are but only distinct each Person has a Self-consciousness of his own and knows and feels it self if I may so speak as distinct from the other Divine Persons The Father has a Self-consciousness of his own whereby he knows and feels himself to be the Father and not the Son nor Holy Ghost And the Son in like manner feels himself to be the Son and not the Father nor the Holy Ghost And the Holy Ghost feels himself to be the Holy Ghost and not the Father nor the Son as James feels himself to be James and not Peter nor John I say then if the Father hath a Self-consciousness of his own whereby he knows and feels himself to be the Father and not the Son nor the Holy Ghost as James feels himself to be James and not Peter c. then both is he separate from the Son and Holy Ghost and his Self-consciousness also separate from the Self-consciousness of each the other And again if the Father Son and Spirit feel himself to be himself and not the other as James feels himself to be James and not Peter nor John then must each feel himself separate from the other For 't is manifest to me that in knowing and feeling my self not to be Peter nor James I know and feel my self separate severed or several from them Nay it is by knowing and feeling my self separate that I know and feel my self distinct If therefore the Father knows and feels himself distinct from the Son and from the Holy Ghost as we Men know our selves distinct from one another he then must know and feel himself separate also unavoidably or else he does not know and feel himself distinct as we do He must therefore upon this Hypothesis be separate as well as distinct from the other Besides three infinite Minds as he there and p. 50. and so onwards most frequently and familiarly stiles the three Persons and one infinite Mind that is three sames and not three sames are to me an unavoidable Contradiction But it had been at least no Contradiction to have said one infinite Mind or a Substance may have three manners of Subsisting or three several Relations which was the old way of speaking and which if it had been kept to the melancholy Stander-by had forborn his Suit That ancient Notion of a Divine Person is more consistent and much less obnoxious though how far satisfactory it may be to all Men he disputes not however he does account it to be the common Orthodox Doctrine now many hundred Years received And here he would have our Divines to stop as a common Boundary for Peace and his Reason is because here our Articles which were as is said in the very Title of them agreed upon for the avoiding of Diversities of Opinions and for the establishing Consent touching Religion do stop expressing only or stating to us the Doctrine of three Persons in the Terms wherein from old Times it has been delivered down and therefore in all Likelihood designing only the old Sense This is but more clearly and explicitely what the Suit for Forbearance desired of Dr. Sherlock and other present Writers in this Controversy Wherefore upon the whole how just in this Case the Imputation of a disguised Heretick of a Man spiteful against the Cause and Persons who maintain it a Wolf in Sheeps clothing and like Characters fastned upon the Author of it are God will judg if the World do not Had I either disputed against the old Notion or assigned any new one or ventured at new and dangerous Explications as some have done Mr. Dean had had some Colour for thus treating me But sith I have not I must tax this Language also as downright Calumny But to come off from this querulous Parenthesis Dr. Sherlock would not or did not stop here as is apparent by what I have transcribed actually out of his Book however he tells the World I did not read it In which Imputation I will frankly acknowledg every tittle of Truth there is namely I had not when I writ read his Book all over for it was taken out of my Lodging without my Knowledg or Consent before I had done with it and perhaps the Doctor has no Reason to complain of that Mischance But I had looked over all and carefully read a great part taken Notes out of it as will appear by my Adversaria of that Month yea indeed transcribed much more than I alledged And I alledged not as the Dean to the end he might shuffle off a distinct Answer to me and the Vindication of his Novelties is pleased to stile them broken Passages out of Pag. 30. his Book but intire Definitions and Propositions which contained the Substance of this Hypothesis as he stiles it And I do affirm the Doctor in what I so cited p. 14 15. of my Paper has gone most plainly beyond and contrary to the Doctrine both of the Fathers Schools and Protestant Divines And in his Apology he seems to have gone beyond himself For he at least four times calls our Lord Jesus a God incarnate p. 4 26 27 31. Now if the Son be a God incarnate then the Father is a God not incarnate And the same ought to be said according to this way of speaking of the Holy Ghost Nay it is actually said by him in these Words This Confession proves the Holy Ghost a God Vind. p. 190. lin ult I say then if there be a God and a God and a God unavoidably there must be three Gods And this is the very Absurdity the Socinians would reduce their Adversaries to Therefore the Doctor so defends the Mystery of the Trinity or so confutes Heresy as to run into the very same Absurdity to which his Adversaries would reduce him which I hope we may say without Offence is most unreasonable most dangerous and at present most unseasonable the thing charged by the Melancholy Stander-by This the Doctor might have evaded had he been content to have taken up with the old Acceptation or Definition of a Person in divinis or to have spoken with Scripture Jesus Christ is God manifest in the Flesh or if that must not suffice as is usual God incarnate But the adding an individuating Particle a to the Name of that common Essence God and then predicating that Name so determined touching the three Persons as it reduces the Subjects touching which it is predicated into the Rank of common Individuals so it leaves the Essence when taken without that individuating Particle in the Rank of a common Species And so contrary to the constant Doctrine even of the Schools God shall be predicated of the Father Son and Holy Ghost as a Species of Individuals as Man is of Abraham Isaac and Jacob whom all acknowledg to have been three Men and as much must the Father Son and Holy Ghost be three Gods Which if it be not most grievous Heresy and particularly the Heresy of * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉
a good Answer in the Fathers and shall the same be ill meerly because at another time in another Case it came from an Heretick The Hereticks proposing it you say renders it suspect St. Athanasius and St. Ambrose using it say I and relying upon it too gives it Authority The Hereticks used it not first but only retorted it on the Fathers Wherefore at least admit the Authority of the one to take off the Disadvantage it may sustain from the other and let the Project as you call it stand or fall according to its own naked Merit Only by the way give me leave to add that if what is just and reasonable must be rejected because it has been sometimes used by Hereticks we must oftentimes give over pleading from Scripture and quit a World of Texts therein I must acknowledg I am not able to see why Men should be so averse from the Language of the Holy Ghost either in their Prayers or Creeds The Sum of the Reason alledged is that it is the Sense of Scripture which Pag. 7. is the true Faith and not merely the Words And must we saith Mr. Dean very admirably believe the Words or Sense of the Scripture I may desire him if he can to believe this or that Sense as revealed by God for he cannot know this or that Sense or Proposition as revealed by God without the Words in which it was revealed I demand Do those Words express contain and convey to us this Sense of such or such Point of Faith or do they not If they do not then the Sense insisted on is not the Sense of the Scripture and consequently not Faith If they do why should we not keep those Words by which God hath thought fit to express this Sense Why should we separate what he has joined Are we wiser than he or can we express the Mind of God better than himself But when Hereticks have used their utmost Art to make the Words of Scripture signify what they please is it not necessary to fix their true Sense and to express that in such other Words as Hereticks cannot pervert Yes in the Name of God let us use our utmost Art to vindicate if possible all and every Scripture from Heretical Glosses or Distortions and with all the Light and Evidence we can discover and assert its genuine Sense The natural Explication of Scripture is our immediate Scope in most or in all the Arts and Sciences which as Divines we take in But what do all our Explications effect save a Proof or Discovery that this or that is the Sense contained under such Words of Scripture When therefore we have plainly proved that these Words of Scripture contain this Sense why should we change the Words If they were not plain the Explication supposing it to have done any thing to the purpose has made them plain When they are plain then why may they not be kept They may be undetermined said Mr. Dean and 't is necessary to fix their §. 10. true Sense But this is the Difficulty They may rationally at least probably admit more Senses than one and when you say you have fixed your own true Sense another shall deny the Sense you have fixed to be the true Sense at least assign another equally probable Sense And a third Person it may be a third For Instance the Apostle tells us 1 Cor. 2. 10 12. God hath revealed the Joys and Glories which he has prepared for those that love him unto us by his Spirit for the Spirit searcheth all things yea the deep things of God For what Man knoweth the things of Man save the Spirit of Man which is in him even so the things of God knoweth no Man but the Spirit of God Now we have received not the Spirit of the World but the Spirit which is of God that we might know the things which are freely given us of God This Text the learned Dr. Sherlock as well as others even Athanasius himself interpret not without Probability of the essential Spirit of God and the Doctor both in his Vindication and Apology endeavours thence to prove the Personality of the Holy Ghost and his mutual Consciousness with the Father and the Son Now I sacredly protest I remember not my self ever to have read any Socinian Author on this Text But I find some others by the word Spirit here understand the spiritual Illumination and inward Perswasion of Mind wrought in the Apostles and other faithful People And this we seem enforced from ver 12. to admit where we read the Apostles to have received the Spirit which cannot be well understood of the Person but of the Gifts of the Holy Ghost This agrees too with the Close of ver 10. The Spirit searcheth all things that is scrutari nos facit This Illumination in their Search leads all such who are endowed therewith into the knowledg and belief of all things necessary to their Salvation even the deepest Mysteries of the Kingdom of Heaven Further this spiritual Gift may be said to know i. e. we by this Illumination know and relish the things of God as feelingly as the Spirit of Man knows the things of a Man because this Gift is so true a Communication from God and as it were somewhat of the Divine Nature 2 Pet. 1. 4. imparted to us But that the Spirit of God here spoken of as knowing the things of God should be a Person distinct from God any more than the Spirit of a Man knowing the things of a Man is a Person distinct from the Man seems unreasonable And it is considerable that amongst others even Calvin and Beza allow by the Spirit here may be understood such Gift of Illumination as spoken of But Grotius referring us to what he had said on Mark 2. 8 c. with great Learning and Probability interprets the Spirit here of the Divine Nature of Christ and tells us it was by Christ as coming from the Bosom of his Father and knowing all his Secrets that these things were revealed to the Apostles and that the Sense here is the same as in John 1. 18. and ch 6. 46 c. and he produces many Authorities both from Scripture and Fathers touching the Divine Nature of our Lord being stiled the Spirit Now who shall determine which is the true and genuine Sense and if any of the two latter should be genuine then has not the Dean evinced hence what he conceived and particularly not the mutual Consciousness of the Holy Ghost with the Father and the Son for that the Person of the Holy Ghost is not here spoken of It were easy but that it would be tedious to give like Instances in many other Texts of Holy Scripture What shall we do then It were an admirable Expedient indeed could we determine infallibly this or that to be the true Sense of each controverted Text and then express that Sense in such Words as Hereticks cannot pervert But where shall we find
Power to enact the Conditions of it and make Articles of Faith But in Controversies the Church may declare her Sense and we are bound so far peaceably to submit and accept it as not to contradict or teach contrary under Penalty of her Censures And this I would be content to conceive the whole of what our Church requires as to those things which are meerly her Determinations For in truth it is to no purpose for her to require such Approbation and Consent which whether paid or no she can never come to have Knowledg of which sort is Belief and inward Approbation To exact this may breed Hypocrisy it cannot be a Seed of Charity and true Christian Concord And thus as to that Latitude Simplicity and negative Belief which have so much offended the Apologist though I am well satisfied that had I imbraced his Definitions and Hypotheses he would have allowed me as great a Latitude in deceding from the Churches Doctrine as he has taken himself And now passing by many Favours so I call divers scornful Expressions §. 13. by the way which Mr. Dean is pleased to bestow upon me I come next to profess that notwithstanding any thing which he hath said to the contrary I am clearly of the Mind still that it is Opposition chiefly which keeps many Heterodox Opinions and Pamphlets alive But it is better such Pamphlets should be in an hundred Hands with an Pag. 10. Answer than in sive without one Not to tell him he takes Care by the rate he receives for every Sheet he publishes that such Pieces of his as the Vindication of the Trinity shall not be in the Hands of one Person in an hundred I am sure at least on a certain time I could not spare Money to buy it I will only say 't is hard to determine which more subverts the Orthodox Doctrine the Adversaries Impugnations or his Vindication I have heard that the wicked Vanninus so writ in Proof of the Being of a God as to increase the Suspition of Atheists that there was none And I do avow that Dr. Sherlock has so vindicated the Trinity that he has to his Power made the Unity asserted by the Fathers utterly impossible and run into the very Absurdity whereto the Adversaries would reduce us For if his Definitions and Hypotheses be true there must unavoidably be three Gods as has been shewn and there may be as well three thousand or as many as Varro says the Romans ever had No these three are one says Mr. Dean one by mutual Consciousness I answer besides that this amounts to no more than to an Unity of Accord which as has been said is not the Unity that the Church and Fathers ever held and which we have seen the Council of Sardis avowed to be the Catholick Faith ever taught received and delivered down 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one Substance or an Unity of Substance besides this I say three thousand Minds or Spirits may be as well conceived mutually conscious as three and so we may defend Polytheism or maintain all the Gods of the Heathen to have been but one Indeed I never read any Christian Writer to go so near in express Terms asserting a Plurality of Gods ad the Dean of St. Pauls has done a God and a God and a God as has been shewn And if this kind of speaking be not direct or full enough what is wanting in express Terms is abundantly made up in his Hypothesis which unavoidably infers three Gods and those no more or otherwise one than even an infinite Number could there be such a Number of Minds might be one which two Points though I was content to stile only the Absurdities to which our Adversaries would reduce us yet I know what Names other People would have given them could they have been found in any Writings of mine Further it is to be considered Dr. Sherlock's Vindication of the Doctrine of the Holy and ever Blessed Trinity an august and glorious Title vastly raising the Expectation of all who read or hear it came out with the Solemnity of a Publick I had almost said Canonical Licence in its Front affixed thereto by an Ecclesiastical Reverend Person authorized by Law for such Purpose So did his Apology also This at first Sight represents the Doctrine contained in them not as the Sentiments of a private Doctor but as Doctrine approved by our Church for there are at least three Doctors of the Church to avouch for it And some will say If it be thus authorized by the Chaplains are not certain other much greater Persons concerned for it What Advantage now may the Enemy take every way thence Plainly forasmuch as other Doctors and Bishops of the Church cannot but disapprove and disclaim this Explication or Notion of the three Persons or of the Trinity and only of such an Unity as there asserted it will and must be said we are neither agreed amongst our selves as to Trinity nor Unity Shall therefore the melancholy Stander by be thought an Enemy to the Church for desiring such Writings as these may be forborn Again Mr. Dean tells us that Dr. Wallis when he called the three Persons Pag. 9. three Somewhats thereby only meant that the true Notion of a Person he did not know And hereto by the way Mr. Dean according to his wonted Ingenuity or Care subjoins I commended this No Sir that which I commended was what I wish had been to be found in you Dr. Wallis's Orthodoxy in the Acceptation of the word Persons in divinis set down by me in the Doctor 's own Words for something analogous to Persons and not signifying just the same But to commend Dr. Wallis or any one who worships three Persons for saying he does not know what a Person is is so far from me that I say Mr. Dean in imputing the Saying to Dr. Wallis and the commending it to me has wronged us both egregiously the Doctor in exposing him and Multitudes in him as liable to this unavoidable Consequence that they worship they know not what and me in telling the World I commend them that do so I delight not to search further into much less to exaggerate the Advantages Dr. Sherlock's Books on this Subject have given our Adversaries of all kinds By these Touches it is plain more may be assigned But as to those two above-named Particulars which I only stiled Absurdities the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or original Grounds of all the rest having now shewn them expresly enough I must mind Mr. Dean of his Promise that he will correct them and it may be a fit Subject for some of those few short Treatises which he has told us he will publish on this Argument as he has leisure whether he correct them thankfully or no I value not much provided Pag. 11. he sincerely or expresly recant them which in case of Errors he has said he will not blush to do However I will not blush to press
this Point but what is taught in Scripture and then I am sure there will be no fear that any wise Man should reject Scripture for its sake or put strained and unnatural Senses on it to reconcile it to Reason But that three such Persons as he has defined are by Scripture asserted or can be thence concluded to be in the Deity I have denied I do and must ever deny and conceive I have proved contradictious In the next Place having repeated his old Prevarication touching my §. 17. stiling the Socinians the learned Writers of Controversy he is displeased with me for not taking them to task for denying the Divine Nature to be incomprehensible Truly I never heard or read any of the Socinians guilty of such Presumption or Blasphemy But this I take only to be a Consequence drawn by himself from a certain Opinion of theirs and then fastned upon them Of which kind of fair dealing I will say nothing for the present But I do know there are some who deny God's Prescience of future Contigents touching which I had no Occasion to speak no more had he here but that he would hedg in any thing pertinent or impertinent to inodiate an innocent Person which being he has done I will take the Occasion to profess before the Searcher of all Hearts who knows what is in Man that he knows I do believe and in my Soul adore his Prescience that I abhor any Suspicions of it as seeing scarce any of his Perfections more clearly express'd and by a World of Instances verified in Holy Scripture Nay I voluntarily profess I cannot conceive infinite Knowledg without Prescience and though I do confess I cannot comprehend infinite Knowledg because I am very finite yet I bless him who helps my Vnbelief and has as fully possess'd my Heart with the Perswasion thereof as with the Perswasion of his Existence But I cannot so easily believe Mr. Dean's Notions for facilitating I suppose the comprehending the next Divine Attribute which he lugs-in namely Eternity which though he truly says pag. 16. lin 28 29. to be without Beginning and without Succession yet with his usual Attention he explains lin 32. to be a Succession without a Beginning a Second or a Third without a First This Notion I will not accuse him to have taken from the School-Doctors Only I must ask him why he put those Words a God Adequate and Commensurate to our Vnderstandings a little finite comprehensible God in the same Character in which he ordinarily puts the Words he cites or wire-draws from my Paper If he did it with a Design to possess the Reader that I had any such Words or had said any thing from whence such an Inserence could be made I have another Kindness to thank him for of a like Nature to his others I now proceed to account for the last Reason I assigned for the present §. 18. Unreasonableness of some Mens agitating this Controversy which was Hereby that is as both the very Title and the Paper it self expresly assert by some learned Mens present Writings on this Controversy our Church at present and the common Christianity it may be feared will be daily Pag. 18. more and more exposed to atheistical Men they being not likely to overlook the Advantages thus daily given them This Mr. Dean according to his usual way first calumniously perverts to another Sense then for this bold Stroke as he calls it will scarce allow me to be either a Christian or a Divine And lastly falls on catechising me First He calumniously perverts my Sense for says he The Sum of this is that to vindicate the Doctrine of the Trinity against Socinians will make Men Atheists Not so fast good Mr. Dean This Sum agrees not either with your own reckoning or with mine Three times at least in your Paper you said these learned Writers of Controversies by me designed were the Socinians According to which your own Interpretation your Proposition or the Sum explicitely should have been this The Socinians present writing against the Trinity will make Men Atheists Do you then deny that Proposition No you 'l say I believe you thought not of it But you know very well on the other side that amongst the present learned Writers of Controversy your self were more immediately concerned they are your own Words pag. 2. And now the Sum if truly stated will be much different namely this Such Vindications of the Trinity as that writ by Dr. Sherlock tend rather to make Men Atheists than to convert Socinians This Sir was my meaning and this I re-assert For Atheists may confute Tritheism or Polytheism for my Part I see not how either is defensible and having proved such Doctrines in Religion to be false they will be ready to conclude all Religion is so too but they can never overthrow the Doctrine of one God the Father of all and one Saviour the Son of God our Lord Christ Jesus and of one Spirit sanctifying and uniting the whole Body of Christian People or of these three being one And this if you will call it a bold Stroke I stick to it and fear not being exposed though I double it The Substance of two of his Questions is answered already First Do I believe the Doctrine of the Trinity to be desensible or no I do as delivered in Scripture but not upon his novel Definitions and Hypotheses But why do I not defend it better I have partly answered it already and a further Answer to that and to his second Question will come in by and by In the mean time as to his third Whâ—â— are Atheists concerned in the Disputes of the Trinity Very much in such Vindications of it which give such a Notion of the true God as implicates or is inconsistent with it self viz. that the true God adored by all Christian People should be three infinite Minds and yet not three infinite Minds If it be as it is impossible that there should be more infinite Minds than one then will Atheists say it is impossible such a Being should exist as you describe your God to be that is there is no God After these Questions I am to be told a Secret which though in great §. 19. Pag. 19. Modesty I conceal yet possibly I may be privy to viz. that Atheists and Deists Men who are for no Religion are of late very zealous Socinians I easily believe and acknowledg Mr. Dean better acquainted with the Town than I am but if Atheists and Deists be zealous Socinians let him never again object to me my Socinian Friends for I protest I have not to my Knowledg any familiar Acquaintance much less Friendship with any Atheists or Theists in the World I pray as our Church teaches to pray FOR ALL INFIDELS AS WELL AS TVRKS AND JEWS that GOD WOVLD TVRN THEIR HEARTS And in my Sphere as God gives me Opportunity I desire to labour in his Church to that purpose but otherwise I
was Poison under the â—n Epistol ad Damas Tom. 2. Honey and boggled at it St. Austin acknowledges he understood not the Difference the Greeks designed between 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is in our present Language between Essence and Subsistence But because says he according to our Custom of Speech Essence and Substance are all one â—e Trinitat â—b 5. in fine â—apitis 8 cap. 9. therefore we dare not say one Essence three Substances but one Essence or Substance and three Persons So that when they laid aside Hypostasis they introduced a Term equivalent and perhaps more ambiguous namely Persona and then said there were three Persons in one Essence Yet at the same time St. Austin acknowledgeth the Use of this Term improper and that it was Necessity drove them to it they used this Word for â—agna prorsus â—opia humaâ—â— laborat â—â—quium Dictum est tamen tres personae non ut illud diceretur sed ne taceretur Non enim rei â—â—bilis eminentia hoc vocabulo explicare valet Cap. 9. want of a better The Father saith he and the Son and the Holy Ghost are truly three But when it is demanded three what humane Speech is defective notwithstanding we have said three Persons not that strictly we mean or intend to say this but lest we should be silent and say nothing for the Transcendency of the ineffable Matter cannot be express'd by this Word And again more fully in his seventh Book proving the Father Son and Holy Ghost to be one because the Father is Wisdom the Son Wisdom and the Holy Ghost Wisdom and in God to be wise is the same as to be and to be the same as to be God Therefore says he for expressing what is inexpressible that we may speak in some measure what we cannot speak out the Itaque loquendi causâ de ineffabilibus ut fari aliquo modo possemus quod effari nullo modo possumus dictum est à nostris Graecis una Essentia tres Substantiae a Latinis autem una Essentia tres Personae Et ut intelligatur in aenigmate quod dicitur placuit ita dici ut aliquid diceretur Ut quaereretur quid tria sunt quid tres conferimus nos ad inveniendum aliquid speciale vel generale nomen quo complectamus haec tria neque occurrit animo quia excedit supereminentia divinitatis usitati eloquii facultatem Cap. 3 4. Grecian Christians have said one Essence three Substances that is Subsistences and the Latins one Essence three Persons And that what we say may be understood at least in a Riddle we thought it good thus it should be said that something might be said When it is required what these three are we apply our selves to find out some special or general Name whereby we may comprize all the three nor does there any occur to our Thoughts because the Transcendency of the Divinity exceeds the Faculty of usual Speech He goes on to the Effect following If we take these three Abraham and Isaac and Jacob we can find somewhat common which they all have and say they are three Men but touching Father Son and Holy Ghost we cannot say they are three Fathers or three Sons nor indeed three Gods what therefore are the three Three Persons By all which it is plain they used this word Persons not because it was proper but because the Speculation was run so fine that they knew not what else or what less improper to say And let this suffice in my present Penury of Books as to the Fathers who of old either first introduced or by their Use first authorized in divinis this Term three Persons or a Trinity of Persons As to the Sense of the School-Doctors touching the word Persona in this Controversy I must speak chiefly out of my Memory having besides the Master of the Sentences and some imperfect pieces of others only St. Thomas's Sum at hand in which Work he is somewhat brief on this Term Yet even therein when he concludes it convenient that the Name Person be used touching God he does it with this Limitation that it be Conveniens est ut hoc nomen persona de Deo dicitur non tamen eodem modo quo dicitur de Creaturis not used or which is the same understood after the same manner as it is of the Creatures But I do avow it and will be bound to produce Testimonies enough as soon as I can come at Books that it is both his Doctrine and the common Doctrine of his Followers that the word Person when used touching God and the Creatures is not taken in the same equal or univocal Sense but only by way of Proportion and as to the manner Persona de Deo Creaturis non dici univoce sed analogice of signifying and Imposition of the Name it first and more properly agrees to the Creatures As to Protestant Divines also for the Reasons above touched I must be sparing in their Numbers but I am sure the Systematists ordinarily assign either four or five Differences in the Use of the Word when attributed to God and to the Creature And I find by me in my Notes this Passage which I long since transcribed out of Zanchy a judicious and learned Calvinist In the Creatures one Person is not only Una Persona creata ex contextu precedente supplenda ab altera non tam distincta quam etiam disjuncta est at proinde diversae sunt inter se substantiae licet unius naturae In Deo una Persona ab altera distincta quidem est sed disjuncta esse non porest c. De tribus Elohim Parte 2da lib. 1. c. 3. distinct from the other but disjoined and separate so that the Substances are divers though the Nature one But in God one Person is indeed distinct from the other but cannot be disjoined and therefore the Divine Persons are not only of the same Nature for so are humane Persons but of the same Essence Nay they so subsist in the same Essence that they are indeed nothing else but that Essence Somewhat very near this the Doctor to do him Justice more than once or twice expresly says in his Book I mean in his Vindication of the Holy Trinity viz. p. 47 67 104 c. that they are distinct not separate but then he in effect unsays all again much oftner and that both by his Definition of a Person in divinis and in those other Passages of his produced by me in my Paper p. 14. and by many other Passages which I might transcribe from him For my own part I am not able to excuse him from contradicting himself over and over most plainly in the Space of a dozen Lines in one of the Pages now cited viz. 67. of his Vindication for first he acknowledges These three Divine Persons are not separate Minds as created Spirits