therefore though there are three distinct Persons or Minds each of whom is distinctly and by himself 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 God yet there are not Three Gods but One God or One Divinity And if they will not allow that the same One Divinity or Godhead may be entirely and indivisible and inseparably in Three distinct Persons or Minds there is an End of a Trinity in Unity of Three Persons and One God For if the whole Divine Nature cannot subsist intirely indivisibly and inseparably and yet distinctly in Three either there cannot be Three each of whom is distinctly and by himself God or there cannot be one God whereas the scripture Notion of the Unity of God is not such an Unity as is only is one Person for then it could not enjoyn the Faith and Worship of Father Son and Holy Ghost but such an Unity as can be between Three when the same One Divine Nature is wholly and intirely communicated by the eternal Father to the eternal Son and by Father and Son to the eternal Spirit without any Division or Separation and that which is communicated whole and intire without Division or Separation makes no Number for it is but One still A Mind and Mind and Mind must be three Minds or Persons by reason of their distinct subsistence which belong to them as three but God and God and God as some of the antient Father speak are not Three Gods but One God because the same One Divinity totus ex toto 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as both the Latin and Greek Fathers speak concerning the Generation of the Son is whole intire indivisible inseparable in all Three and Three distinct whole inseparable sames how hard soever it may be to conceive as to the Manner of it is the most natural and intelligible Notion of three and one and this is the Catholick Notion of a Trinity in Unity I forbear prosecuting this any farther here because I shall do it at large elsewhere 4. The next Charge is that it is Disagreeing and contrary to the Doctrine of the Catholick Church I am truly sorry for this because it must unavoidably reflect on their Skill in Antiquity and the Doctrine of the Catholick Church but if the Animadverter has imposed upon them in this too they must thank themselves and take what follows I shall not multiply Testimonies in this Cause at present because I have a Treatise by me which is near finished upon this very Subject to give an Account of the Judgment of Catholick Fathers and Councils concerning a real and substantial Trinity and what their Notion of Thritheism is The Matter appeared to me so plain and demonstrable that I began to be weary of it as an unnecessary Work but this Decree has convinc'd me of the contrary and I now thank God that I am so well prepared to justifie the true antient Catholick Faith against the Pretences of those who judge of the Doctrine of the Catholick Church by Inspiration or Prophesie without knowing what the Catholick Fathers have said about it As Confident as these Heads are of the Doctrine of the Catholick Church those even of their Mind who have looked into the Fathers are not willing to stand to their Judgment in this Cause Some of the Ante-Nicene Fathers they give up to the Arians and they know not what to think of the Nicene Fathers themselves they spoke incautiously and bordered very near upon Tritheism nay some of them they think were down right Tritheists and they are in the right for they were all so to a man in this modern notion of Tritheism that I was glad to find they would own the Doctrine of the Catholick Church and put the Cause upon that issue The present Dispute is about Three distinct infinite Minds and Substances in the Trinity whether this be the Catholick Doctrine or Catholick Language now I suppose if it appear that they owned Three distinct Substances both Name and Thing there will be no Dispute about three Minds for the Substance of the Deity can be no other than infinite Mind Now this is a Wonderfull Dispute when the School-Men themselves own the Three Divine Persons to be Three Substances though they say they are not meer Relations without a Subject but relative Substances and we say so too That their Substances as their Persons subsist in an inseparable Union and Relation to each other But relative Substances Substances which are not absolute and independent but essentially related to each other as Father Son and Holy Ghost are Substances still and three distinct Substances as they are distinct Persons But this is not our present Inquiry what the Doctrine of the Schools is but what was the Doctrine of the Primitive Fathers Now it is evident beyond all possibility of Denial that the Catholick Fathers one and all did assert Three substantial Persons in the Trinity against the Heresie of Sabellius who owned but one substantial Person with Three Names according to his different Appearances now besides that it is impossible to make sense of Three substantial Persons without three personal Substances for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 must signifie Three Substances had not these Fathers understood it in the Sense and Notion of three Substances they had not opposed Sabellius whose fundamental Principle was the one singular solitary Substance of the Deity They asserted indeed one Substance of the Deity against Arius but it was only in that sense in which Arius denied the One Substance He owned the Son to be a substantial Person who had a distinct Substance of his own and this the Nicene Fathers never quarelled with him for but he denied that the Substance of the Son was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the Substance of the Father but perfectly of a different Kind and Nature as not begotten of his Father's Substance but made by his Power In Opposition to this Heresie the Fathers taught not one singular Substance in God which is Sabellianism but such an Oneness of Substance as we know not how to express otherwise than by a specifick Sameness and Unity tho' that does not answer the compleat Notion of the Divine Unity but this is one Way the Fathers commonly express it by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and genus and such like Words as among us signifie the specifick Unity of Nature and therefore they tell us that by the Homoousion they only meant that the Son was so of the same one Substance with the Father that he is God of God Light of Light very God of very God that is true and perfect God as his Father is true and perfect God considered in his own Person as distinct from his Father that he is not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 created out of nothing as all Creatures are but is truly begotten of the Substance of his Father and in that Sense Consubstantial or of one Substance with him as all other Sons are Consubstantial with their Fathers Now had not this been a very
Ghost by a diversity and dissimilitude of Essences So that St. Hilary thought that Three Substances when they are not used in an Arian sense to fignifie a diversity of Nature but only to signifie Three substantial subsisting Persons in opposition to Sabellius are very Catholick Words and contain a true Catholick sense in this sense and for the very same reason we use these Expressions of Three distinct infinite Minds and Three Substances And I hope these Heads will not take it amiss if One St. Hilary have more Authority with me than all they together 3. As for One Substance which was taught by the Nicene Council and inserted into their Creed St. Hilary very plainly and frequently tells us in what sense we are to understand it that there is one Substance of the same Kind and Nature in genere naturae secundum proprietatem naturae not one Substance as that signifies one subsisting Person but as it signifies perfectly the same Nature in every thing alike without the least difference or variation that the Homoousion signifies one Nature perfectly alike and the same by Natural Propagation because the Essence of the Son is from no other Cause but the Essence of the Father and therefore Father and Son may both be said to be of one Nature or Substance And for the sake of the Charge of Tritheism which the Anim adverter makes such a Noise with it will be necessary to observe that St. Hilary gives the same account of the Unity of the Godhead as he does of the Unity of the Divine Substance aud indeed they must be one in the same sense for one divine Substance is one God The Sardican Synod anathematiz'd those who said there were Three Gods And St. Hilary gives this account of it that speaking properly the Divine Substance or Nature will not admit of the plural Number to say that there are more Gods than One excepting when the Title of God is given to Men or Angels by way of Honour not of Nature But in the Nature of God there is but One God yet so that the Son is God because he has the same Nature without any unlikeness or difference with his Father and when there is God of God it cannot be but that each of them must be God because their Nature is not distinguish'd by a different Kind or Species and when he is anathematiz'd who says there are two Gods and he also is anathematiz'd who denies the Son to be God it is manifest that the same Name of God and One God is apply'd to both of them upon account of the same Nature without the least difference or diversity And adds that least the Doctrine of One God should seem to teach that there is but one singular Subsistance of one solitary God without his Son The same Synod condemns those also who under pretence of owning but One God profess only One singular and solitary God the Father under the Name of Father and Son whereas the Father who begets and the Son who is born are to be acknowledg'd One God upon account of the same Nature in both without the least difference or variation Were it not to shorten this Discourse I could easily furnish my Readers with Numerous Quotations to the same purpose out of St. Hilary to whom I now confine my self and particularly to his Book de Synodis that these Authorities may be the more easily found all together to prove That the Catholick Notion of One Divine Substance and One God does not signify One Personal Substance nor One singular solitary God who is but One Person but there is One Divine Substance and One God as the same Divine Nature is communicated whole and entire by the Father to the Son and by Father and Son to the Holy Spirit without the least difference or change or separation Which I shall explain more at large elsewhere Thus much for St. Hilary who has always been allowed a Credible Witness of the Catholick Faith for which he suffered Banishment under Constantius and is now condemned for a Heretick by the Oxford Heads But it is more wonderful to me that men who understand what Hypostasis signifies and in what sense it was used by the Nicene Fathers should condemn the Phrase of Three Substances in the Trinity as False Impious and Heretical when 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Three Hypostases which is the Catholick Language is neither better nor worse than Three Substances In the Nicene Council it self 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 are used in the same sense and both signify Substance And Petavius owns that all the Ancient Fathers used Hypostasis in no other sense but to signify Substance and then Three Hypostases are Three Substances And when afterwards they more nicely distinguished between 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they still used Hypostasis in the notion of Substance that which did actually subsist which is therefore often rendred by the Latins extantia But to set aside other Observations the Alexandrian Synod under Athanasius is sufficient to put an end to this Dispute When the Catholick Bishops were recalled from Banishment by Julian several of them stopt at Alexandria and met in Council to advise about the broken state of the Church Among other things that fell under consideration there had a Dispute happened among the Catholicks themselves concerning the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 whether they ought to say That there is but One Substance in the Trinity or That there are Three Substances for so it is plain that both sides understood Hypostasis in the notion of Substance To compose this Difference the Synod called both Parties before them and examined them in what sense they used these words As for those who said there were Three Hypostases in the Trinity they asked them Whether by this they meant as the Arians did Three Hypostases of a different Kind and Nature subsisting by themselves absolutely and independently as perfectly divided and separated from each other as other Creatures and as the Children of men are or as those things which have different Natures as Gold and Silver and Brass Or whether by Three Hypostases they meant as some other Hereticks did Three Principles or Three Gods All this they professed they had neither said nor thought And being asked again Why they then used those Expressions of Three Substances They answered Because they believed in the Holy Trinity not a Trinity of Names but a Real Subsisting Trinity a Father who really and actually is and subsists a Son who in truth and reality is a substantial subsisting Son and the Holy Spirit who actually is and subsists That they never said There are Three Gods or Three Principles but owned the Holy Trinity and but one Godhead one Principle and the Son consubstantial to the Father and the Holy Spirit neither a Creature nor of a different Nature but
genuinely and inseparably of the same Nature with Father and Son All this was approved of as very Orthodox And then the Synod examined those who affirmed That there was but One Substance in the Trinity What they meant by it Whether they understood it as Sabellius did to deny the Real Subsistence of the Son and Holy Spirit to make an Unsubstantial Son and an Unsubsisting Spirit This they also denied and told the Synod that they thought Hypostasis signified the same with Ousia Essence Substance Nature And therefore they owned but one Hypostasis or Substance because the Son is of the Substance of the Father and by reason of the Identity of Nature between Father and Son for they believed but One Divinity and one Divine Nature and not one Nature of the Father and another different Nature of the Son and of the Holy Spirit This Explication also was approved by the Synod and thus this matter was reconciled Those who taught Three Substances in the Trinity and those who believed but one Substance when they had given their several Explications were both owned by the Synod and owned each other for Catholick Christians and both Condemned Arius and Sabellius though the Synod thought it better to adhere strictly to the words of the Nicene Creed but soon after they distinguished between 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and then Three Hypostases still in the notion of Three Substances and One Nature was the Catholick Language which St. Basil gives a large account of Ep. 300. of which more elsewhere So that Athanasius and those Glorious Confessors for the Nicene Faith in the Alexandrian Synod owned Three Substances in the very same sense in which we now use those words to contain the true Catholick Faith and if they knew what the Doctrine of the Catholick Church was our Oxford Heads are out in their guess 5. The last Charge is That Three distinct Minas and Substances is especially contrary to the Doctrine of the Church of England publickly received What they may mean by publickly received I can't tell there may be some Doctrines too publickly received in the Church of England which are not the Doctrines of the Church and I doubt Sabellianism is one of them But if they mean by publickly received the Doctrine of our Articles and Creeds this is the very same with the Doctrine of the Catholick Church We make profession of the Nicene Faith every Week and that asserts a Real and Substantial Trinity if Athanasius understood it The only pretence I can guess they had for this charge if they thought of any themselves must be the Form of the Athanasian Creed which will not permit us to say that in the Plural Number of all Three Divine Persons which it allows us to attribute distinctly to each distinct Person in the Singular Number we may say the Father is Almighty the Son Almighty and the Holy Ghost Almighty but must not say that there are three Almighties but one Almighty But will they hence frame an Universal Rule That nothing must be said of the Holy Trinity in the Plural Number considered as Three We will not attribute any thing to the Holy Trinity in the Plural Number which this Creed forbids we will not say there are Three Almighties Three Eternals Three Omnipotents Three Infinites Three Gods or Three Lords but this Creed does not forbid us saying There are Three Minds or Three Substances nay it teaches us to say 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which as you have already heard in the Language of the Nicene Age and more expresly in After Ages signified Three Substances and therefore must do so in this Creed The reason given in the Creed against this Plural Praedication is Because there is but One God and therefore such terms as immediately and directly multiply the Deity and Godhead must not be exprest Plurally and thus the Plural Praedication of any Divine Perfections in the abstract does Three Omnipotents Three Infinites Three Eternals which are Equivalent to Three Omnipotencies Three Infinities Three Eternities and they to Three Deities and Three Godheads or Three Divine Natures but though we cannot distinguish between the Person and the Divinity or Divine Nature of that Person for there is no Composition in God or in a Divine Person as there is in Creatures yet when the same Divine Nature communicated from the Father to the Son and from Father and Son to the Holy Spirit subsists distinctly tho inseparably whole and entire in Three and that which really and actually subsists is Mind and Substance with respect to these Three Subsistencies they are and must be Three Minds and Substances though with respect to the sameness and identity of the Divine Nature which is Whole and Entire and Inseparable and therefore but One in all they are but One not Three Gods This is all the sense I can make of that known distinction between Substantives and Adjectives in a Plural Praedication That we may say there are Three who Create but not Three Creators Three who are Omnipotent but not three Omnipotents c. that in these Adjective Praedications we consider the Divine Person Mind or Substance as a subject of Jahaesion and these Divine Perfections as Essential Properties or Attributes which may and must be numbred with the Subjects in which they are but Substantives have a more absolute sense and include pure nature without relation to different Subjects and therefore to use them Plurally is to multiply Nature to make more than One Infinite Eternal Incomprehensible Omnipotent Nature and consequently to multiply Gods But from this very distinction we learn that there are Three Suppositums or Subjects and then they will easily be owned to be Three Minds and Substances to which all the Perfections of the Deity belong for when these Divine Perfections are Praedicated Adjectively they must suppose a Subject to which they belong and they being such Perfections as can be only in a Mind they must suppose Three distinct Minds to which they belong Thus I have considered with all possible brevity every particular of this Charge and if these Decreeing and Heresy-making Heads will be just to me they must own that as they and the Animadverter had ordered the matter it was impossible for me to do otherwise unless I would have been trampled on by every Scribler This is a good human reason but I had a better reason for this than any thing meerly Personal They have condemned the true Catholick Faith even the Nicene Faith which is the Faith of the Church of England for Herefy and they have exposed this Faith to the Scorn and Triumph of the Socinian Hereticks who already make their boast That they have a Decree against the real Trinit arians and they only want another against the Nominal ones and then their work is done to their hands tho I think they have Decrees enow against them even all the Fathers and Councils which condemned Sabellius condemned them
the Censure which these Oxford Heads have made of these Propositions There are Three Infinite distinct Minds and Substances in the Trinity Item That the Three Persons in the Trinity are Three distinct Infinite Minds or Spirits and Three Individual Substances That is I suppose as much Individual Substances as they are Individual Persons It is evident that all this relates only to the Notion of the Trinity and to the Notion of a Divine Person and of Three Divine Persons in the Trinity and therefore the Unity of the Godhead is not concerned in this which belongs to another Question How these Three are One of which more when I examine the Heresy charged on these words 1. But the first charge is that they are false I wish they had told us what in them is false but since they have made no distinction we must suppose they mean that all these words are false Is it false then that each Person in the Ever-Blessed Trinity is by himself in his own Person a Distinct Infinite Mind Spirit or Substance Is not God the Father an Infinite Mind or Spirit Is not God the Son the substantial Word and Wisdom of the Father an Infinite Mind or Spirit Is not God the Holy Ghost that Eternal Spirit which knoweth the things of God as the Spirit of a Man knoweth the things of a man an Eternal Mind or Spirit Or is not an Infinite Mind and Spirit a Substance the most real perfect Substance that is in the world which gives Substance and Subsistence to all other things Is not the Father considered as an Infinite Mind and Spirit distinct from the Son and the Holy Ghost the Son distinct from the Father and the Holy Ghost the Holy Ghost distinct from the Father and the Son To deny any thing of all this is downright Sabellianism and destroys a real substantial Trinity which is as Essential to the Christian Faith as the Unity of the Godhead is The only Quarrel then that I can imagine against these words is this That tho the Father be a distinct Infinite Mind and the Son a distinct Infinite Mind and the Holy Ghost a distinct Infinite Mind yet according to the Catholick Form of Speech we must not say that there are Three distinct Infinite Minds but one Infinite Mind or Spirit or Substance Now I grant that in the sense of the Homoousion or Consubstantiality this is very True and Orthodox in which sense St. Jerom condemned Tres Substantias or Three Substances and St. Austin who allowed that the Father is a Spirit the Son a Spirit and the Holy Ghost a Spirit yet denied that there are Three Spirits but One Spirit but when we apply this to Persons it is gross Sabellianism to say that there are not Three Personal Minds or Spirits or Substances but only One Mind Spirit or Substance for then there can be but one Person too for one Personal Mind is but One Person Let us consider what a Mind is and how we can know whether there be but One or more distinct Minds The Substance of a Mind I know nothing of no more than I do what the naked Substance of Body or Matter is but the true Notion of a Mind is a thinking Being and therefore where ever we find the Acts of Knowledge Understanding and Will there is a Mind and where there are distinct Personal Acts of Knowledge and Will there are distinct Personal Minds Now if we believe the Scripture the Father knows the Son and the Son knows the Father the Father wills and the Son by a distinct Personal act wills with the Father and what the Father wills the Father works and the Son works and sees all that the Father doth and doth the same things Thus the Fathers proved against the Sabellians the real and substantial distinction of Persons in the Unity of the Godhead from those distinct personal acts which are attributed in Scripture to Father Son and Holy Ghost which having a mutual relation to each other require distinct Persons for their Subjects and since all the instances they give as may be seen in Tertullian against Praxeas Novatian in his Book of the Trinity Athanasius against the Sabellians St. Hilary St Austin and all that have writ on this Argument are acts of a Mind as well as of a Person they must prove if they prove any thing distinct Minds as well as Persons for if one singular Solitary Mind may be the Subject of such distinct acts as necessarily suppose more than one One Person may be so too and then there is no possible way left to confute Sabellianism or to prove a real Trinity of distinct substantial Persons It is very evident that both the Sabellians and the Catholick Fathers in this Controversy understood the same thing by Person which we do by Mind or Spirit By Person the Sabellians meant such a Person as is true and perfect God and therefore the most real Substance an Infinite Mind and Spirit and for this reason they rejected Three Persons for fear of Three Gods which always was and is still the Objection against a real substantial Trinity for there is no danger that Three Names or Notions or Modes should be a Trinity of Gods Notwithstanding this the Catholick Fathers allow their Notion of a Person and prove against them such a Trinity of Persons as they rejected each of which is true and perfect God Now since Person is the Catholick word which long Ecclesiastical use has made familiar I should by no means allow of any other word in this Mystery could we retain the old Catholick Faith together with the word But when men make no more of a Person than a meer Mode and a Trinity of Modes in one singular Nature and Substance must pass for a Trinity of Divine Persons which was the Heresy of Sabellius who contended for One Singular Solitary Nature or Subsistence in God and was not much concerned by what name you called the Three so they were not Three Substantial Subsisting Persons for he never dreamt that there could be Three Real Substantial Persons in One Singular Nature I say when this Heresy is reviv'd under a new Name we are under a necessity of saying in more express words what the Fathers meant by Person if we will retain the Catholick Faith as well as the Word Would Men but give themselves a little Liberty of thinking they would see how impossible it is to find a Medium between a real Trinity and Sabellianism however disguis'd The Three Persons in the blessed Trinity are either Three Substantial Persons or they are not to deny them to be Substantial is Sabellianism whatever else we call them There must be either One singular solitary Substance in the Deity or Three distinct Personal Substances The first is the fundamental Article of the Sabellian Creed and a direct Contradiction to the Doctrine of the Trinity for One singular solitary Nature or Substance is but One Person for which reason the