no man ought to proceed further in the interpretation of Scripture than the Soveraign limits So that a Soverâ—ign ought to be either a more exact Divine than ever I heard of in the World to interpret all places of Scripture that a question is demanded of or else of a most exact and quick Iudgment to limit others how far they shall go And suppose a Soveraign prove a fool or like an ill Steersman always turning the boat round uncertain in his resolves who must interpret the matter thenâ— But I shall pass this over without more saying as one of the chances of Mr. Hobbes his fancy Mr. Hobbes p. 263. saith That the end of Our Saviour's câ—ming into the World was to restore unto God the Kingdom cut off from him by the rebellion of the Israelites in the election of Saul So far he hath renounced all Salvation by Christ. But to do him right he saith afterwards That our Saviour had an other imploy and that was to Preach that he was the Messiah and in case the Nation of the Iews should refuse him then to call to his obedience the Gentiles So now he seems only by the accident of the Iews refusal to exclude them from Salvation and by the same accident only to make the Gentiles capable of mercy Now is any thing more plain in the World than that he came into the World to satisfie God's justice for the sins of the World and with intent to bring in the Gentiles as well as the Iews and to make them one sheepfold under himself the great Shepherd And that appears from the first promise of him viz. That the Seed of the Woman should break the Serpents Head that is should take away that misery from the Seed of the Woman which the subtlety of the Serpent had brought upon it and I suppose Mr. Hobbes will not say amidst his new found unreasonable Doctrines That the Gentiles as well as the Iews were not the off-spring of Eve And he was the blood of the everlasting covenant and the great Shepherd of the Sheep spoken of Heb. 13. 20. And Iohn 1.29 he is called the Lamb of God which taketh away the sins of the World and this was before he was rejected by the Iews And all the Prophesies of our Saviour in the Old Testament express our Saviour's bringing in the Gentiles and the intent of God to do so as Isaiah 49. 22. I will lift up my Hand to the Gentiles and set up my Standard to the People and this was before our Saviour's coming into the World Texts for this I shall cite no more it being a thing so plain against Mr. Hobbes and one would wonder ever such conceits without ground or reason should come into any Man's Head Mr. Hobbes after a great deal of stir about the Trinity and the Unity of that Trinity which is hard to make any thing of or rather impossible by reason his opinion was concealed comes p. 268. to tell us his opinion in these words following viz. To conclude saith he the Doctrine of the Trinity as far as can be gathered directly from the Scripture 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 by Moses the Father is God as represented by his Son that was God and Man the Son is God These are his very words So observe he absolutely denies in this the personal existence of the two last Persons in the Trinity And 't is in short to say as others have said before me that there is but one Person under different conceptions And the inference is direct and natural for saith Mr. Hobbes God was in three respects represented which excludes the real existence of three Divine Persons in the Godhead and only supposeth three Persons that represented this one God not that there are three Persons in the Godhead or that are God for no one is said to represent that is the Person represented Now to illustrate this the King of England is represented by the Lord Deputy of Ireland by the Viceroy of Scotland and by his Governor of the Island of Iersey But still 't is the energy of the one Person of the King that actuates them all and there are not three Persons of the King nor any of those three Persons are the King no more are there three Persons in the Godhead if we will believe Mr. Hobbes who makes the three Persons in the Trinity but three Names to express one only Person of God So 't is all one as if he had said the Son is not God as a distinct Person from the Father but that the only one Person of the Godhead was come into Man or at best had taken the Virgins Son into it or that he had said the Person of the Holy Ghost was not God as a distinct Person from the Father but that the only one Person of God inspired the Apostles So then clearly here is a denial of the two second Persons in the Trinity for if there be only one Person there is not three in the Trinity But Mr. Hobbes in this hath the confidence to say That this his fancy is all that can be gathered from Scripture concerning the Trinity And that he may meet with his match I will say the contrary and I doubt not but my authorities for my opinion will prove better than his It is said in 1 Ioh. 5. 7. There are three bear record in Heaven the Father the Word and the Holy Ghost and these three are one So this is clear that the Godhead is three Persons not as 't is represented at three different times upon Earth but as it is three distinct Persons in Heaven So this makes an end of Mr. Hobbes his conceit that there are only said to be three Persons in the Godhead to be made out by Scripture in respect of the three representations upon Earth for they are in this Text said to be three in Heaven and all three are said to be in action that is to bear record which shews they are several and distinct Persons And the 3 d of Titus 4 5 6. v. clearly shews the Trinity of the Persons really existent which Texts are viz. After the love of God our Saviour toward Man appeared By his mercy he saved us by the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Ghost Which he shed on us abundantly through Iesus Christ our Saviour Here is God the Father that saves his people by regeneration and renewing of the Holy Ghost and 't is through Iesus Christ our Saviour So what can be plainer besides the Scriptures that speak of the descent and mission of the Holy Ghost that the Godhead hath three Persons in it in another manner than as it was represented by Moses for here is God the Father
observed of Mahomet's doctrine for Religion that the Turk teacheth within his Dominions or that a Papist should teach if uppermost So now Mr. Hobbes hath done like a Scholar as he may well think to find a place in the Bible to prevent Preaching against the Alcoran or Mass Yet to do Mr. Hobbes Right after his so many assertions that that only is to be acknowledged as Canonical Scripture which the Civil Soveraign saith is so and that in 1651. he attended the determination of the Sword to decide all Doctrines he saith That he can acknowledge nothing to be Canonical Scripture but that which the Church of England hath commanded to be acknowledged for such and I think there is nothing so near an Orthodox opinion in all his Book but I suppose he meant that he would acknowledge it to be so only until the Sword had at that time determin'd it After Mr. Hobbes had laid down positive general Rules for enervating the Scriptures in saying That the Authority of them depended upon the determination of the Soveraign now in his 33. Chap. he comes to the particulars of the several Books of the Scriptures and hopes there I suppose to compleat the work For he saith That the several Books especially of the Old Testament were not written by those that are commonly supposed to be the Penmen of them but by others a long time after their deaths which if true may raise a scruple to the truth of them only he saith That he supposeth Moses wrote the greatest part of Deuteronomy else that the Old Testament was penned generally by Esdras for which he cites the Apocrypha Esdras the 14 th Chapter and when he hath done so takes it for granted that Esdras penned them after the captivity To answer particularly Mr. Hobbes in this would require a very large Discourse enough to tire out both Me and my Reader besides I think it not worth my while to answer general assertions in matters of fact which are contrary to the general admissions of the most Learned Men with long Discourses but rather content my self with saying that they are not to be credited but rejected Yet to that which Mr. Hobbes is particular in I shall answer particularly He saith The Pentateuch was penned long after Moses death and for this he cites the 12. of Genesis v. 6. which saith That when Abraham passed through the Land to the plain of Moreh the Canaanite was then in the Land Which shews clearly saith Mr. Hobbes that this Book was written after Moses time because the Canaanite was not displaced till after Moses death But if Mr. Hobbes had well considered and look'd into the 7 th verse he would have found that God promised Abraham the Land in which at that time Abraham built an Altar unto the Lord which was as it were a taking possession of the Land and by God's gift he had a better right to it as to futurity than the Canaanite had whereupon Abraham by Faith look'd upon the future time and saw the Canaanite displaced and knew that by force of God's promise the Canaanites antient right to them and their posterity was changed So that the Canaanites as to the succession might be rather said to have had the Land than that they had it and so is the 48. Gen. 21. to be understood Or may not the Text be rationally intended that Moses said this to declare that the Canaanite was then in the Land and not any other people How unreasonable then it is for Mr. Hobbes to change a general supposition at the best but upon a doubtful Text of Scripture and an Apocryphal story I shall refer to any Man that hath his reason and if reason be on my side Mr. Hobbes ought to be so too because he said before that Reason is the Word of God The rest of Mr. Hobbes his Texts to prove this are nothing to the purpose and so I pass them over As to the Pen-men of the Books of the New Testament he determins nothing but saith That they were made Canonical by the Church and that the writers of them were indowed with God's spirit in that they conspire to the setting forth the rights of the Kingdom of God the Father Son and Holy Ghost Let me then ask Mr. Hobbes why they need to be made Canonical and to be approved or rejected by the Soveraign or his reciprocal Word the Sword Mr. Hobbes said p. 38. That the Scriptures by the spirit of God in Man mean a mans spirit inclined to godliness the falsness of which I have upon that page spoken to Now p. 207. he comes to treat of Spirits in general what they aâ—e and saith if I rightly understand him which I think is difficult in so perplex'd a discourse as he makes all over this his 34. Chapter That they are bodies for he saith that substance and body are the same thing And p. 17 53 214. saith That all substances must be bodies and that the words incorporeal substance joined together are unintelligible nonsence and imply a contradiction And so runs on further in his old vein of making positive affirmations contrary to the general received opinion of all Christian Men without giving any reason at all for his so â—aying But to reason the matter a little why are the words incorporeal substance contradictories Why may there not be a substance that hath no Body as well as a substance that hath one For substance is nothing but that which doth substare such and such qualifications as are proper and do belong to the being or nature of the thing in which those qualifications are and without which those qualifications could not be for want of something to support them As we may say that Iron which is a corporeal substance is hard so we may say that a thing of a more subtle existence or substance is intelligent rational or wise For that it may be equally capable to support these as the Iron doth hardness colour or any other qualification Now then to say that body and substance are the same thing is only a positive saying and if the words had been never thought on before might as well signifie variously as the same Then certainly 't is a strange piece of confidence to obtrude such a position upon the World without any possibility of reason which is contrary to the sentiments of all Learned persons that ever I heard of But if Mr. Hobbes ask me what a Spirit is if it be not a Body I must say that I can no more tell the likeness of it than Mr. Hobbes supposing he had never seen by some external obstruction any thing nor spoken with them that had could have told what a like thing an Horse or a grey Hound is things incapable and things obstructed giving the same account of their proceedings But 't is apparent that there is such a thing as a Spirit for our Saviour saith Luke 24. 39. Handle me and see for a Spirit hath
not Flesh and Bones as ye see me have And if not Flesh and Bones of what must a Spirit consist that is corporeal I hope Mr. Hobbes will not say that 't is made like his deciding Sword of Iron and Steel But the apprehension that we can have of a Spirit is that it is something that is no object of our Senses and so not Mathematically descriptable but an object of our Understandings which apprehend that a good Spirit is wise and knowing and that an evil Spirit is subtle and cunning But what shall we say then of Mr. Hobbes his Spirit that is his Soul which is neither wise subtle nor cunning To this I shall only say that I think 't is no Body by reason it hath actuated every part of his Body and been in the same for near 80 Years together which it could not have been had it been Body for this would be to make several Bodies in one place at the same time which Mr. Hobbes disallows of So then the Soul of Man must be something that is not Body that is as we call it Spirit or Spiritual substance created by God in Man as Life was breathed into Adam and all other living creatures But Mr. Hobbes after his Philosophical discourse concerning the corporeousness of a Spirit cites Texts of Scripture to shew what the meaning of Spirit is there His first is Gen. 1. 2. where 't is said That the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the Waters This he saith is meant a wind wrought by God because motion is attributed to it and consequently place and nothing can be moved that changeth not place or hath not dimension and whatsoever hath dimension is Body Admirable Philosophy For mark the Argument motion and place belong to Bodies therefore nothing but a Body can have motion or place Suppose a Man should reply upon Mr. Hâ—bbes and say Ears belong to an Ass therefore nothing but an Ass can have Ears what a trouble would this be to Mr. Hobbes to be made an Ass by his own Argument which supposeth all things to be the same to which any one circumstance or qualification equally belongeth But fully to answer Mr. Hobbes motion in this place of Scripture is intended as I think of the special and extraordinary operation of God's Spirit though some Interpreters take it I confess to be a wind impulsed by God's Spirit like Gen. 8.1 upon the Waters and not to denote God's moving from place to place as Bodies do for in that sence neither motion nor place can be attributed to God who is every where but in no place either circumscriptively or definitively as Bodies are But it follows not therefore that God by his Spirit cannot extraordinarily act in one place more than another without becoming a Body as he did in the creation upon the Waters And 't is not sence to say that of necessity dimension mâ—st belong to that which hath motion or place because that Bodies that have motion and place have dimension for 't is to make a general conclusion of the Being of a thing from a particular qualification and that would be to make Men Beasts and Beasts Men as I hinted before But I confess that the word Spirit in Scripture and common discourse hath various significations as Mr. Hobbes hath plentifully discoursed but what that makes to the impossibility of a substance being incorporeal I know not neither do I think it conceptible And I cannot agree with Mr. Hobbes in his several quotations of Scripture that mention our Savour who was indowed with God's Spirit and 't is abominable to question it and several eminent Persons as Gideon c. to be indowed with God's Spirit that those places as he saith only mean that our Saviour and others had special virtues for such purposes but that God had not inspired his Spirit into them to inable them to perform such and such things as when he cites the 6. of Iudges v. 34. which saith that the Spirit of the Lord came upon Gideon that is saith Mr. Hobbes Gideon had courage to defend God's people And this let me add that if it was barely courage in Gideon it was the strangest courage that I ever read of except that of Ionathan to attack so great an host as that of Midian was with only 300 Men and the arms of them nothing but Trumpets Lamps and Pitchers But if this Interpretation of Mr. Hobbes was true Oliver Cromwel or any other valiant Man might be said to have God's Spirit as well as Gideon although we do not find that so much as any of David's Worthies in the repetition of their great acts are said to have it when we cannot suppose but that they had as much courage as Gideon and upon that account might as easily have been said to have God's Spirit if by God's Spirit in such Men is only meant courage What folly then is it for Mr. Hobbes to affirm this having no warrant for it but his own fancy To which he hath given so great a latitude as in this Chapter most damnably and prophanely to make nothing of the blessed Spirit of God but a Ghost as p. 209. which in other places he makes the companion of Goblins both which he takes to be as indeed they are the imaginations of distempered brains such as Mr. Hobbes his was when he wrote this interpretation of places of Scripture of this kind when in p. 58. he saith That the Scriptures mean by the Spirit of God in Man a Man's Spirit inclined to godliness and here he saith they mean the particular virtues Men are indowed with for such purposes and whether this be not the next thing to a contradiction I shall refer to any one that hath so much virtue and godliness as to speak true for a godly Man that is one devout towards God may not be indowed with any other virtue And then Mr. Hobbes comes to Texts of Scripture concerning our Saviour as to this matter it is Luke the 4 th v. 1. and Matth. 4. 1. that express our Saviour to be full of God's Spirit This saith Mr. Hobbes was a zeal to do God's work but saith he to say God was fill'd with God is improper and insignificant And this last I shall be beholding to Mr. Hobbes for hereafter when I come to p. 268. where Mr. Hobbes denies the existence of God the Holy Ghost and the Godhead of the Son for here he confesseth the Godhead of both of them But to return to this page I am now upon Mr. Hobbes is certainly upon a wrong ground though I will not say how the blessed Spirit of God is communicated or infused into Man or was in our blessed Saviour to suppose that God the Holy Ghost must be infused into the Godhead of the Son and that the Godhead must be full of the Godhead for our Saviour had an humane Nature which he might not out of his good pleasure indow with all the graces of