gathered directly from the Soripture is in substance this that the God who is always one and the same was the Person represented by Moses the Person represented by his Son incarnate and the Person represented by the Apostles As represented by the Apostles the holy Spirit by which they spake is God As represented by his Son that was God and Man the Son is that God As represented by Moses and the High Priests the Father that is to say the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ is that God From whence we may gather the reason why those Names Father Son and Holy Ghost in the signification of the Godhead are never used in the Old Testament For they are Persons that is they have their Names from representing which could not be till divers Persons had represented God in ruling or in directing under him Who is so bold as blind Bayard The Emblem of a little Boy attempting to lade all the Water out of the Sea with a Cockle-shell doth sit T. H. as exactly as if it had been shaped for him who thinketh to measure the profound and inscrutable Mysteries of Religion by his own silly shallow conceits What is now become of the great adorable Mystery of the blessed undivided Trinity It is shrunk into nothing Upon his grounds there was a time when there was no Trinity And we must blot these words out of our Creed The Father eternal the Son eternal and the Holy Ghost eternal And these other words out of our Bibles Let us make man after our Image Unless we mean that this was a consultation of God with Moses and the Apostles What is now become of the eternal generation of the Son of God if this Sonship did not begin until about 4000 years after the Creation were expired Upon these grounds every King hath as many Persons as there be Justices of Peace and petty Constables in his Kingdom Upon this account God Almighty hath as many Persons as there have been Soveraign Princes in the World since Adam According to this reckoning each one of us like so many Geryons may have as many Persons as we please to make Procurations Such bold presumption requireth another manner of confutation T. H. As for the words recited I confess there is a fault in the Ratiocination which nevertheless his Lordship hath not discovered but no Impiety All that he objecteth is That it followeth hereupon that there be as many Persons of a King as there be petty Constables in his Kingdom And so there are or else he cannot be obeyed But I never said that a King and every one of his Persons are the same Substance The fault I here made and saw not was this I was to prove That it is no contradiction as Lucian and Heathen Scoffers would have it to say of God he was One and Three I saw the true definition of the word Person would serve my turn in this manner God in his own Person both created the World and instituted a Church in Israel using therein the Ministry of Moses the same God in the Person of his Son God and Man redeemed the same World and the same Church the same God in the Person of the Holy Ghost sanctified the same Church and all the faithful men in the World Is not this a clear proof that it is no contradiction to say that God is three Persons and one Substance And doth not the Church distinguish the Persons in the same manner See the words of our Catechism Quest What dost thou chiefly learn in these Articles of the Belief Answ First I learn to believe in God the Father that hath made me and all the World Secondly In God the Son who hath redeemed me and all Mankind Thirdly In God the Holy Ghost that hath sanctified me and all the elect people of God But at what time was the Church sanctified Was it not on the day of Pentecost in the descending of the Holy Ghost upon the apostles His Lordship all this while hath catched nothing 'T is I that catched my self for saying instead of By the Ministry of Moses in the Person of Moses But this Error I no sooner saw then I no less publickly corrected then I had committed it in my Leviathan converted into Latin which by this time I think is printed beyond the Seas with this alteration and also with the omission of some such passages as Strangers are not concerned in And I had corrected this Error sooner if I had sooner found it For though I was told by Dr. Cosins now Bishop of Duresme that the place above-cited was not applicable enough to the Doctrine of the Trinity yet I could not in reviewing the same espy the defect till of late when being sollicited from beyond Sea to translate the Book into Latin and fearing some other man might do it not to my liking I examined this passage and others of the like sence more narrowly But how concludes his Lordship out of this that I put out of the Creed these words The Father eternal the Son eternal the Holy Ghost eternal Or these words Let us make man after our Image out of the Bible Which last words neither I nor Bellarmine put out of the Bible but we both put them out of the number of good Arguments to prove the Trinity for it is no unusual thing in the Hebrew as may be seen by Bellarmine's quotations to joyn a Noun of the plural Number with a Verb of the singular And we may say also of many other Texts of Scripture alledged to prove the Trinity that they are not so firm as that high Article requireth But mark his Lordship's Scholastick charity in the last words of this period Such bold presumption requireth another manner of confutation This Bishop and others of his opinion had been in their Element if they had been Bishops in Queen Maries time J. D. Concerning God the Son forgetting what he had said elsewhere where he calleth him God and Man and the Son of God incarnate he doubteth not to say that the word Hypostatical is canting As if the same Person could be both God and Man without a Personal that is an Hypostatical Union of the two Natures of God and Man T. H. If Christian Profession be as certainly it is in England a Law and if it be of the nature of a Law to be made known to all men that are to obey it in such manner as they may have no excuse for disobedience from their ignorance then without doubt all words unknown to the people and as to them insignificant are Canting The word Substance is understood by the Vulgar well enough when it is said of a Body but in other sence not at all except for their Riches But the word Hypostatical is understood only by those and but few of those that are learned in the Greek Tongue and is properly used as I have said before of the Union of the two Natures of Christ in one Person So
Chap. 17. de Cive In the Body of the Chapter it is thus The time of Christ's being upon the Earth is called in Scripture the Regeneration often but the Kingdom never When the Son of God comes in Majesty and all the Angels with him then he shall sit on the seat of Majesty My Kingdom is not of this World God sent not his Son that he should judge the World I came not to judge the World but to save the World Man who made me a Judge or Divider amongst you Let thy Kingdom come And other words to the same purpose out of which it is clear that Christ took upon him no Regal Power upon Earth before his Assumption But at his Assumption his Apostles asked him if he would then restore the Kingdom to Israel and he answered it was not for them to know So that hitherto Christ had not taken that Office upon him unless his Lordship think that the Kingdom of God and the Kingdom of Christ be two distinct Kingdoms From the Assumption ever since all true Christians say daily in their Prayers Thy Kingdom come But his Lordship had perhaps forgot that But when then beginneth Christ to be a King I say it shall be then when he comes again in Majesty with all the Angels And even then he shall reign as he is Man under his Father For St. Paul saith 1 Cor. 15.25 26. He must reign till he hath put all Enemies under his feet the last Enemy that shall be destroyed is Death But when shall God the Father reign again St. Paul saith in the same Chapter verse 28. When all things shall be subdued unto him then shall the Son also himself be subject unto him that put all things under him that God may be all in all And verse 24. Then cometh the end when he shall have delivered up the Kingdom to God even the Father when he shall have put down all Rule Authority and Power This is at the Resurrection And by this it is manifest that his Lordship was not so well versed in Scripture as he ought to have been J. D. He taketh away his Priestly or Propitiatory Office And although this Act of our Redemption be not alwayes in Scripture called a Sacrifice and Oblation but sometimes a Price yet by Price we are not to understand any thing by the value whereof he could claim right to a Pardon for us from his Offended Father but that Price which God the Father was pleased in mercy to demand And again Not that the Death of one Man though without sin can satisfie for the Offences of all Men in the rigour of Justice but in the mercy of God that ordained such Sacrifices for sin as he was pleased in mercy to accept He knoweth no difference between one who is meer man and one who was both God and man between a Levitical Sacrifice and the All-sufficient Sacrifice of the Cross between the Blood of a Calf and the precious Blood of the Son of God T. H. Yes I know there is a difference between Blood and Blood but not any such as can make a difference in the Case here questioned Our Saviour's Blood was most precious but still it was Humane Blood and I hope his Lordship did never think otherwise or that it was not accepted by his Father for our Redemption J. D. And touching the Prophetical Office of Christ I do much doubt whether he do believe in earnest that there is any such thing as Prophecy in the World He maketh very little difference between a Prophet and a Mad-man and a Demoniack And if there were nothing else says he that bewrayed their madness yet that very arrogating such inspiration to themselves is Argument enough He maketh the pretence of Inspiration in any man to be and always to have been on opinion pernicious to Peace and tending to the dissolution of all Civil Government He subjecteth all Prophetical Revelations from God to the sole Pleasure and Censure of the Soveraign Prince either to Authorize them or to Exauctorate them So as two Prophets prophecying the same thing at the same time in the Dominions of two different Princes the one shall be a true Prophet the other a false And Christ who had the approbation of no Soveraign Prince upon his grounds was to be reputed a false Prophet every where Every man therefore ought to consider who is the Soveraign Prophet that is to say who it is that is Gods Vicegerent upon Earth and hath next under God the Authority of governing Christian Men and to observe for a Rule that Doctrine which in the Name of God he hath Commanded to be taught and thereby to examine and try out the truth of those Doctrines which pretended Prophets with miracle or without shall at any time advance c. And if he disavow them then no more to obey their Voice or if he approve them then to obey them as Men to whom God hath given a part of the Spirit of their Soveraign Upon his Principles the case holdeth as well among Jews and Turks and Heathens as Christians Then he that teacheth Transubstantiation in France is a true Prophet he that teacheth in it England a false Prophet He that blasphemeth Christ in Constantinople a true Prophet he that doth the same in Italy a false Prophet Then Samuel was a false Prophet to contest with Saul a Soveraign Prophet So was the Man of God who submitted not to the more Divine and Prophetick Spirit of Jeroboam And Elijah for reproving Ahab Then Michaiah had but his deserts to be clapt up in Prison and fed with Bread of Affliction and Water of Affliction for daring to contradict God's Vice-gerent upon Earth And Jeremiah was justly thrown into a Dungeon for Prophecying against Zedekiah his Liege Lord. If his Principles were true it were strange indeed that none of all these Princes nor any other that ever was in the World should understand their own Priviledges And yet more strange that God Almighty should take the part of such Rebellious Prophets and justifie their Prophesies by the Event if is were true that none but the Soveraign in a Christian the reason is the same for Jewish Commonwealth can take notice what is or what is not the Word of God T. H. To remove his Lordship's doubt in the first place I confess there was true Prophesie and true Prophets in the Church of God from Abraham down to our Saviour the greatest Prophet of all and the last of the Old Testament and first of the New After our Saviour's time till the death of St. John the Apostle there were true Prophets in the Church of Christ Prophets to whom God spake supernaturally and testified the truth of their Mission by Miracles Of those that in the Scripture are called Prophets without Miracles and for this cause only that they spake in the Name of God to Men and in the name of Men to God there are have been and shall be in the Church
them who by patient continuance in well doing seek for Honour Glory and Immortality Eternal Life But unto them that be contentious and do not obey the truth but obey unrighteousness indignation and wrath Here it is plain that God gives Eternal Life only to well doers and to them that seek not to them that have already Immortality Again 1 Tim. 1.10 Christ hath abolished Death and brought Life and Immortality to light through the Gospel Therefore before the Gospel of Christ nothing was Immortal but God And St. Paul speaking of the day of Judgment 1 Cor. 15.54 saith that This Mortal shall put on Immortality and that then Death is swallowed in Victory There was no Immortality of any thing Mortal till Death was overcome and that was at the Resurrection And John 8.52 Verily Verily if a man keep my sayings he shall never see Death that is to say he shall be Immortal but it is no where said that he which keeps not Christ's sayings shall never see Death nor be Immortal and yet they that say that the wicked Body and Soul shall be tormented everlastingly do therein say they are Immortal Mat. 10.28 Fear not them that can kill the Body but are not able to kill the Soul but fear him that is able to destroy both Soul and Body in Hell Man cannot kill a Soul for the Man kill'd shall revive again But God can destroy the Soul and Body in Hell as that it shall never return to life In the Old Testament we read Gen. 7.4 I will destroy every living Substance that I have made from off the face of the Earth therefore if the Souls of them that perished in the Flood were Substances they were also destroyed in the Flood and were not Immortal Math. 25.41 Depart from me ye cursed into everlasting Fire prepared for the Devil and his Angels These words are to be spoken in the day of Judgment which Judgment is to be in the Clouds And there shall stand the men that are reprobated alive where Souls according to his Lordships Doctrine were sent long before to Hell Therefore at that present day of Judgment they had one Soul by which they were there alive and another Soul in Hell How his Lordship could have maintained this I understand not But by my Doctrine that the Soul is not a separated Substance but that the Man at his Resurrection shall be revived by God and raised to Judgment and afterwards Body and Soul destroyed in Hell-fire which is the second death there is no such consequence or difficulty to be inferred Besides it avoids the unnecessary disputes about where the Soul of Lazarus was for four dayes he lay dead And the order of the Divine Process is made good of not inflicting torments before the Condemnation pronounced Now as to the harmony of the two Testaments it is said in the old Gen. 2.17 In the day that thou eatest of the Tree of Knowledge dying thou shalt dye Moriendo morieris that is when thou art dead thou shalt not revive for so hath Athanasius expounded it Therefore Adam and Eve were not Immortal by their Creation Then Gen. 3.22 Behold the man is become as one of us Now lest he put forth his hand and take also of the Tree of Life and eat and live for ever c. Here they had had an Immortality by the gift of God if they had not sinned It was therefore sin that lost them Eternal-life He therefore that redeemed them from sin was the Author of their Immortality and consequently began in the day of Judgment when Adam and Eve were again made alive by admission to the new Tree of Life which was Christ Now let us compare this with the New Testament Where we find these words 1 Cor. 15.21 since by Man came Death by Man came also the Resurrection of the dead Therefore all the Immortality of the Soul that shall be after the Resurrection is by Christ and not by the nature of the Soul verse 22. As by Adam all dye even so in Christ shall all be made alive Therefore since we dyed by Adam's sin so we shall live by Christ's Redemption of us that is after the Resurrection Again verse 23. But every man in his order Christ the first Fruits afterwards they that are Christs at his coming Therefore none shall be made alive till the coming of Christ Lastly as when God had said That day that thou eatest of the Tree of Knowledg of Good and Evil thou shalt dye though he condemned him then yet he suffered him to live a long time after so when Christ had said to the Thief on the Cross this day thou shalt be with me in Paradise yet he suffered him to lye dead till the General Resurrection for no man rose again from the dead before our Saviours coming and conquering death If God bestowed Immortality on every man then when he made him and he made many to whom he never purposed to give his saving Grace what did his Lordship think that God gave any man Immortality with purpose only to make him capable of Immortal Torments 'T is a hard saying and I think cannot piously be believed I am sure it can never be proved by the Canonical Scripture But though I have made it clear that it cannot be drawn by lawful consequence from Scripture that Man was Created with a Soul Immortal and that the Elect only by the Grace of God in Christ shall both Bodies and Souls from the Resurrection forward be Immortal yet there may be a Consequence well drawn from some words in the Rites of Burial that prove the contrary as these Forasmuch as it hath pleased Abmighty God of his great mercy to take unto himself the Soul of our dear Brother here departed c. And these Almighty God with whom do live the Spirits of them that depart hence in the Lord. Which are words Authorised by the Church I wonder his Lordship that had so often pronounced them took no notice of them here But it often happens that men think of those things least which they have most perfectly learnt by rote I am sorry I could not without deserting the sence of Scripture and mine own Conscience say the same But I see no just cause yet why the Church should be offended at it For the Church of England pretendeth not as doth the Church of Rome to be above the Scripture nor forbiddeth any man to Read the Scripture nor was I forbidden when I Wrote my Leviathan to Publish any thing which the Scriptures suggested For when I Wrote it I may safely say there was no lawful Church in England that could have maintained me in or prohibited me from Writing any thing There was no Bishop and though there were Preaching such as it was yet no Common-Prayer For Extemporary Prayer though made in the Pulpit is not Common-Prayer There was then no Church in England that any man living was bound to obey What I Write here at this