made God in the Flesh being born of the Virgin Mary and of God of David and of the Holy Spirit This is the true Divine Dispensation this is the great Mystery of the Christians The same Author in his Epistle to the Church of Smirna presents us with another Passage sutable to this occasion For thus he speaks of Jesus Christ That he was truly of the Race of David or the Son of David according to the Flesh but the Son of God according to the Will and Power of God in that he was truly born of a Virgin Monsieur Daillé having mark'd out this Passage of Ignatius as Heretical since he makes the Generation of the Son to depend on the Will and Power of the Father Bp Pearson gives this account of it in his Vindic. Ignat. Par. 2. c. 9. That 't is clear this Father does not speak of the Eternal Generation of the Son but of his Incarnation which as the World owns was by the Will and Power of God For which reason adds Pearson the Interpolator having a mind to pervert these Words by applying 'em to the Divine Nature he was forc'd to change their Order 'T is sufficient that this Learned Person affirms that in this Passage there 's nothing of an eternal Generation and that Ignatius speaks not but of Jesus Christ in allusion to the Words of the Angel The Holy Spirit shall come upon thee c. Wherefore that which c. shall be called the Son of God 'T is enough that he owns this Conception was so wonderful as to intitle Jesus Christ to the Name and Dignity of the Son of God As for the word Incarnation which Ignatius does not use we 'll excuse it in Pearson 't is a Term of art unknown to the good Father and signifies in the Platonizing Divinity that the Supreme God was made Man And if it be certain that Ignatius did not speak in this Passage but of the miraculous Conception of Jesus Christ can it be doubted whether he discours'd upon that same Subject and by no means on the eternal Generation in the two other Passages I am about to cite and which are very like to this here In the mean time Dr. Bull has the rashness to produce them for a Proof of that which he calls the two Natures of our Saviour that is that of a Supreme God and that of a Man like one of us in his Judic Eccles p. 5 seq Who would not wonder at the Artifice of Divines who have the Skill to pervert these Passages to serve their Notion of the Eternal-Generation We can furthermore shew you the Footsteps of this plain antient Divinity in other of the Fathers who Platonize more than Ignatius as in Justin and Irenaeus But we shall have another opportunity of examining the Theology of those two Fathers at present the Passage in Ignatius will suffice whereby to judg of the rest The only Reflection that remains is that Ignatius having so often distinguish'd between the Son born of God and of Mary and the Son born of David and the Holy Spirit 't is upon this Foundation that the distinction of the two Natures in Christ is founded in the true sense of it or if you please his twofold Filiation the one Divine the other Human. He is the Son of God says the Author of the Questions and Answers to the Orthodox Quest 66. in that he was born of the Holy Spirit and the Son of Joseph in that he was born of Joseph's Wife 'T is in this the Mystery consists He was born of Joseph's Wife this is but a legal Filiation with regard to Joseph and he was born of the Spirit of God this is a proper and natural Filiation with respect to God So that in this last respect it may be said that he is truly Light of Light and God of God I have already said it and I 'll repeat it again The Fathers thought that the Holy Spirit which overshadowed the Virgin Mary in some sort united it self to the Flesh of Jesus Christ so as never to be separated from it and 't is upon this perpetual Inhabitation that they have philosophized in their manner upon the two Natures of our Saviour Grotius aim'd at this Theology in one of his Notes upon Colos 1.19 The Plenitude of Divine Vertues says he dwelt in Jesus Christ that is to say 't was perpetually and inseparably united and not by intervals as in the Prophets This is what 's called the Hypostatick Vnion This in effect is the personal Union of the Divine with the Human Nature even this Shekinah or this perpetual Inhabitation of the Spirit of God in Jesus Christ To go farther in quest of other Mysteries betrays a Vanity of Mind The Fathers compriz'd all in what I have said and upon it they built those profound Speculations with which their Books are fill'd If at some times they went farther and spoke of the Word in a manner not agreeable with the ground I have laid down 't is
Platonism Unveil'd OR AN ESSAY Concerning the Notions and Opinions OF PLATO And some Antient and Modern Divines his Followers In relation to the LOGOS or WORD in particular and the Doctrine of the Trinity in general In TWO PARTS Anno Dom. 1700. ADVERTISEMENT TO THE READER THE Author of this Piece as I may say was stopped in the very middle of his Course he intended to have added a third Part to the two others which were publish'd and in it to have examin'd what Divinity the Holy Scriptures attribute to Jesus Christ He would have confin'd himself to what the four Evangelists acquaint us concerning it and made it appear to the meanest Capacity that the Ideas those Sacred Writers have given us are very wide from such as the Antients put upon 'em and the Moderns have espoused But Death prevented the Execution of this Design and hindered the Publick from reaping the Benefit of it However if this Essay meet with the Approbation it merits the World may be oblig'd with a Dissertation the Author has left upon the Gospel of St. John It may be said of this excellent Man that he was a Person of very great Penetration as well as Piety and that he made the Study of the Holy Scriptures his greatest Entertainment He had nothing in view but a Search after Truth which when he had found he embrac'd it with all his Heart for he was incapable of betraying or disguising it for any secular Interest whatever This plain dealing drew upon him many Enemies but his Patience in a manner overcame all and the firm hopes he had of a better Life after this did always support him under all the Tryals thro which the Calumnies and Malice of his Enemies had forc'd him His Friends have this Comfort however That those very Persecutors could not refuse him when alive nor since his Death the Elogies that his Vertues drew from 'em and according to the Custom of this present Age they took care in his behalf to distinguish the Morals from the Doctrine The Publick will see by what is bere represented to 'em what Judgment ought to be made of the latter THE TRANSLATOR TO THE READER THERE are several Passages in the ensuing Discourse that are very uncommon and extraordinary which if they should happen to be true will be much surprizing to the World And if they are not the Author has to appearance supported them with such Authorities from Antiquity that besides the Importance of the things themselves it will deserve the Pains of some Learned Pen to confute this Discourse to reclaim some who have and others who may imbibe this Author's Opinions ERRATA PAG. 4. Col. 2. Lin. 26. for Love r. Power P. 13. c. 2. l. last save one r. in Isaiah according to the Hebrew P. 21. c. 1. l. 22. r. acquir'd P. 36. c. 1. l. 5. dele of P. 39. c. 1. l. 37. r. dwelt in him P. 42. c. 2. l. 29. r. it was P. 45. c. 1. l. 4. r. World P. 49. c. 2. l. 40. r. contained P. 64. c. 2. l. penult r. however P. 81. c. 1. l. 20. r. herself Platonism Unveil'd c. The FIRST PART CHAP. I. The true Idea of the Logos GOD dwelling in an inaccessible Light where no one can either find or comprehend him was yet willing to reveal himself to his Creatures either by the way of a Manifestation without or by the way of Communication within To manifest himself 1. He environs himself with a supernatural Light whence he causeth his Voice to be heard and declares his Will 'T is thence that he speaks to Angels For being invisible by his Nature even in reference to Angels it is necessary that whenever he is pleas'd to declare his Orders to these Ministring Spirits he should give them some marks of his Presence in some certain Place in the Heavens and make his Will known This Manifestation is so lively and luminous that the Eyes of Men cannot bear the Splendor of it in this mortal Life None but the glorified Spirits may enjoy this Privilege in common with the Angels and which St. Paul calls the seeing of God face to face It is thus without doubt that Jesus Christ beheld him Mr. Le Clerc hath very well observ'd on Exod. 34.18 that Moses who had such frequent Testimonies of the Divine Favour desir'd this as a singular advantage that God who us'd to shew himself in a Cloud would vouchsafe at last to discover to him his Glory in the same manner as he doth in Heaven But this is too much for a Mortal this Glorious Presence is an advantage reserv'd for the Angels as I said before And without doubt it was in such like Splendor that he presented himself before them when he design'd to create the World and pronounc'd these words Let there be Light At least this is the Sentiment of Basil of Seleucia in his first Oration upon these words In the beginning God created c. God said Let there be Light The Voice was heard and the World produc'd But could not he have perform'd what he design'd in silence and without uttering a word Would not the Work have obey'd the least token of his Will Certainly the Heaven and the Earth with the Waters were already produc'd without any preceding Voice But it was not so with the Light the Voice preceded the Production What sort of a Voice is this and what was the cause of it Let us learn to hearken to Scripture even when it is silent and instruct our selves when it speaks Behold here you have it The infinite Companies of Angels that were created saw indeed the things that were a doing but could not perceive their Author nor discover the Cause for the Divine Essence is really even above the Contemplation of Angels 'T is not then without reason that God usher'd in his Voice to make himself sensible to those Celestial Spirits and to stir up their admiration that seeing the Effect follow'd immediately the Word and Command they being astonish'd at the Prodigy should turn themselves wholly to the knowledg of their Creator and celebrate his Praises saying Is there any greater than this God himself teacheth us this Truth in his Discourse with his Servant Job Job 28.7 apud LXX When I made the Stars all the Angels prais'd me with a loud Voice For by reason of their astonishment proceeding from the Greatness of that Spectacle they repeated their Acclamations and redoubled their Applauses at every Work that God was a doing 2. God makes use of the Person of an Angel that bears his Name and speaks by his Authority 'T is thus that he appear'd and spoke to the Patriarchs and this is the reason why Philo calls Angels Words so often The Author of Questions and Answers to the Orthodox speaks thus of this Manifestation All the Angels saith he which appeared unto Men instead and in the Person of God have born the Name of God Men likewise have been call'd
and Reasonings are the same with those of Beza concerning it we will not count him for a separate Witness The third Interpreter I shall alledg is Coelius Secundus Curio who speaks thus in his Araneus The Sacred History informs us that several have seen God present let it be so but the same History teacheth us that these were Angels and ministring Spirits who holding the Place of God did appear unto Men and spake in his Name in a visible Form and Person And not this only but the incomprehensible God being willing to make himself known in a more illustrious manner did moreover insinuate himself into J. C. with all his Majesty for we read thus in the Gospel The Father that dwells in me he doth the Works and he that seeth me seeth my Father also Add to these the Words of the Apostle God was in Christ reconciling the World to himself and these also He was pleas'd that all the Fulness of the Godhead should dwell bodily in Jesus Christ Doth not all this manifestly prove this Author plainly acknowledges that as Angels had been the Person or the Word of God J. C. was so likewise but yet a Word more excellent and a Person more noble into which God insinuated himself not God the Son as they tell us but God the Father according to the Passage the Author quotes Pater in me manâ—â—s facit ipse opera The Paraphrase of the same Author on the beginning of the Gospel of St. John is yet more express Before saith he that God created the World he had in himself the Cause and the Reason of all things the Idea and the Design Altho this Reason was with God we must not therefore imagine that it was any thing else but God himself For God was that Reason but seeing God cannot be seen with our Eyes nor comprehended by our Mind he was pleas'd to put on a Person under which he might shew himself as it were in his natural and living Image Now seeing he is an only and simple Being and cannot borrow any form of himself he produc'd himself one without by the mean of a Voice and a Light wholly Divine which because he made use of it to instruct us and manifest himself was called his Word that is to say his Oracle and his Wisdom c. to the 14th ver where he proceeds thus Would you have me at last to discover this great Mystery And tell you under what Form God came unto Men This Word this Reason this Wisdom this Oracle was made Flesh and this Flesh which is called Man that he might raise ours to a Sovereign Immortality A Metamorphosis to be admir'd in all Ages God was the Word the Word was the Life the Life was the Light of Men the Light was Flesh the Flesh Man the Man God who is blessed for ever God and Man have join'd themselves together for God was in J. C. reconciling the Word to himself 'T is on this wise that God the Sovereign God Deus Deus ille O Man manifested himself in the Flesh and conversed amongst us Hence comes it that a great Prophet gives him the Name of Emanuel This Learned Man's Words are remarkable He saith that the invisible God being willing to make himself known was pleas'd to put on a Person that is to say give himself a Figure take a sensible Image under which he produced himself outwardly That this Image consisting in a Light and a Voice which he made use of to shew himself and to instruct us was for that reason call'd his Word So that the Word of S. John and the Image of the invisible God as S. Paul has it are the self-same thing Thus you have the Word excellently well defin'd according to the Ideas of Clement neither do I believe that a neater and more distinct Notion can be formed of it nor one more agreeing with the Scriptures which tell us so often of the Glory of God of his Face of his Dwelling of his Presence in an Angel in a Cloud in a Light in a Fire with a Clap of Thunder with a Voice or with a gentle and still Sound and what can this be I pray you but his Person and his Word You need only read Maimonides in his More Nevochim P. 1. ch 25 64. where with extraordinary Clearness he explains what the antient Word is saying that it is the Habitation of the Divine Majesty and Providence in some certain Place where he would make himself known which he causeth to dart forth miraculously under the Representation of a created Light Would you have the same Word under the N. Testament Consider the extraordinary Providence that presided at the Conception of the Messiah behold an Angel that speaks and is the Voice of God on this occasion a Spirit overshadowing the Holy Virgin the which resembles so much the light Cloud that cover'd the Tabernacle behold the Habitation of God in the Messiah dwelling himself amongst us In a word see the Majesty of the Father in the Son whose Glory we have beheld If this will not suffice get up the Mount to the Transfiguration of J. C. you will there see an Apparition of two great Prophets a Cloud that covers them a Light spreading it self over J. C. his Face becoming bright like the Sun and lastly a Voice coming out of the Cloud saying these Words This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleas'd hear ye him Behold here the Word wherein God gives all the Marks of his Presence and whence he declares his principal Will which is that we should give ear to his Son the only Oracle and the sole Word by which he would ever hereafter discover himself and speak to us Irenaeus had no other Idea of the Word Lib. 4. c. 37. where he saith That the Word designing to shew God in its sundry Dispensations shew'd him made like to a Man that by this mean he preserv'd to the Father his Invisibility lest Man should come to despise him that if the Manifestation of God which was at the Creation of the World did give Life unto Men how much more will the Manifestation of the Father by the Word give Life to all those who see God on this wise That the Prophets never saw the Face of God uncover'd but only certain Dispensations and certain Mysteries by which God began to shew himself that these first Sketches of the Divine Manifestation were only the Preludes of that which was to be made by J. C. That the Father is invisible in Truth that no Person ever saw him but that the Word manag'd the Dispensations of the Father and shew'd their Glory as it thought fit Irenaeus tells us afterwards That the Word appeared under different Figures of a Man a Wind a Light a Cloud a Fire c. which discovers to us that all external Manifestation whether it be by Angels or by the Flesh of J. C. is the Word of God as all internal Communication
whether it be by an Angel or by an immediate Virtue is the Holy Spirit And all this is call'd the Oeconomy or as Irenaeus saith they are mysterious and extraordinary Dispensations of the Divinity which environ his Majesty to temper its great Splendor and adapt it to our Curiosity For to imagine that this is a second Person of this Divinity as invisible and as infinite as the first would make all the Reasonings of the antient Fathers not only useless but also absurd for they all unanimously declare not only that the Father never makes himself visible but also that he cannot do so It is impossible saith Eusebius Demonstr Evang. lib. 5. cap. 20. That the Eyes of Mortals should ever see the Supreme God to wit him who is above all things and whose Essence is unbegotten and immutable It is absurd and against all reason saith the same Author Hist Eccl. lib. 1. c. 2. that the unbegotten and immutable Nature of Almighty God should take the Form of a Man and that the Scripture should forge such like Falsities God forbid saith Novatian de Trinit cap. 26. that we should say that God the Father is an Angel lest he should be subjected to him whose Angel he were Et ibid. cap. 31. If the Son saith he were as incomprehensible as the Father the Objection of the Hereticks would have some ground that then there are two Gods It is an Impiety say the Fathers of the Council of Antioch Epist adv Paulum Samosat to fancy that that God who is above all things can be called an Angel Lastly otherwise I must transcribe all the Fathers Justin Martyr explains himself on this wise in his Dialogue with Tryphon No body saith he unless he be out of his Wits will dare to advance that the Father and Author of all things did quit the Heavens to cause himself to be seen in a small part of the Earth I thought to have finished but that I can by no means pass by that excellent Passage of Tertullian against Praxeas cap. 16. That he would not believe that the Sovereign God descended into the Womb of a Woman tho even the Scripture it self should say it This Father being persuaded by Reason and Philosophy that the supreme God is immense immutable and invisible demands how it could come to pass that the Almighty God whose Throne is the Heaven and the Earth his Footstool that this most high God should walk in the terrestrial Paradise should converse with Abraham should call to Moses out of a Bush c. and what is yet worse that he should descend according to Praxeas into the Womb of Mary that he should be impeached before Pilate and be shut up in the Sepulcher of Joseph He goes on Really one would not believe this concerning the Son if the Scripture did not speak it and perhaps would not believe it of the Father tho even the Scripture should say it How so would he mistrust the Scripture No he means only that he should mistrust the literal sense and search there for an Allegory Consequently then all these Fathers own that the Word by which the Father makes himself visible is not of a Nature incapable of causing it self to be seen but something sensible which represents God to us It matters not whether they conceive by it an Hypostasis a Spirit an intelligent Being or any other kind of Representation in a bright Cloud animated with a Voice This will always remain true that they did not understand the Word to be a Spirit equal to the Father as invisible by its Nature as the Father but only a certain Emanation where God produceth himself outwardly and discovers himself in a sensible manner And tho they might have sometimes spoken of the Word as of something invisible they meant not by this that it was invisible by its Nature but only that it was not visible to Men out of the time of its Oeconomy retiring it self from their Presence and becoming as it were hid in God Sometimes they would denote by it even the Energy and the Power of God wherewith his Manifestation is always accompanied but never a second Hypostasis in the Divine Nature For we must observe here sincerely once for all that the Word if you consider it only in its Energy is no other thing but God himself but when it is consider'd as it is a Mark of the Divine Presence then it is something sensible a Voice a Light or some external Form such like as was seen in Angels or in the Man J. C. our Lord. CHAP. II. The Antients believed that the Word was Corporeal WHerefore the Antients attributed a Body to the Word as Servetus very well observed Apolog. ad Philip Melanct. and so Tertullian speaks in his Book of the Flesh of Jesus Christ against Praxeas chap. 7. where he proves at large that when God uttered his Word he gave it a Body indeed not a Body of Flesh but an Hypostasis that is Solidity and Substance which is the true Signification of the Word That 's probably what he means when in chap. 6. of the Book of the Flesh of Christ he assures that Jesus Christ appeared to Abraham with Flesh which was not yet born non nata adhuc that is to say not indeed with such Flesh as ours but with a solid Body which had more than appearance A Body I say which he in the 8th Chapter calls the Seed of God from which as from a Heavenly Seed the Messiah was to be born and this Seed is the Holy Ghost or the Substance of the Word which insinuated it self into it Thence the antient Docetes and all the other Hereticks who held the pre-existence of the Word suppos'd that the Word did not take true Flesh of Mary but that he contented himself with the Celestial and Etherial Body which he formerly bore in the Apparitions of the Old Testament which had no more than the Appearance and Figure of a Man which the Scripture calls the Face of God Mons le Moyne did not understand the thing otherwise in his Varia sacra p. 415. The Docetes says he compared the Apparitions of Jesus Christ to the Apparitions of the Old Testament which having been in Etherial Bodies for certain times vanished into the Air as soon as the Dispensation was finish'd imagining that the Body of Jesus Christ was not of any other Nature And it is in the same sense that Cerinthus and Ebion suppos'd that Jesus Christ had not taken true Flesh as St. Jerom assures in the Preface to his Commentary on St. Matthew As Cerinthus held Iren l. 1. c. 25. Epiph. Haeres 28. That the World had been created by a Power he also maintain'd that Jesus who was begotten of the Seed of Joseph and Mary was the Son of the Creator As to the Christ or the Word he made him the Son of another Power superiour to the Creator and attributed to him a Celestial Body which he had always kept without
mixing it with the Flesh of Jesus For we cannot think he suppos'd that Jesus the Son of Mary had not Flesh like ours He meant nothing more than that the Word or the Christ as he is pleas'd to call him had not appear'd to Men but with a Body wholly celestial and impassible so separating Jesus from the Christ and making two Natures of them as St. Irenaeus informs us It is with reason wonder'd that so grave Authors have said and so often repeated that Cerinthus's Heresy consisted in denying the Divine Nature of Jesus Christ when he is the first who brings the two Natures of Jesus Christ into the Christian Religion the Divine Nature which he believed to be impassible and which he makes to descend from Heaven and the Humane which he believed to be begotten by Joseph and Mary But there is yet greater reason to wonder that Irenaeus has been quoted for it who says nothing less than what Controvertists make him say All that that Father says concerning the Error which St. John oppos'd in Cerinthus is that the World had been created by an inferiour God or by an Angel but that there was another superiour God who had sent his Word or the Holy Ghost in the shape of a Dove into the Son of Mary That the inferiour Christ who was called Jesus was indeed the Son of the Creator but that the superiour Christ who descended into the other was the Son of the most high and unknown God who after having render'd Jesus capable of working Miracles and of manifesting the unknown God withdrew himself into his Pleroma when Jesus was to suffer Iren. l. 3. c. 11. This Opinion was not so much Plato's as Philo the Jew 's who believed that God had never done any thing but by Angels Some Hereticks added that besides the God of the Jews who was one of those Angels and Creator of the Universe there was another God who had never manifested himself until he made himself known by the Coming of the Christ Indeed it seems that this is the only Error which St. John opposes in his Gospel First he shews therein following the Psalmist St. Paul and St. Peter that the World was not made by any other than by the Word or by the Power of God that this Word was not an Efficacy or Power distinct or separate from the most High God that is an Angel or self-subsisting Hypostasis but that it was in God the Creator as his Efficacy or to say better that it was the Creator himself Then he shews that the Word the Spirit or the superior Christ who descended into Jesus who dwelt in him and who had wrought so many Miracles was not an Hypostasis or an emanated Efficacy of another God than he who had created the World but the proper Efficacy of God the Creator the same Word which having created the World was united to Jesus Christ and manifested in him The Word by which all things were made says he was made Flesh or manifested in the Flesh Which shews that Christ was the Son of the Creator and not of another God superiour to him and that the World was not made by an Angel but by the most high God Mons le Moyne among others believes that St. John aim'd at opposing this Error St. John assures says he Varia sacra p. 407. that the Word was made Flesh in opposition to the Doctrine of the phantastick Body of Christ He has no other Design in his first Epistle where he teaches that Christ is come in the Flesh and protests that he preaches and insists on no other Word of Life than that which he had seen heard and touched that is according to him that Christ came no otherwise than in a real Body and no way in an etherial one If we inclin'd to believe that St. John aim'd at Cerinthus in writing his Gospel we might add that it is very remarkable that as often as this Evangelish relates Jesus Christ's saying that he descended from Heaven he always makes him speak as if he directly oppos'd that Heretick For whereas Cerinthus said that the Christ or a Spiritual Nature descended from Heaven Jesus Christ assures on the contrary that 't is the Son of Man that 't is his own Flesh which descended from thence Man as you see and not a Nature distinct from Man Flesh and not a Spirit 'T is pity that Heretick did not live in the time of our Lord one might have the Pleasure of forming a curious System on that Subject which would not be less well contrived than that which has been built on the Word of St. John with respect to that Heretick But if we cannot positively assert that Jesus Christ or his Disciple did attack Cerinthus we may at least affirm that 't was against him or his like that St. Irenaeus disputed They hold says that Father l. 3. c. 17 18 19 20. that indeed Jesus is born of Mary but that as to Christ he descended from above so dividing the Lord by saying that he is composed of two Substances c. With their Mouths they confess but one Christ but in reality they have two one passible and the other descending from Heaven invisible and impassible not knowing that the Word which was united to and mix'd with his Work and which was made Flesh is it self that Jesus who suffer'd for us But if one suffer'd while the other remain'd impassible it is not one Christ but two Now every Spirit which divides Jesus Christ qui solvit Jesum Vulg. is not of God What hinder'd the Apostles from saying that Christ descended into Jesus or the Saviour who is above the Oeconomy into him who is of the Oeconomy But the Apostles neither knew nor said any thing like it What there was of it they said to wit that the Spirit descended on him like a Dove It appears by this Passage and by the whole Work of St. Irenaeus that his Opinion was that the Word was made Flesh not only in communicating it self to the Flesh which the Hereticks believ'd but also in mixing it self with the Flesh And therefore in the 21st Chapter of the same Book he twice calls him the Word mix'd and blended commixtum Verbum The same Theology is found in Novatian de Trinitate c. 11 19. In one place he maintains that Jesus is not only a Man but that he is likewise God according to the Scripture because the Divinity of the Word enter'd into the Composition and mix'd it self with the Flesh Divinitate Sermonis in ipsa concretione permixta In another place like unto this he takes upon himself to demonstrate that the Word having by its Vnion and by its Mixture with the Flesh associated to it self the Son of Man made him what he was not to wit the Son of God Origen says as much of it in his third Book against Celsus The Humanity of Christ says he rais'd it self to such a degree of Divinity not only by
ingenuously in Joan. 1.1 they only meant that the Word was not created in the beginning of all things when God created the Heavens and the Earth after the manner of other Creatures or that of the other generated Spirits because it had a Being then already the Father having begotten it before by an immediate Generation For this Reason the Author of the Recognitions lib. 3. cap. 11. denies formally that the Holy Spirit may be called Son because there is saith he but one ungenerated and but one generated it cannot be said that the Holy Spirit is a Son having been made by another who was likewise made Eusebius delivers this Doctrine as a * Such is the Argument of that Chapter Tradition of the Church De Eccles Theol. lib. 3. cap. 6. The Spirit the Paraclet saith he is neither God nor Son because he took not his Origin from the Father after the same manner as the Son did being of the Number of those things that were made by the Son for whom all things were made All things saith the Evangelist consequently then the Holy Spirit also Origen's Doctrine is the source of all this who maintains in his 1 Tom. upon St. John that the Holy Spirit is a Creature of the Son relying with Eusebius upon this Expression that all 〈◊〉 not excepting the Holy Spirit were made by the Son This Theology of the Antients â—â—â—hing the immediate Generation of the Word at the time of the World's Creation was follow'd by many other Doctors even after the Council of Nice Marius Victorinus is of this Number who would have it in his first Book that the Generation of the Word is only an Effusion and Manifestation of that Power which created the World and which was hid in God before You may join Zeno of Verona with him de aeterna Filii Generatione Serm. 3. who moreover explains this Generation by referring it to the Creation of the World For as he saith it was then that the Word which was as it were buried in the Abyss of the Divine Understanding in profundo sacrae Mentis Serm. 1. was thrust forth and begotten Would Valentine have expressed himself otherwise about his Word which came forth out of the Understanding than this Man doth of his come out of the Deep and Silence But we ought not to forget Rupert who unfolds admirably this Philosophic Cabala saying That the Father actually begot the Word which contain'd potentially all things when he created the Heavens and the Earth Yes he goes on the Father thrust forth this good Word out of his Heart and before the Morning-Star begot him out of his Bosom viz. out of the Bottom of his Substance when he said Let there be Light Nothing can be more like to Origen's Expression That the Generation of the Light is the Generation of the Son Mr. Huel excuseth Origen alledging that he spoke allegorically we do not doubt it all this Theology is Allegorick The Word or Command which God utter'd to the Creature is the Son of God but improperly so and in the same sense that my Thought or my Speech are the Sons of my Understanding which both conceives and brings them forth This is too evident and for this Cause Dr. Ball had reason to retrench out of his Quotation Desen Fidei Nic. p. 395. these last Words of Rupert's Passage That the Father beget the Son when he â—â—id Let there be Light But Lactartius goes beyond all these Doctors I quoted for he allows not to the Word so much as the Advantage of an immediate Generation above the other generated Spirits He finds no difference between them but only in the different manner of their Prolation and in the different Design God had in the begetting of them The Holy Scriptures teach us saith he Lib. 4. c. 8. that the Son of God is the Word of God even as also the other Angels are the Spirits of God For the Word is a Spirit which was brought forth with a significative Voice But because the Spirit Breath and Speech are thrust forth by different Organs the Spirit proceeding out of the Nostrils and the Speech out of the Mouth consequently there is a great difference between this Son of God and the other Angels caeteros Angelos these being come forth out of God as silent and mute Spirits because they were not created to preach the Doctrine of God but only for the executing of his Orders But the Son notwithstanding he is a Spirit yet he came forth of the Mouth of God with a Sound and a Voice like unto Speech because God was to make use of his Voice to instruct the People c. You see manifestly how he confounds the Angel who is called the Word with the other Angels that he makes them all to proceed out of God equally by an immediate Prolation and that the only difference he makes here consists in this that the common Angels proceeded out of the Nostrils of God as mute Spirits design'd only to execute his Orders by Deeds whereas this chief Angel whom he calls the Son doth proceed out of the Mouth of God as a vocal and sounding Speech design'd to deliver his Oracles and to reveal his Will Lastly Origen or some body else under his Name goes beyond even Lactantius himself in that he confounds the Generation of the Word with that of common Creatures Homil. 2. in diversos For tho on the one hand he seems to say That the Word was born before all things and that all things were made by him yet he advanceth at the same time that these Words all things were made by him signify only that at his being born of the Father all things were likewise born together with him the Generation of the Word-God being the same with the Creation of all things And tho he saith That the Son is of a different Substance from the Creature that he hath the same Nature with the Father and that he had a beginning before Time was He seems to destroy all this by adding That the Substance of the Father is the Cause of the Son's Substance and that Jesus Christ intended so much when he said that his Father was greater than he which asserts evidently that the Substance of the Father is greater than that of the Son As also when he goes on To exist before Time is to exist not in Time but with Time His Conclusion will tell us his Meaning We ought then saith he to believe three things the Father bringing forth the Son begotten and the things that were made by the Word the Father speaks the Word is begotten and all things are made Conformably to what he was saying viz. that the Father bringeth forth the Word that is to say begetting his Wisdom all things were then made It is not difficult to sound the Depth of this Philosophy The Word is of the same Substance with the Father because it is the proper Power of the Father but it is less than
have innovated He must know little of Plato who can believe that he could fall into so dull a Philosophy as that God did from all Eternity necessarily beget a Son a second God putting him forth out of himself with his proper Hypostasis which distinguisheth him from the Father and that he made use of him to create the World unless 't were perhaps to deceive the vulgar People But that God did voluntarily conceive a Design of creating the World that he did actually create it by his efficacious Word that that Word is his Son in an allegorical Sense because it was emanated from the Divine Understanding that it was in an allegorical sense the Creator because it was the Means and Instrument which the Wisdom of God made use of to give Life and Being to all things Then indeed I own literally Moses saying that God spake and the Creature obey'd then I shall own Plato's Allegory telling me the same thing with Moses but in the Stile of the Religion wherein he was born Then to conclude I own the good Divinity of Clemens Alexandrinus who assures me that the Word of the Father is not that which was begotten but supreme Goodness profound Wisdom and infinite Power manifesting it self in the Work of this Universe This is without doubt the true way of understanding Plato and we have a famous Platonist as our Warrant for it 't is Coelius Rhodoginus Lect. Antiq lib. 9. c. 12. For that Great Man very judiciously observes that one can never be a good Platonist if he do not reckon that Plato is to be understood allegorically Good Platonists like the Author of the Recognitions discover to us the Origin of this allegorical Philosophy by saying That from the first Will proceeded another Will and from this the World Lib. 1. c. 24. That is to say that from the first eternal and internally begotten Will proceeded at the beginning of all things a second Will externally begotten an express Command which spoken all things were made And this second Will is metaphorically the Son because proceeding from God himself and from the Invisibility which is proper to his Nature it is a kind of Generation producing his Image every Manifestation being the Image of God Irenaeus is also another of the good Platonists who allegoriz'd In many places of his Treatise against Heresies he supposes God not to have needed any more than his two Hands to create the World There 's no difficulty in perceiving his intention thro those Words Whereas the Hereticks maintain'd that all was made by Angels and that those Spirits had created the World Irenaeus in opposing that Doctrine flies into the opposite extreme viz. That God who had no need of Angels made use of no more than his two Hands his Word and his Spirit to do all things not that by those two Powers he understood two Hypostases but only personaliz'd them in opposition to the Aeons or to the Gnosticks Angels which were esteemed Persons And he meant nothing more than that God needed not any other than himself as he explains himself in the 19th Chapter of his first Book and in no wise any Power separate from him having an Hypostasis distinct from his This God says he is the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ What do these words signify That God needed no other than himself if not that God had no need of any more than his Command and Power to operate what he will'd Now this Command and this Power are not two Hypostases separate and distinct from his which was the Opinion of those Hereticks but two Powers which he imploy'd as his two Hands Either let 's blind our selves or see Allegory in all this Again it 's by a common Figure that the Name the Qualities and even the Personality of the thing which ceaseth to be or which is rejected is given to that which takes its place tho it be of a different nature God rejecting Sacrifices gives the name of Sacrifice to the Obedience which he accepts There is nothing more natural says Dr. A. in his Manuscript concerning the Satisfaction than to give to a thing which supplies the place of another and which procures all the fruits of it the Name of that instead whereof it is substituted St. Paul observ'd this Rule in his Epistle to the Hebrews If he gave the Name of Sacrifice to the Obedience of Jesus Christ it was to sute his Expressions to the Ideas which prevail'd under the antient Dispensation wherein the principal Acts of Piety consisted in Sacrifices he applied those antient Sacrifices to the Death of Jesus Christ without intending any other Mystery in it Whereto may be added that Jesus Christ speaking of the Holy Ghost who was to teach the Truth by his Inspirations as he himself had taught it by Preaching speaks of him as of a Teacher as of a Person because he was to supply the absence of a Teacher and fill the place of a Person So as the Gnosticks spake of nothing but Angels who had created the World and govern'd the antient People and of Emanations and Generations from the Supreme Being Irenaeus answers The true Angels which created the World and taught the Prophets are the Word of God and his Spirit and that Word and Spirit are his true Emanations So making of a Manifestation and of a Communication God's Helpers his Coadjutors in the Creation his Ministers in the Government of the World making I say so many Hypostases of the Godhead of those Powers because he substitutes them in lieu of the Hypostases rejected by him It is by the fame method that Theophilus of Antioch made intirely allegorical Commentarys on the four Gospels Thus he allegorizes the first words of St. John The Beginning says he that is God The Word that is the Son of God Jesus Christ of whom the Voice of the Father saith in the Psalm My Heart hath uttered a good Word that is to say Christ by whom all things were made And without him nothing was made Nothing that is to say an Idol which as the Apostle saith is nothing in the World It is apparent by the Method of this Author who designs the explaining the Gospels allegorically and particularly by the allegorical Explanation he gives of the word Beginning and of that of Nothing that what he says of the Word is likewise allegorical The Word says he is the Son of God that is to say the Christ by whom all things were made Is not that saying that it is the Christ the Man whom God hath anointed who is the Son and the Word by whose Power all under the Gospel was made even the Idol which was made without him having been destroy'd and the World reform'd Let us deal plainly Christ is the Word only by virtue of an allegorical Sense which considers him as a second Word in as much as he is with respect to the spiritual World what the Word-God was with respect to the sensible World It
Holy Ghost In the next place let 's attend to Irenaeus who takes the Terms mere Man in the same sense as Justin They says he lib. 3. c. 23. who call him i. e. Christ a mere Man begotten by Joseph continue in the Bondage of the antient Disobedience They then according to Irenaeus held J. C. to be a mere Man who believed he was begotten by Joseph and consequently not begotten by the Holy Ghost of a Virgin To make good this Charge against those Persons it was not it seems necessary they should have denied a Platonic Generation But the Passage is so clear it needs no gloss I proceed to another Father and that is Euseb in his 3. B. c. 27. where he speaks thus of the Ebionites They believe J. C. to be a mere Man an ordinary Person begotten by Joseph and Mary but otherwise a just Man and extraordinary for his Vertue You see how Eusebius when Platonism did not run in his Head acquaints us that they were none other than Ebionites who held J. C. was begotten by Joseph and Mary upon which account it may be truly said that they made him a mere ordinary Man This scap'd Eusebius without doubt by his following the Mode of speaking according to antient Tradition which opposed in the Hereticks of that time not those Christians who denied an eternal Generation of the Substance of God for where was that Notion then but the Ebionites who contested the miraculous Generation of the Substance of a Virgin It remains that I examine two Passages of Epiphanius The 1st is in his account of the 29th Heresy which is that of the Nazarenes whom he ranks among the Hereticks altho Irenaeus who must have known them better has made no mention of this pretended Heresy I do not affirm says Epiphanius of those Nazarenes whether following the Impiety of Cerinthus they received J. C. to be but a mere Man or whether they acknowledged which is the Truth that he was begotten by the Power of the Holy Ghost on the Virgin Mary The two things oppos'd in this Passage make it evident to our present Trinitarians that it is not believing J. C. to be a mere Man when with Socinus 't is own'd that he was begotten by the Holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary The second Passage of Epiphanius is in his 54th Heresy which is that called the Theodotians who he tells you held J. C. to be a mere Man How so Why because they believed he was begotten by a Man This is clear one Proposition explains t'other to be a mere Man and to be begotten by a Man are Phrases equivalent And by the Rule of Contraries to be begotten by the Holy Ghost is to be more than a mere Man that is to be the Son of God The Angel tells us as much and without doubt these were the Words which were the Foundation of the Theology of the Antients For says the Angel The Power of the Highest shall overshaddow thee and that which shall be born of thee not that which was begotten from Eternity but that which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God The Angel alludes to the Spirit of God which overshadowed the Chaos as if he would say that the same Power of God which drew the World out of that unshapen Mass would likewise cause the Messias to be born of Matter as infertile as the Chaos it self even of the Womb of a Virgin and that because of this extraordinary Birth he should be called the Son of God See Maldonate in Loc. The Expressions of the Angel have that force in them that the Moderns themselves when they are free from Prejudice and their Minds are not engaged in the Controversy have made them their Rule according to which they express themselves as to the Filiation of J. C. often alledging his Conception of the Holy Ghost as the formal Reason that made him the Son of God in opposition to Son of Man Thus Bishop Vsber us'd them in explaining a Passage of Ignatius Dissertat in Ignat. cap. 12. where he says The Devil knew not whether the Mother of our Saviour who was married to a Man was a Virgin at the Birth of the Child nor whether the new-born Infant ought to be called the Son of God or the Son of Joseph This Learned Person explaining an Apostolic Doctrine speaks in an Apostolic Manner He opposes Son of Joseph to Son of God but to what Son of God To a Son begotten from all Eternity 'T is plain enough of what Son he is speaking 't is to a Son of God who was begotten by the Holy Ghost who was not the Son of any Man altho he was born of a Woman and who had none but God for his Father So Grotius upon Mark 1.1 having given the reason why St. Mark spoke nothing of the miraculous Birth of J. C. he adds That 't was not necessary to speak of it till there were such who held that J. C. was no more than a mere Man From which Words of this great Critic it follows that to hold J. C. to be a mere Man is not to deny him to be the supreme God but to deny that he was born of a Virgin Dr. Bull in his Judicium Eccles p. 43. objects against this antient Faith that no Writer has spoken of it as of a Tradition different from the Platonic Faith which is pretended to have prevailed afterwards That on the contrary Eusebius gives this Testimony of the Bishops of Jerusalem that they had a right Knowledg of J. C. and that their Doctrine was sound on this Article But that which I am now going to say concerning this antient Faith and that which shall be said hereafter makes it evident enough that 't is to little purpose for the Doctor to boast that Antiquity is altogether silent in this matter As for his Proof from Eusebius 't is too uncertain and general to be us'd as an Argument in our Question Eusebius says in general that the Antients were sound in their Opinion or had a right Knowledg of J. C. Who doubts it Since in believing him to be born of a Virgin by the Operation of the Holy Ghost and not by her Conversation with Joseph they professed the sound Doctrine of that time and they rejected the Error oppos'd to it which made J. C. but a mere Man But Eusebius 't will be said could not speak so but with regard to his own Opinion which was that of the Pre-existence But I shall reply whence had Eusebius his Information that the Doctrine of the Antients was sound Was it not from Hegesippus or as he himself says from Monuments of the Antients which is the same thing But if this antient Author Hegesippus did not believe the Platonic Pre-existence as Eusebius did will it not follow that the Doctrine of these Bishops was sound not with respect to the sense of Eusebius but with regard to the antient Author who gives them that
and his Spirit And further to make it clearer that this Father always confounds the Holy Ghost with the Word I must observe that in the last Passage I am about to cite he applies to the Holy Ghost the same Words of Solomon which are ordinarily applied to the Son The Word says he who is the Son was always with the Father and because the Wisdom which is the Holy Ghost was also with God before the Creation it speaks thus by Solomon God hath founded the Earth by his Wisdom c. and again The Lord created me c. There is therefore but One God who hath made all things by his Wisdom and by his Word CHAP. XI A Continuation of the same Proofs that the Antients understood by the Word and the Holy Ghost one and the same thing BUT after all you will say Irenaeus makes an express distinction between the Word and the Spirit I answer Yes But David makes the same distinction too and from him I believe the Fathers borrowed theirs The Heavens says he were formed by the Word of the Lord and by the Breath of his Mouth By the way who will be so weak as to affirm that he did not mean by these two words the same Power of God as if the Word was not the Breath of his Mouth and the Breath of his Mouth the Word Can one forbear smiling when one sees our Divines put David in the number of the Trinitarians In fine Irenaeus extols the Generation of the son of God by the Operation of the Holy Ghost as infinitely more excellent than the Generation of the first Man which was by breathing Life into him or by the Divine Breath Irenaeus affirms it but Dr. Bull denies it maintaining that Jesus Christ was not the Son of God by virtue of his miraculous Conception in a manner more excellent than Adam was by virtue of his immediate Generation or Formation by God's own hand Let us suppose it as the Doctor would have it yet after all he must agree that this Holy Father carries the Parallel that he makes between the first and second Adam no further than their Generation which was equally extraordinary in both This appears in the 31st Chapter of his 3d Book If the first Adam says he had his Being from a Man it might be said with some shew of reason that 't is the same as to the second Adam and that Joseph was his Father But if it be true on the contrary that the first was form'd out of the Earth by the Word of God must not the same Word acting with the same Power as he did at the Formation of Adam carry a resemblance of the same Generation Let this Comparison be a little minded it contains this clearly that God did no more in the Generation of the second Adam in whom he would dwell than in that of the first Adam that Adam and Jesus Christ are the immediate Production of this Word Consequently there 's no more reason to infer the hypostatick Union of the Word with Jesus Christ than with Adam this Word being as you see nothing but the Power of God which having immediately formed the first Man did also form Jesus Christ after the same primitive manner of Generation All the difference is that God was pleas'd to dwell in the latter after an extraordinary manner Let 's see in the next place what Tertullian has to say He was a great Platonist but that Party does not always strictly observe the Rules of Platonism They have their lucid Intervals wherein some Remains of the antient Tradition drop from their Pens Whenever they philosophize according to the humour of that Faction they are to be suspected 't is the effect of their Prejudices but when they happen to speak to the disadvantage of their own Hypotheses what is it that could oblige them to it but the Power of Truth alone Tertullian therefore at the end of his Discourse against Praxeas sisting this matter of the Nature of the Word and the Holy Ghost to the bottom speaks of 'em as one and the same Power 'T is worth while to read the whole throughout but I shall content my self with this following Passage which is decisive and beyond dispute Contra Prax. cap. 26. The Spirit of God i. e. Holy Ghosi shall come upon thee c. By saying the Spirit of God altho the Spirit of God be God nevertheless he not calling it directly God he would have us understand a Part of the Whole which was to attend the Person of the Son and get him the Name that he has This is that Spirit of God which we call the Word also For as when St. John says the Word was made Flesh by the term Word we understand the Spirit so in this Passage we understand the Word under the Name of the Spirit since the Spirit is the Substance of the Word and the Word the Operation of the Spirit and these two are but one For if the Spirit be not the Word and the Word be not the Spirit 't will follow that he of whom St. John says that he was made Flesh will not be the same with him of whom the Angel says that he shall be made Flesh Let us weigh well all these Words By the Spirit Tertullian understands nothing but a Portion of the whole a Beam of the Substance of God as he expresses himself elsewhere because otherwise it would follow according to Praxeas that the Father himself was incarnate He will have it that this Portion makes the Son what he is that is the Son of God He confounds the Spirit with the Word and will have St. Luke and St. John speak the same Language and that the first might have said the Word shall come upon thee and the latter the Holy Ghost was made Flesh since that by the term Holy Ghost the Word must be understood and by the term Word the Holy Ghost and that 't is not likely St. John would speak of one particular Spirit and the Angel of another And more than this he acquaints us what use we ought to make of these two Words which at the bottom signify but the same thing and that is we ought to call this Power Spirit when we would express its Substance and Word when we would express its Operation In short he decides our Question by saying that these two are but one and the same thing that is to say the same Power For the Word says he in his Rule of Faith de Praescript descended from the Spirit and the Power of God into the Womb of the Virgin What does this import viz. the Word descended from the Spirit and the Power of God if not this that the Word is nothing else but an Emanation a Manifestation of the Power which is internal and essential to God And 't is almost in the same sense that Marius Victorin contra Arium lib. 1. states a twofold Power of the Word that is to say a
twofold Operation the one manifest which is Jesus Christ in the Flesh the other secret or hidden which is the Holy Spirit the one by way of Manifestation the other by way of Communication But after all 't is but a twofold Operation of one and the same Power I forbear to take notice of divers other Testimonies of Tertullian of the like kind as for instance at the beginning of his Book concerning Prayer in his Dispute against Marcion lib. 3. cap. 6 16. and in his Discourse of the Flesh of Jesus Christ cap. 19. the Reader may consult 'em if he pleases To the foremention'd Authoritys from Tertullian I will subjoin that of Novatian de Trinitate cap. 19. That which chiefly constituted the Son of God says he was the Incarnation of the Word of God which was formed by means of that Spirit of whom the Angel said the Holy Ghost shall come upon thee c. For this is the true Son of God who is of God who uniting himself to the Son of Man makes him by that Union the Son of God which he was not before So that the main reason of this Title the Son of God arises from that Spirit of the Lord which descended How the Word of God incarnate by means of that Spirit which descended on Mary Is the second Person incarnate by means of the third Very good Divinity Is it not rather this Divine Operation that bears the Name of the Word which manifested it self in the Flesh of Jesus Christ by means of the Holy Spirit which insinuated it self into that Flesh That is to say that which is called the Spirit on account of its Substance is at the same time called the Word on account of its Manifestation and its Operation For this reason Novatian places not the chief ground of the Filiation of Jesus Christ in a Word which was a different Hypostasis from the Spirit but in the Word which is the Operation of that Spirit of whom the Scripture speaks saying the Holy Ghost shall come upon thee c. And it would not be understood what the Fathers mean when they confound the Word with the Spirit that over-shadowed the Virgin or when they distinguish these two Powers if it be not laid down for a Rule that by the Spirit they understand the very Nature of the Spirit the Principle or Source whence Prophecy comes and by the Word a certain and particular Operation of that Spirit as for instance the miraculous Conception of our Saviour I have yet an antient Doctor to alledg and he not of the meanest Rank I mean St. Cyprian who does not make any distinction between the Word the Spirit the Son of God the Wisdom c. This Father having cited the second Psalm de Mont. Sina Zion adv Jud. cap. 2. where he speaks of the King whom God had anointed on Mount Sion 'T is upon this Mountain says he that the Holy Spirit the Son of God was establish'd King to proclaim the Will and the Empire of God his Father and in the fourth Chapter of the same Discourse the Flesh of Adam says he which J. C. bore in a Figure that Term has a Tang of Marcion's Heresy this Flesh was call'd by his Father the Holy Spirit which came down from Heaven the Christ the anointed of the Living God a Spirit united to Flesh The same Father elsewhere in his Discourse de Idolor vanit cap. 6. expresses himself thus The Word and the Son of God is sent whom the Prophets had forespoken of as the Instructor of Mankind He is the Power of God his Reason his Wisdom and his Glory the Holy Spirit hath put on Flesh God is mingled or united with Man The Holy Spirit is the Son of God and at the same time the Word is the Son of God and which is more the Flesh of J.C. is called the Holy Spirit which came down from Heaven which could not be true but of its Celestial Origin and as it was formed by the Holy Spirit So that Cyprian seems to intimate thereby that 't is because of this Celestial Origin that the Scriptures say the Flesh of J. C. came down from Heaven that the Son of Man came down from Heaven for it may be very well said that J.C. came down from Heaven since his Origin was from Heaven in his Birth by the Holy Ghost And what is the Holy Spirit but the Word according to this Father The Word is the Holy Spirit which united it self to Man the Word is the Holy Spirit which put on Flesh In short 't is the Holy Spirit which is the Christ of God You 'll say what hinders but the second Person in the Trinity may have also the Name of the third That 's pure Fancy Why should one shut ones eyes when one sees as clear as the day that St. Cyprian alludes to the miraculous Conception of our Saviour and that these sublime Expressions of that Father have no other Foundation but that Mystery As for what Lactantius affords us I hope his Authority will not be contested with me in the decision of a Point wherein he does no more than confirm a Tradition elsewhere well supported and followed This pious Person having said in his Institutions lib. 4. c. 6. That God begat a Holy Spirit which he call'd his Son he resumes this Discourse in the 12th chap. of the same Book thus This Spirit of God says he coming down from Heaven made choice of a pure and holy Virgin into whose Womb he insinuated himself and this Virgin conceived being full of the Holy Spirit which embrac'd her That which Lactantius expresses by these Words descended on a Virgin can it be any other than that which St. Luke expresses in these The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee But the Holy Ghost of whom the Angel speaks is the same according to Lactantius with that Holy Ghost which God begat and which he called his Son Dr. Bull tells us the Fathers understood by the Holy Ghost the Divine Nature of J. C. Very well but why so If not for this Cause that J. C. had no other Divinity than that Spirit of Power and Holiness which form'd his Body in the Womb of a Virgin For in short the Fathers speak after this manner when they explain these words The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee c. or allude to them and always with regard to his Birth of a Virgin But the Holy Spirit in this Passage Luke 1. 35. signifies most certainly that Power which we Trinitarians call the third Person And if the Fathers had a mind to find the second there as is said there 's no knowing what the Words signify for it must be affirmed that they have strangely mistaken the Scriptures and in so unaccountable manner as I may say that there is no longer any certainty to be met with in their Writinâ—â—â—â—ll's in Confusion as in the antient Chaos There 's nothing whereby to discover the Names of the
Divine Persons nor by consequence the Persons themselves Be it as it will the Doctor will find it hard enough to apply his Solution to all the Arguments I am about to mention And if he can do it 't will be no more difficult for him to find the Divinity of J. C. in all the Passages of the Gospel where mention is made of the Holy Ghost I hope also that at last he 'l say that when J. C. promis'd his Holy Spirit to his Apostles he promis'd them his Divine Nature But I must beg my Reader 's Patience a little longer to see what Answer the Doctor will make against the last Authority I am going to alledg And that 's a Letter of the Council of Sardis in the second Book of Theodoret's Hist Eccles The Fathers there drew a Creed in three very distinct Articles the first concerning the Father the second the Son and third Article the Holy Ghost In the last which is so expresly distinguished from that of the Son they speak thus of the Incarnation by the Holy Ghost We believe also there is a Holy Spirit or Paraclet which the Lord promis'd and sent He did not suffer but the Man whom he assumed or took from the Virgin Mary he suffer'd because he was capable of it whereas God is immortal 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Is passus non est Where one sees the Pronoun 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 agrees with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is a Neuter Now of this Spirit the Fathers say he cannot suffer but 't was Man whom he put on and took from the Virgin that did suffer This they speak I say of the Paraclet whom they confess after the Father and the Son and not of the Divine Nature of J. C. A Passage express and formal which clearly proves these Doctors understood nothing else by the Holy Ghost but that Power of God whereof the Word is the Manifestation and the Operation confounding the Spirit with the Word and very distinctly assuring us that the Paraclet was incarnate Is the Paraclet the Divine Nature of J. C. or the second Person of the Trinity Here we 'll wait the Doctor 's Answer Valesius not bearing with this Incongruity in the Council had the Boldness to corrupt this Passage in his Version by foisting in the word Christ for thus he has translated it He did not suffer but the Man whom Christ put on The Word Christ is not in the Text which intirely relates to the Holy Ghost or Paraclet In short that Word ruines the whole sense of the Period and strangely confounds all this third Article which belongs only to the Holy Ghost and is distinct from that concerning J. C. Both Translators and Copists are guilty of Falsification in this particular Give me leave to affirm one thing and that is that the Antients have often distinguished the Holy Spirit from the Power of the Highest whereof he is speaking in the same Text calling the latter the Word of God the Son of God and saying only of the former that he overshadowed the Virgin Now even this shews that by the Word they understood nothing but the Power and the Operation of the Holy Spirit which is the same thing with the Power and Operation of the Highest The Holy Spirit signifying the Substance and the Power of the Highest signifying the Operation it follows that the Word which is the Power of the Highest according to the Fathers is not otherwise distinguished from the Holy Spirit than as the Operation is distinguished from its Subject We may conclude therefore from Proofs so very evident that the Antients who have deified J. C. had no other ground for their Theology but the Birth of J. C. of a Virgin by the Holy Ghost that by the Word and the Son of God they always understood this miraculous Operation and that they never advanced any higher in their Discourses towards that which is called an eternal Generation CHAP. XII An Account of the Foundation of the Allegorical Theology of the Fathers concerning the Word and the Holy Spirit I Dare assure my Reader that I can shew him the very Foundation of this Allegorical Theology 'T is known that the Fathers imitated the Gnosticks in many things and particularly in the way of Allegory and Contemplation But 't was Mark the Valentinian as we are inform'd by Irenaeus lib. 1. cap. 12. who was the Author of the Allegorical Exposition on the Birth of J. C. that is the first who elevated it to a sense of Contemplation and Mystery He makes a Quaternity of the Man and the Church which are the first Pair and of the Word and Life which are the second Pair But what sort of Theology does he couch under this Enigma or Allegory Why nothing less than the wonderful Conception of J. C. The Man says he is the Power of the Highest because that acted instead of the Man The Church is the Holy Virgin because she held the place of the Church The Angel Gabriel was instead of the Word and the Holy Spirit instead of Life Nothing can better convince us of the Allegory us'd by the Valentinians than this Passage in which the Angel is the Word and the Spirit is the Life the Power of the Highest is instead of the Man and the Virgin is instead of the Church I might also have produc'd this Passage for a Proof when I was arguing this Point but I have reserv'd it on purpose for this place to shew that the whole Mystery of the Word reduces it self to the miraculous Conception of our Saviour upon which both the Hereticks and the Orthodox have equally allegorized each taking his Flight as his Contemplation led him on And this is that famous Theology so much extolled by the Fathers I know most of them being entangled with their Platonism have mightily embroiled the first and antient Ideas of this matter But I know also that before they came to make two Hypostases of the Word and the Holy Spirit they were terribly perplexed about the latter and could not tell what to do Hence it was without doubt that they so long delayed the deifying of the Holy Ghost The Council of Nice has not at all touched upon its Divinity So far were they from it and the Holy Ghost made so small a Figure at that time that some Fathers of the Council made no difficulty to give its place to the Blessed Virgin by making her the third Person in the Trinity Of which we are informed by Elmacinus and Patricides in Hotting Orient Hist lib. 2. p. 227. The Council of Constantinople durst not speak openly upon the point And in S. Basil's time there was a little Shiness in calling the Holy Ghost directly and formally God 'T is worth our regard what Petavius de Trinit lib. 2. c. 7. § 2. says hereupon The Catholic Church says he accommodating it self for prudential Reasons to human Frailty came not to the full Profession of some